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The effect of emotional content and concreteness on word processing in second language learners: event-related potentials study
Poster E23 in Poster Session E, Thursday, October 26, 10:15 am - 12:00 pm CEST, Espace Vieux-Port
This poster is part of the Sandbox Series.
Roberto Ferreira1,2, Andrea Helo3,4,5, Ernesto Guerra5,6, Cristina Rodriguez1,2; 1Facultad de Ciencias de la Educación, Universidad Católica del Maule, Chile, 2Millenium Nucleus for the Science of Learning (MiNSoL), Chile, 3Departamento de Fonoaudiología, Universidad de Chile, Chile, 4Departamento de Neurociencias, Universidad de Chile, Chile, 5Centro de Investigación Avanzada en Educación, Universidad de Chile, Chile, 6Instituto de Educación, Universidad de Chile, Chile
In second language learning, vocabulary knowledge is crucial. However, most research has primarily focused on concrete word learning, while abstract words have received less attention. Abstract and concrete words possess distinct characteristics, suggesting that they might be learned differently. The process of learning abstract words is not yet fully understood, with some proposals suggesting that emotional experiences play a key role in their acquisition. This question holds significance for theories of both first language (L1) acquisition and second language (L2) learning. To investigate the role of emotion and concreteness in L2 learning, we conducted an event-related potentials (ERP) experiment in a group of unbalanced bilinguals. Forty-two university students who were learning English as their L2, with Spanish as L1. During the experiment, participants completed a semantic lexical task while their EEG was recorded. We implemented a 2x2x3 experimental design with language (L1 vs. L2), concreteness (concrete vs. abstract words), and emotional valence (positive, negative, neutral words) as factors. The study aimed to test the hypothesis that emotional abstract words are processed more efficiently than neutral abstract words during the early stages of L2 acquisition. We predicted that this effect would be reflected in two ERP components: the early posterior negativity (EPN) and the late positive complex (LPC). We identified six regions of interest: left anterior (electrodes FC1, F3, FC5 & F7), right anterior (FC2, F4, FC6 & F8), left central (C3, CP1, CP5), right central (C4, CP2, CP6), left posterior (P3, PO3, O1), and right posterior (P4, PO4, O2). Two time-windows corresponding to the EPN (200-400 ms) and LPC (400-650 ms) components were analyzed. Data from each region were subjected to a mixed-effect linear regression with language, concreteness, and valence (using neutral words as the reference group) as fixed effects. We included random intercepts for participants and items, and valence as random slopes for participants. Our results revealed significant interaction effects between language and valence in the LPC time-window at the right anterior region. These effects were observed for both the positive versus neutral (β=0.22, se=0.08, t-value=2.82, p-value=0.005) and negative versus neutral (β=0.16, se=0.08, t-value=2.07, p-value=0.038) valence conditions (see Conrad et al., 2011; Velez-Uribe and Rosselli et al., 2020 for similar effects in central electrodes). No other significant effects were observed. Notably, we observed a more positive amplitude for positive words (compared to neutral) in L1, whereas the opposite pattern emerged for L2. Additionally, we found a more positive amplitude for neutral words (compared to negative) in L2, whereas no difference between negative and neutral words was evident in L1. These results align with previous findings presented by Velez-Uribe and Rosselli et al. (2020), who observed a distinct pattern of LPC response in L1 (English) compared to L2 (Spanish) in unbalanced bilinguals. In sum, unbalanced bilinguals process emotional words differently in L2 compared to L1. Interestingly, we did not observe any interaction between concreteness and valence. These findings provide valuable insights into the varying impact of emotion during second language acquisition.
Topic Areas: Meaning: Lexical Semantics, Language Development/Acquisition