The Role Of Face Race On Lexical Processing In Chinese-English Bilinguals

The present study aims to investigate the influence of nonlinguistic cues on language processing of Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native language environment.Two research questions were addressed: 1)Does face race modulate the lexical production of Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native language environment? 2)Do cultural icons modulate the lexical production of Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native language environment?In recent years there is increasing evidence that nonlinguistic cues such as face race and cultural icons can modulate bilingual language processing.It is assumed that bilinguals who are extensively exposed to the co-occurring cues within one language(e.g.,Chinese faces)and the language(e.g.,Chinese)will make connections between them.With the exposure increasing,the link between the cues and the language becomes stronger and stronger.Experiment one was carried out to investigate whether face race can modulate the lexical production of Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native language environment.In this picture-naming experiment,participants saw Chinese or White American faces,with a frame below and they were asked to name the object which appeared in the center of the frame.The color of the frame indicated which language to name the object.No Face conditions were included as baseline tasks.Experiment two was conducted to examine whether cultural icons can modulate the lexical production of Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native language environment.This experiment adopted the same picture-naming paradigm as used in experiment one.Participants saw a Chinese(the Temple of Heaven)or American cultural image(the White House).Then an object appeared in the center of the frame with the cultural cue still present.The color of the frame indicated which language to name the objects.No Culture conditions were included as baseline tasks.The results obtained in our study can be summarized as follow: 1)when participants were naming pictures in Chinese,their accuracy rates were better and RT was faster than naming pictures in English;2)when they were primed with Chinese faces(experiment one)or Chinese cultural images(experiment two),their L1 naming latencies were faster than seeing White American faces and no faces(experiment one),or American cultural images and no images(experiment two);3)the pattern of naming latencies was different when they were primed with White American faces(experiment one)or American cultural images(experiment two).In experiment one,when participants were seeing White American faces,their L1 naming latencies were faster than being primed with no faces;in experiment two,when they were presented with American cultural images,their L2 naming latencies were slower than seeing Chinese cultural images or no images;4)when participants were primed with Chinese faces,their accuracy rates of L1 naming were less accurate than being presented with White American faces or no faces;5)in both experiments,as bilinguals’ L2 proficiency increases,the facilitation effect of White American faces in L2 naming accuracy increases significantly.In short,the current study shows that both face race and cultural images can affect the bilingual language production,and that this modulation can be affected by the different context of language use.For Chinese-English bilinguals who are immersed in their native environment,they are not extensively exposed to the out-group faces(White American faces)or other cultural cues(American cultural images).As a result,the link between these cues and the second language(English)is not direct and strong.Therefore,participants didn’t use the nonlinguistic information as nonlinguistic cues in bilingual language processing as bilinguals in L2 environment did.