Title: Li Wei
1Multilingualism, social cognition, and creativity
- Li Wei
- Birkbeck College, University of London
- li.wei_at_bbk.ac.uk
2- 2014 A control process model of codeswitching
(with David Green). Language, Cognition and
Neuroscience 29,4 499-511 - 2014 The role of codeswitching in bilingual
creativity and selective attention (with Anatoliy
Kharkhurin). International Journal of Bilingual
Education and Bilingualism. DOI
10.1080/13670050.2014.884211 - 2013 Is multilingualism linked to a higher
tolerance of ambiguity? Bilingualism Language
and Cognition. 16.1 231-240 (with Jean-Marc
Dewaele) - 2012 Multilingualism, empathy and
multicompetence. International Journal of
Multilingualism 9.4 352-366 (with Jean-Marc
Dewaele)
3Language mode of the bilingual speech production
(Grosjean, 1998)
4implications
- (Some) Bilinguals can behave as if they were
monolingual by using only one of the languages
they know. - How do you tell whether a person is bilingual or
not? - Ask the person directly whether she is bilingual.
- The person introduces herself as bilingual.
- Someone else introduces her as bilingual.
- You hear the person speaking two or more
languages with other people. - Only in D, we have evidence that the speaker is
in fact bilingual.
5- Code-Switching is therefore a defining feature of
being bilingual. - Yet, CS has received relatively little attention
in cognitive psychology of bilingualism. - Most of the existing work is on
differentiation/separation/deactivation. - (Some) Bilinguals can behave as if they were
monolingual by using only one of the languages
they know. - SOME, because there are different types of
bilinguals. For some, separation is neither a
possibility nor a need.
6- Experience - born into a multilingual
family/community vs learning additional
languages later in life living in a multilingual
environment vs OLON/OLAT environment - Multilingual reality cf. bilinguals, few
multilinguals separate languages all the time
(Clyne and others).
7Different types of cs
- 1. Its absolutely scandalistic. (referring to
a news story) - 2. Can you open the light?
- 3. lama f?lik bj??e (referring to a cartoon
character) (Khattab 2009 152) - (Arabic. when Flick comes, with Flick
pronounced with an epenthetic vowel, as in
Arabic) - 4. Girl 1 Dónde estás?
- (Spanish.
Where are you?) - Girl 2 Upstairs.
- Girl 1 Dónde?
- (Spanish.
Where?) - Girl 2 En mi habitación.
- (Spanish. In
the bedroom.)
8- 5. Mother Nei sik muyt-ye a?
- (Cantonese. What do you want
to eat?) - Son (1.0) Just apples.
- Mother Just /n/ just apples? Dimgai m sik
yoghurt a? - (Cantonese. Why not have some
yoghurt?) - 6. There was a guy, you know, que that he se
montó got up. He started playing with congas,
you know, and se montó y empezóa brincar got up
and started to jump and all that shit.
(Winford, 2003 105) - 7. Ngaw wei solve di problem
- (Cantonese. I will that/those. I will solve
that problem.) - 8. Tu peux me pick-up-er?
- (French You can. Can you pick me up?)
(Gardner-Chloros, 2009 97)
9- 9. I'm LAVing PANDELCAGEs.
- (Danish. Make, pancake. I'm making pancakes.)
(Petersen, 1988) - 10. I have cha de/-ed chulai
- (de Chinese case marker. I have checked.)
- Traditional de, simplified/de (de Chinese case
marker) - 11. She asked me, nei ha m ha-ppy la? So I told
her, ho m happy la. - (Cantonese. You NEG. PART. Very PART. Are you
happy or not? Very unhappy.) - 12. Sho shenme ping!
- (Mandarin. What. What shopping)
10- Different structural configurations
- Different social motivations/purposes/contexts
- Different cognitive mechanism (?)
