Simultaneous bilingualism
Encyclopedia
Simultaneous bilingualism is a form of bilingualism
that takes place when a child becomes bilingual by learning two languages from birth. According to Annick De Houwer, in an article in The Handbook of Child Language, simultaneous bilingualism takes place in “children who are regularly addressed in two spoken languages from before the age of two and who continue to be regularly addressed in those languages up until the final stages” of language development
. Both languages are acquired as first languages
. This is in contrast to sequential bilingualism
, in which the second language
is learned not as a native language
but a foreign language
.
’ of their two languages. Wölck has pointed out that there are many “native bilingual communities,” typically in South America
, Africa
, and Asia
, where “monolingual norms may be unavailable or nonexistent."
in either language and that they will be cognitively disadvantaged by their bilingualism. Many studies in the early 20th century found evidence of a “language handicap” in simultaneously bilingual children, linking bilingualism with a lower intelligence
. However, many of these studies had serious methodological flaws. For example, several studies relating bilingualism and intelligence did not account for socioeconomic differences among well-educated, upper class
monolingual children and less-educated (often immigrant) bilingual children.
Some recent research on simultaneous bilinguals has actually found some evidence that they have a cognitive advantage over their monolingual counterparts, particularly in the areas of cognitive flexibility
, analytical skill
, and metalinguistic awareness
. However, most studies agree that simultaneous bilinguals do not have any definitive cognitive edge over monolinguals.
Despite these findings, many therapists and other professionals are at odds with still believing that simultaneous bilingualism can be harmful for a child’s cognitive development. One side argues that only one language should be spoken until fluently spoken and then incorporate the second language. The other side argues that the child, whether simultaneously bilingual or not, would still have speech issues. Some bilingual families have chosen to stop speaking a language after hearing about the supposed negative developmental effects of child bilingualism from people in authority.
patterns have been seen in bilingual and monolingual children.
”, which may or may not reflect the language of the surrounding community.
However, bilingual acquisition can also be affected by the amount of input, the separation of input, and the stability of input, as well as attitudes about bilingualism.
experts, dating from the early 20th century, have maintained that the best way to facilitate bilingual acquisition is to have each main input carrier (usually parents) use one and only one language with the child. By having each parent speak one of the two languages, this method (known as the “one person, one language” approach) attempts to prevent the child from confusing the two languages.
However, the lack of language separation by person does not necessarily lead to failure to communicate effectively in two languages. Further studies have shown that a “one person, one language” approach may not be necessary for the early separation of language systems to occur. Children appear to be able to disentangle the two languages themselves.
There has been little research done on other methods of language separation. De Houwer points out that input may be separated by situation: for example, "Finnish
spoken by all family members inside the home but Swedish
once they are outside."
. Sometimes, when input for one language is lost before the final stage of development, children may lose their ability to speak the “lost” language. This leaves them able to speak only the other language, yet fully capable of understanding both.
The parents’ expectations and knowledge about language development can be instrumental in raising simultaneously bilingual children. Parental attitudes toward “their roles and linguistic choices” also play a part in the child’s linguistic development. The attitudes of the child’s extended family and friends have been shown to affect successful bilingualism.
This “single-system hypothesis,” as it is called, has been the subject of much debate in the linguistic world. Since its publication, the single-system has been discredited, and current linguistic evidence now points to two separate language systems.
Meisel proposed in a 1990 article that “bilinguals tend to focus more on formal aspects of language and are therefore able to acquire certain grammatical constructions faster than many or most monolinguals."
. It is common for one language to become dominant over the other. The dominant language is almost always the language spoken by the greatest number of the people the child interacts with (generally the language the child is educated in). The child sees this language as most effective and begins to favor it.
occurs when a child combines more than one language in a single utterance. This phenomenon is also seen in bilingual adults. Bilingual children most often engage in intrasentential code-switching, switching languages in the middle of a sentence. Bilingual children code-switch for several reasons, including the following:
Further study into the effects of changing a child’s linguistic environment could uncover the minimal language input required to maintain "active use potential" in a particular language.
