Predictive Language Processing in Russian Heritage Speakers: Task Effects on Morphosyntactic Prediction in Reading

Languages. 2024. Vol. 9. No. 5. Article 158.

Parshina O., Ladinskaya N., Gault L., Sekerina I.

This study investigates the effect of task demands on the predictive processing of mor‐ phosyntactic cues (word class, noun/adjective gender, case, and number) in reading among Heritage Speakers of Russian (N = 29), comparing them with Russian language learners (N = 29) and mono‐ lingual Russian speakers (N = 63). Following the utility account of bilingual prediction, we hypoth‐ esized that the predictive use of morphosyntactic cues would be more evident in a less‐demanding reading cloze task (Experiment 1) than in a more‐challenging eye‐tracking reading task (Experi‐ ment 2), and for cues that RHSs regard as more reliable (word class and number vs. gender and case cues). The results confirmed our predictions: In Experiment 1, Heritage Speakers (and L2 learn‐ ers) used all cues predictively to generate the upcoming lexical item, with higher accuracy for word class and number cues compared to gender and case cues. In Experiment 2, in contrast to monolin‐ gual readers, neither Heritage Speakers nor L2 learners used gender cues on adjectives to anticipate the gender of the upcoming noun. The results are discussed in respect to the interplay between task demands, cue weight, oral fluency, and Russian literacy experience.

Keywords: русский язык, чтение, reading, второй язык, Russian, heritage speakers, херитажные говорящие, видеоокулография, L2 learners, morphosyntactic prediction, eyetracking, морфосинтаксическое предсказание

Publication based on the results of: Neuroanatomical foundations of language disorders in children and adults: structural and functional correlates (2024)