What Heritage Bilinguals Tell Us about the Language of Emotion
Open accessAbstract
Variation in the language experience of bilinguals has consequences for cognitive and affective processes. In the current study, we examined how bilingual experience influences the relationship between language and emotion in English among a group of Spanish–English heritage bilinguals on an emotion–memory task. Participants rated the emotionality of English taboo, negative and neutral words and then completed an unexpected recognition test. To account for language experience, data were gathered on the participants’ language dominance and proficiency. Results showed emotion–memory effects in the Spanish–English heritage bilinguals’ English (the societal language): taboo words were recognized significantly better than neutral words, while the emotionality of negative words carried over and significantly affected the recognition of preceding neutral words. Furthermore, such effects were modulated by language dominance scores with more pronounced emotion–memory effects in more English-dominant bilinguals. The findings contribute to a growing body of evidence showing that emotions are not necessarily restricted to the first acquired home language. Critically, for heritage speakers, there is often a shift in language dominance from the home language to the societal language. The present study demonstrates that the effects of emotion on memory are seen in the acquired societal language.
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- Authors
- Vargas Fuentes, N. A., Kroll, J. F., & Torres, J.
- Affiliations
- School of Education, University of California—Irvine, Irvine, CA 92797, USA
- University of California, Irvine (US)
- Venue
- Languages
- Publisher
- MDPI AG
- Published
- 2022-06-06
- Volume
- 7
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 144
- ISSN
- 2226-471X (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W4281717187
- Semantic Scholar
- b6faf03cafdc41aebc5fe8f4678adbbbe64c0bff
- Cited by
- 5
- References
- 74
- Citations by year
- 2025: 2 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 2
- FWCI
- 1.91
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Languages (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Communication › Swearing, Euphemism, Multilingualism
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Categorization, perception, and language
- Keywords
- Spanish-English bilinguals, language of emotions, emotion and memory, taboo words, negative words, recognition memory, language dominance, language proficiency, language experience
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