Simultaneous trilingualism is also possible. There is significantly less research in this area than in simultaneous bilingualism. However, trilingual language acquisition in young children has been shown to generally mirror bilingual acquisition.
Multilingualism
Multilingualism is the act of using, or promoting the use of, multiple languages, either by an individual speaker or by a community of speakers. Multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. Multilingualism is becoming a social phenomenon governed by the needs of...
that takes place when a child becomes bilingual by learning two languages from birth. According to Annick De Houwer, in an article in The Handbook of Child Language, simultaneous bilingualism takes place in “children who are regularly addressed in two spoken languages from before the age of two and who continue to be regularly addressed in those languages up until the final stages” of language development
Language development
Language development is a process starting early in human life, when a person begins to acquire language by learning it as it is spoken and by mimicry. Children's language development moves from simple to complex. Infants start without language. Yet by four months of age, babies can read lips and...
. Both languages are acquired as first languages
First language
A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity...
. This is in contrast to sequential bilingualism
Sequential bilingualism
Sequential bilingualism occurs when a person becomes bilingual by first learning one language and then another.There is variation in the period in which learning must take place for bilingualism to be considered simultaneous. Generally, the term sequential bilingualism applies only if the child is...
, in which the second language
Second language
A second language or L2 is any language learned after the first language or mother tongue. Some languages, often called auxiliary languages, are used primarily as second languages or lingua francas ....
is learned not as a native language
First language
A first language is the language a person has learned from birth or within the critical period, or that a person speaks the best and so is often the basis for sociolinguistic identity...
but a foreign language
Foreign language
A foreign language is a language indigenous to another country. It is also a language not spoken in the native country of the person referred to, i.e. an English speaker living in Japan can say that Japanese is a foreign language to him or her...
.
Prevalence
It is estimated that half of the world is functionally bilingual, and the majority of those bilinguals are ‘native speakersNative Speaker
Native Speaker is Chang-Rae Lee’s first novel. In Native Speaker, he creates a man named Henry Park who tries to assimilate into American society and become a “native speaker.”-Plot summary:...
’ of their two languages. Wölck has pointed out that there are many “native bilingual communities,” typically in South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
, Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
, and Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
, where “monolingual norms may be unavailable or nonexistent."
Beliefs about simultaneous bilingualism
Some popular misconceptions about bilingualism include the ideas that bilingual children will not reach proficiencyLanguage proficiency
Language proficiency or linguistic proficiency is the ability of an individual to speak or perform in an acquired language. As theories vary among pedagogues as to what constitutes proficiency, there is little consistency as to how different organizations classify it...
in either language and that they will be cognitively disadvantaged by their bilingualism. Many studies in the early 20th century found evidence of a “language handicap” in simultaneously bilingual children, linking bilingualism with a lower intelligence
Intelligence
Intelligence has been defined in different ways, including the abilities for abstract thought, understanding, communication, reasoning, learning, planning, emotional intelligence and problem solving....
. However, many of these studies had serious methodological flaws. For example, several studies relating bilingualism and intelligence did not account for socioeconomic differences among well-educated, upper class
Upper class
In social science, the "upper class" is the group of people at the top of a social hierarchy. Members of an upper class may have great power over the allocation of resources and governmental policy in their area.- Historical meaning :...
monolingual children and less-educated (often immigrant) bilingual children.
Some recent research on simultaneous bilinguals has actually found some evidence that they have a cognitive advantage over their monolingual counterparts, particularly in the areas of cognitive flexibility
Cognitive flexibility
Cognitive flexibility is the term used to describe one of the executive functions; a function which is an important component of human behavior; the ability to switch behavioral response according to the context of the situation...
, analytical skill
Analytical skill
Analytical skill is the ability to visualize, articulate, and solve both complex and uncomplicated problems and concepts, and make decisions that make sense based on available information...
