10. When is a First Language More Emotional? Psychophysiological Evidence from Bilingual Speakers

Abstract

This chapter will review recent studies measuring physiological aspects of bilinguals’ emotional response to stimuli presented in speakers’ first and second language. We also introduce a new theory, ‘the emotional contexts of learning theory’, developed to account for findings from existing studies of bilingualism and emotion. We then evaluate the data consistent with this theory, the new predictions it makes, and the overall prospects for integrating psychophysiological research with cross-linguistic and cross-cultural research. The connections between emotion and cognition have been increasingly studied over the past decade (e.g. Damasio, 1994, 1999; LeDoux, 1996, 2002; Panksepp, 1998). Less attention has been paid to the emotional correlates of language. One arena in which emotional concomitants of language are keenly felt is in bilingual speakers’ sense that there is greater emotional arousal associated with their first language compared to their second language. Intuitions like these have been documented in the writings of bilingual authors (Pavlenko, 1998), testimonials of patients undergoing psychotherapy (Altarriba & Santiago-Rivera, 1994; SantiagoRivera & Altarriba, 2002; Schrauf, 2000), and in laboratory studies (Anooshian & Hertel, 1994; Aycicegi & Harris, 2004; Bond & Lai, 1986; Marian & Neisser, 2000; Schrauf & Rubin, 1998). However, investigation of personal emotional experiences, such as which language feels more emotional, has traditionally been assumed to lie outside the scope of scientific research. The cognitive sciences have avoided studying emotion and subjective experience for several reasons: (1) the origins of the cognitive revolution