Abstract:

Introduction: Bilingual researches about languages switching focused on three fundamental issues in the processing of the non-target language in language switching: (1) whether the non-target language was activated when bilinguals intended to use the target language? (2) If the non-target language was activated, then at what level did this activation occur, at the conceptual level or the lexical level? (3) If the non-target language was activated, then what influence would it exert on the processing of the target language? As the first two questions have been answered, we try to answer the third question.Used cross-language instant semantic priming and long-term priming, under semantic decision task (Biological properties judgment) to investigate how non-target language affect target language at the time courses for the late fluent bilinguals. Design: Chinese as a target language and English as a non-target language in experiment 1;English as a target language and Chinese as a non-target language in experiment 2. Method: Twenty-three native Chinese/English bilinguals (21-25 years old) participated in experiment1 and twenty-four participants (21-25 years old) took part in experiment2. Semantic relatedness was controlled based on a rating procedure conducted with 20 native Chinese/English bilinguals using a Lickert scale (1 = unrelated, 5 = strongly related). Semantically related pairs were significantly more related than semantically unrelated pairs (all ps < 0.001). All words were presented one after the other at fixation for 1000 ms. Block order and response sides were counter balanced to cancel out carry over effects. Participants were asked to finish Biological properties judgment in the experiment, which contents two parts: instant semantic priming and long-term priming. Result: In experiment 1, Semantically related pairs and semantically unrelated pairs were not significantly different neither in instant semantic priming(t =-0.423，p =0.676) nor long-term priming(t =-0.82，p =0.419).In experiment 2, semantic short-term priming from L1 to L2 was significant(t =-3.05，p =0.006) while semantic long-term priming was not (t =-0.63, p =0.536). Conclusion: The two experiments’results show that instant priming occurred only when English as target language and Chinese as non-target language; cross-language long-term priming did not occur in experiment 1 nor experiment 2. There is an asymmetry of semantic priming in late fluent bilinguals.

Key words: language switching, non-target language, target language, semantic related, priming

摘要：

运用跨语言即时启动和延时启动范式，要求被试完成生物属性的语义判断任务，研究语言理解转换中非目标语言影响目标语言语义理解的时间进程。实验1非目标语言为英文，目标语言为中文，结果表明，无论是即时启动(t = -0.423, p = 0.676)，还是延时启动(t = -0.82, p = 0.419)，语义相关组与语义无关组都无显著差异。实验2非目标语言为中文，目标语言为英文，结果表明，在即时启动条件下，语义相关组显著快于语义无关组(t = -3.05, p = 0.006)，但延时条件下语义相关组与语义无关组无显著差异(t = -0.63, p = 0.536)。综合两个实验结果表明，晚期熟练双语者在双语语言理解转换过程中语义的即时启动影响存在不对称性，语义相关的非目标语言中文对目标语言英文语义理解起促进作用；但是语义启动效应没有得到延时体现。

关键词: 语言理解转换, 非目标语言, 目标语言, 语义相关, 启动