, and metalinguistic awareness
Metalinguistic awareness
Metalinguistic Awareness refers to the ability to objectify language as a process as well as a thing. The concept of Metalinguistic Awareness is helpful to explaining the execution and transfer of linguistic knowledge across languages Metalinguistic Awareness refers to the ability to objectify...
. However, most studies agree that simultaneous bilinguals do not have any definitive cognitive edge over monolinguals.
Despite these findings, many therapists and other professionals are at odds with still believing that simultaneous bilingualism can be harmful for a child’s cognitive development. One side argues that only one language should be spoken until fluently spoken and then incorporate the second language. The other side argues that the child, whether simultaneously bilingual or not, would still have speech issues. Some bilingual families have chosen to stop speaking a language after hearing about the supposed negative developmental effects of child bilingualism from people in authority.
Bilingual Acquisition
According to De Houwer, there is no established normal development pattern for simultaneous bilinguals. However, similar language developmentLanguage development
Language development is a process starting early in human life, when a person begins to acquire language by learning it as it is spoken and by mimicry. Children's language development moves from simple to complex. Infants start without language. Yet by four months of age, babies can read lips and...
patterns have been seen in bilingual and monolingual children.
Language input in Bilingual Acquisition
The most influential factor in bilingual language acquisition is the languages spoken by parents to their children, and the languages spoken by others with whom the child comes into contact. This language exposure is called comprehensible input. In a 1984 edition of Bilingual Education Paper Series, Carolyn Kessler claimed that “children develop faster in the language which is used most in their environmentSocial environment
The social environment of an individual, also called social context or milieu, is the culture that s/he was educated or lives in, and the people and institutions with whom the person interacts....
”, which may or may not reflect the language of the surrounding community.
However, bilingual acquisition can also be affected by the amount of input, the separation of input, and the stability of input, as well as attitudes about bilingualism.
Amount of Language Input
It is important to consider amount of input, because not only do the languages of each person affect on bilingualism; the amount of time each main input carrier spends with the child also has an effect.Separation of Language Input
There is a spectrum ranging from zero to total separation of language by person. Usually, a simultaneous bilingual child’s situation is somewhere in the middle. Some linguisticLinguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
experts, dating from the early 20th century, have maintained that the best way to facilitate bilingual acquisition is to have each main input carrier (usually parents) use one and only one language with the child. By having each parent speak one of the two languages, this method (known as the “one person, one language” approach) attempts to prevent the child from confusing the two languages.
However, the lack of language separation by person does not necessarily lead to failure to communicate effectively in two languages. Further studies have shown that a “one person, one language” approach may not be necessary for the early separation of language systems to occur. Children appear to be able to disentangle the two languages themselves.
There has been little research done on other methods of language separation. De Houwer points out that input may be separated by situation: for example, "Finnish
Finnish language
Finnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
spoken by all family members inside the home but Swedish
Swedish language
Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
once they are outside."
Input stability
A change in a child’s linguistic environment can trigger language attritionLanguage attrition
Language attrition is the loss of a first or second language or a portion of that language by individuals. Speakers who routinely use more than one language may not use either of their languages in ways which are exactly like that of a monolingual speaker...
. Sometimes, when input for one language is lost before the final stage of development, children may lose their ability to speak the “lost” language. This leaves them able to speak only the other language, yet fully capable of understanding both.
Attitudes
The parents’ expectations and knowledge about language development can be instrumental in raising simultaneously bilingual children. Parental attitudes toward “their roles and linguistic choices” also play a part in the child’s linguistic development. The attitudes of the child’s extended family and friends have been shown to affect successful bilingualism.
Single-System Hypothesis of Bilingual Acquistion
Virginia Volterra and Traute Taeschner put forth an influential study in 1978, positing that bilingual children move from a stage where the two languages are lexically mixed into eventual structural differentiation between the languages. They theorized that until age two, a child does not differentiate between languages.This “single-system hypothesis,” as it is called, has been the subject of much debate in the linguistic world. Since its publication, the single-system has been discredited, and current linguistic evidence now points to two separate language systems.