11Cognitive mechanisms of codeswitching
- Cognitive control differentiation / separation
/ deactivation - Language switching and task switching
- Executive systems (cognitive advantages)
- Imaging research neural networks involved in
language switching - Subject selection bilinguals vs monolinguals
early vs late bilinguals high proficiency
bilinguals vs low proficiency bilinguals
12Cognitive consequences of bilingualism
- Cognitive advantages of bilingualism (knowing
more than one language) - Non-verbal domains / reaction time (Simon task)
- Metalinguistic awareness
- Selective attention
- Creativity
- High-proficiency bilinguals have better
cognitive/executive control functions - Ability to separate languages (control/deactivatio
n) is taken to be the key
13Cognitive consequences of codeswitching
- What happens to habitual/dense Codeswitchers who
simply do not separate their languages? - Poor executive control? Does CS require More or
Less control? - Poor metalinguistic awareness? Grammaticality and
structural well-formedness. - Poor selective attention, therefore poor
creativity?
14The social Cognition of Habitual Codeswitchers
- A) Empathy
- B) Tolerance of Ambiguity
- with Jean-Marc Dewaele
15Empathy
- Empathy - the ability to tune into how someone
else is feeling, or what they might be thinking
(Baron-Cohen Wheelwright, 2004, p. 193). - Empathy plays a crucial role in social
interactions as it allows us to understand the
intentions of others, predict their behaviour,
and experience an emotion triggered by their
emotion (p. 193). - Linguists working on CS often claim that
multilinguals can collaboratively build sentences
with elements from different languages. - Potential to test multilinguals Theory of Mind.
- Cognitive empathy - the intellectual/imaginative
apprehension of anothers mental state - Emotional empathy - an emotional response to .
. . emotional responses of others (Lawrence,
Shaw, Baker, Baron-Cohen, David, 2004, p. 911).
- In SLA, learners with higher Cognitive Empathy
has been shown to have better attainment, and
vice versa. - Instrument Baron-Cohen and Wheelwrights (2004)
Empathy Quotient questionnaire.
16findings
- A total of 2,158 multilinguals (1589 females, 457
males) completed a language use questionnaire and
the Baron-Cohen/Wheelwright EQ questionnaire,
focusing on Cognitive Empathy. - Participants knowing more languages did not score
higher on cognitive empathy than those knowing
fewer knowing more languages alone does not
enhance Cognitive Empathy. - Participants who use multiple languages more
frequently scored significantly higher on
cognitive empathy. - Participants who habitually codeswitch between
multiple language showed a stronger effect on
cognitive empathy than mere proficiency in
multiple languages. - Separately Dewaele and others investigated CS and
emotions.
17Tolerance of Ambiguity
- TA is tendency to perceive ambiguous situations
as desirable (Budner 1962 29). - TA refers to the way an individual (or group)
perceives and processes information about
ambiguous situations when they are confronted by
an array of unfamiliar, complex or incongruent
cues (Furnham 1994 403) - gt correlated with Openness (behaviour wide
interests, imaginative insightful, linked to
activity in dorsolateral cortex considered
primarily a cognitive trait) Rigidity
(inflexibility, difficulty making transitions,
adherence to set patterns, linked to deficit of
the executive functions (frontal lobe). - In SLA, some studies have shown that good
language learners are more tolerant of ambiguity,
though it remains a controversial issue.
18- Multilingual Use questionnaire with 18 questions
related to sociobiographical background,
frequency of codeswitching and attitudes towards
CS etc. - Adapted version of Hermans (2010) Tolerance of
Ambiguity questionnaire - N 2158 (1589 females, 457 males)
19Effect of multilingualism on Tolerance of
AmbiguityF 2.33, p lt 0.041 eta2 0.006
20Effect of TA on self-reported frequency of
Code-switching (ANOVAs)
21EFFECT OF TA ON ATTITUDES TOWARD CODE-SWITCHING
22Results
- Participants who know more languages score high
on TA. - TA not linked to proficiency
- TA not linked frequency of CS (!)
- TA linked to attitudes towards CS - High TA less
likely to view CS negatively or to be bothered by
being different!
