Cited by 367Language Development and DisordersNeurobiology of Language and BilingualismMultilingual Education and Policy

The measure matters: language dominance profiles across measures in Spanish–English bilingual children

Open access
BEDORE, LISA M., PEÑA, ELIZABETH D., SUMMERS, CONNIE L., BOERGER, KARIN M., RESENDIZ, MARIA D., GREENE, KAI, BOHMAN, THOMAS M., GILLAM, RONALD B.·2012·Bilingualism: Language and Cognition

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine if different language measures resulted in the same classifications of language dominance and proficiency for a group of bilingual pre-kindergarteners and kindergarteners. Data were analyzed for 1029 Spanish-English bilingual pre-kindergarteners who spanned the full range of bilingual language proficiency. Parent questionnaires were used to quantify age of first exposure and current language use. Scores from a short test of semantic and morphosyntactic development in Spanish and English were used to quantify children's performance. Some children who were in the functionally monolingual range based on interview data demonstrated minimal knowledge of their other languages when tested. Current use accounted for more of the variance in language dominance than did age of first exposure. Results indicate that at different levels of language exposure children differed in their performance on semantic and morphosyntax tasks. These patterns suggest that it may be difficult to compare the results of studies that employ different measures of language dominance and proficiency. Current use is likely to be a useful metric of bilingual development that can be used to build a comprehensive picture of child bilingualism.

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  • Greater exposure to L2 English significantly enhanced young bilingual children's acquisition of vocabulary, grammatical complexity, and MLU in English.

    “This finding aligns with the existing literature (e.g., Bedore et al., 2012; Hoff et al., 2012) which found that greater exposure to L2 English significantly enhanced young bilingual children's acquisition of vocabulary, grammatical complexity, and MLU33 in English.”

    From The roles of L1 transfer, L2 exposure, and morphological salience in bilingual children's L2 English morphological development (2025) · cites this paper as Bedore et al., 2012

    The Results section (‘Relationships between experience and language dominance and proficiency’; page unavailable) reports that English semantics and morphosyntax scores rose with greater English use. That supports an association with language performance, but the paper does not establish that exposure caused improved acquisition or report an exposure-related improvement in MLU. (LLM, conf=0.88)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Greater input of a given language is associated with more advanced language outcomes in bilingual children.

    “Findings consistently indicate that more advanced language outcomes are often associated with greater input of a given language (e.g., Bedore et al., 2012; Bohman et al., 2010; Jia and Fuse, 2007; Paradis, 2023, among others).”

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Research works printed but not linked: 1

  1. DeAvila A Duncan SE 1990 Language Assessment Scales oral technical report Monterey, CA Macmillan–McGraw–Hill

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Authors
BEDORE, L. M., PEÑA, E. D., SUMMERS, C. L., BOERGER, K. M., RESENDIZ, M. D., GREENE, K., BOHMAN, T. M., & GILLAM, R. B.
Affiliations
  • The University of Texas at Austin (US)
  • The University of Texas at El Paso (US)
  • Utah State University (US)
Corresponding author
BEDORE, LISA M.
Venue
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition
Published
2012-03-20
Volume
15
Issue
3
Pages
616-629
ISSN
  • 1366-7289 (ISSN-L)
  • 1469-1841
OpenAlex
W2027266261
Cited by
365
References
72
Citations by year
2026: 29 · 2025: 29 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 35 · 2022: 24 · 2021: 29 · 2020: 39 · 2019: 25 · 2018: 34 · 2017: 26 · 2016: 21 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 14 · 2013: 18 · 2012: 3
FWCI
31.56
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Bilingualism Language and Cognition (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • ScholarsArchive (Brigham Young University) (submittedVersion)
Funders
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (R01DC007439)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Language Development and Disorders
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism
  • Social Sciences › Linguistics and Language › Multilingual Education and Policy
Keywords
language dominance, Spanish-English bilingual children, age of first exposure, semantic development, morphosyntactic development, language measures, bilingual language acquisition, preschool children

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