Bilingual Acquisition versus Monolingual Acquisition
The study of simultaneous bilingualism supplements general (monolingual) theories of child language acquisition. It particularly illuminates the critical role of the nature of language input in language development. This indicates that the form of language input must be similarly influential in monolinguals.Difficulties
However, it has proven difficult to compare monolingual and bilingual development, for a number of reasons:- Many languages don’t have much data
- The data that there is may not represent the normal population of children
- There are contradictions in the literature concerning normal monolingual development
- There are a large number of variables between bilingual and monolingual children besides the number of languages they speak
- It can be difficult to differentiate between universal developmental processes and cases of language transfer
Findings
Meisel claims “there is no reason to believe that the underlying principles and mechanisms of language development [in bilinguals] are qualitatively different from those used by monolinguals." Döpke has hypothesized that communication styles that facilitate monolingual development are a major variable in successful bilingual development.Meisel proposed in a 1990 article that “bilinguals tend to focus more on formal aspects of language and are therefore able to acquire certain grammatical constructions faster than many or most monolinguals."
Dominance
Though the simultaneous bilingual child learns two languages at once, this does not mean that he or she speaks them with identical competenceLinguistic competence
Linguistic competence is the system of linguistic knowledge possessed by native speakers of a language, it is in contrast to the concept of Linguistic performance, the way the language system is used in communication...
. It is common for one language to become dominant over the other. The dominant language is almost always the language spoken by the greatest number of the people the child interacts with (generally the language the child is educated in). The child sees this language as most effective and begins to favor it.
Code-switching
Code-switchingCode-switching
In linguistics, code-switching is the concurrent use of more than one language, or language variety, in conversation. Multilinguals—people who speak more than one language—sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other...
occurs when a child combines more than one language in a single utterance. This phenomenon is also seen in bilingual adults. Bilingual children most often engage in intrasentential code-switching, switching languages in the middle of a sentence. Bilingual children code-switch for several reasons, including the following:
Equivalency Problems
Bilingual children often interject words from the other language when they do not know or cannot remember the equivalent, and when one language has no suitable equivalent in the other. Taeschner found that bilingual children prefer to insert elements of the other language rather than use simplified forms.Social Norms
Code-switching has also been tied to the bilingual child’s socialization process. According to Poplack, a bilingual child code-switches based on the perceived linguistic norms of the situation and the perceived bilingual ability of the hearer.Parental Interaction
Children will mirror their parents in this aspect of speech. If a child’s parents engage in code-switching in their own speech, this will affect the child’s perception of the appropriateness of mixing languages.Further Research
There is currently no differentiation of normal and deviant bilingual development.Further study into the effects of changing a child’s linguistic environment could uncover the minimal language input required to maintain "active use potential" in a particular language.
Simultaneous trilingualism is also possible. There is significantly less research in this area than in simultaneous bilingualism. However, trilingual language acquisition in young children has been shown to generally mirror bilingual acquisition.
See Also
- Sequential bilingualismSequential bilingualismSequential bilingualism occurs when a person becomes bilingual by first learning one language and then another.There is variation in the period in which learning must take place for bilingualism to be considered simultaneous. Generally, the term sequential bilingualism applies only if the child is...
- MultilingualismMultilingualismMultilingualism is the act of using, or promoting the use of, multiple languages, either by an individual speaker or by a community of speakers. Multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. Multilingualism is becoming a social phenomenon governed by the needs of...
- Monolingualism
- Language AcquisitionLanguage acquisitionLanguage acquisition is the process by which humans acquire the capacity to perceive, produce and use words to understand and communicate. This capacity involves the picking up of diverse capacities including syntax, phonetics, and an extensive vocabulary. This language might be vocal as with...
- Second Language AcquisitionSecond language acquisitionSecond-language acquisition or second-language learning is the process by which people learn a second language. Second-language acquisition is also the name of the scientific discipline devoted to studying that process...
- Comprehensible Input