23CS and selective attention, and creativity
- with Anatoliy Kharkhurin
- Kharkhurin - effect of speaking several languages
on an individuals creative capacities. - Individuals who know many different languages
have better/enhanced selective attention, i.e.
control and separation - Selective attention is crucial to creativity,
i.e. divergent thinking - Using the Stroop task, Kharkhurin revealed that
bilinguals who are better at focusing on relevant
information i.e. selective attention, tend to
also activate a larger number of possible
solutions to a problem (i.e., generative
capacity). - It also revealed that bilinguals with high
language skills may utilize the inhibition
mechanism of selective attention to enhance the
extraction of innovative and useful ideas (i.e.,
innovative capacity) presumably by suppressing
the interference of the ideas that fail to
satisfy task requirements. - Kharkhurin, 2011, made a logical though
speculative conclusion that habitual CS where
multiple languages are simultaneously activated
may hinder selective attention and therefore may
have negative impact on creative performance.
24CS and selective attention, and creativity
- The performance of 166 multilingual college
students in UAE (59 male and 107 female, all
Arabic-English bilingual with various other
languages) with different code-switching
behaviors and attitudes was tested on a battery
of creativity and cognitive measures. - Participants creative abilities were assessed
using the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults
(ATTA, Goff Torrance, 2002). It has three paper
and pencil activities. - In Activity 1, participants were asked to suppose
that they could walk on air or fly, and then to
identify the troubles that they might encounter.
This activity provided verbal fluency and
originality scores. - In Activity 2, participants were presented with
two abstract and incomplete figures and were
asked to draw pictures with these figures and to
attempt to make these pictures as unusual as
possible. This activity provided figural fluency,
originality, and elaboration scores. - In Activity 3, the participants were presented
with a group of nine triangles arranged in a 3 x
3 matrix and were asked to draw as many pictures
or objects as they could using those triangles.
This activity provided figural fluency,
originality, elaboration, and flexibility scores. - .
25- ATTA offers four scores of fluency, originality,
elaboration, and flexibility. - Fluency measures the ability to produce
quantities of ideas, which are relevant to the
task instructions. The sum of fluency scores in
all three activities provided a fluency raw
score. - Originality measures the ability to produce
uncommon ideas, or ideas that are totally new or
unique. The sum of originality scores in all
three activities provided an originality raw
score. - Elaboration measures the ability to embellish
ideas with details. The sum of elaboration scores
in Activities 2 and 3 provided an elaboration raw
score. - Flexibility measures the ability to process
information or objects in different ways, given
the same stimulus. A flexibility raw score was
obtained from Activity 3. - The raw scores for fluency, originality,
elaboration, and flexibility obtained in the test
were subsequently transformed into scaled
norm-referenced scores by the recommended
procedure (Goff Torrance, 2002) which took
age-related norms into account.
26- Participants fluid intelligence (Gf) was
assessed by a standard Culture Fair Intelligence
Test battery (CFIT, Cattell, 1973), which uses
nonverbal stimuli to assess intelligence in such
a way that the influence of verbal fluency,
culture, and educational level has the least
effect possible. - Selective attention was assessed by a version of
the standard Eriksen flanker task. Participants
were first presented with a fixation cross for
500 ms, which was immediately followed by a
horizontal array of five equally sized and spaced
arrows for 1700 ms. The array was 14.87 cm wide
and 1.16 cm high. The stimuli were presented in
black on white background using 19 flat monitor.
Participants were instructed to attend to the
central arrow and ignore the four flankers. They
were to press the left key for a left facing
central arrow and the right key for a right
facing central arrow. The flanking arrows either
all pointed in the same direction as the target
arrow, or they all pointed in the opposite
direction. The trials on which the flanking
arrows pointed in the same direction as the
target arrow were the congruent trials the
trials in which they pointed in the opposite
direction were the incongruent trials. Subjects
received a total of 80 trials (40 congruent and
40 incongruent ones) in a random order, requiring
an equal number of left or right responses.
27ATTA Activity 2
28ATTA Activity 2
29ATTA Activity 3
30ATTA Activity 3
31Results
- The study revealed both effects code-switching
was found to weaken an individuals selective
attention, yet at the same time, it facilitated
certain creative capacities and had no overall
negative consequences for creativity. - Specifically, CS for special communication
purposes was found to be detrimental for
selective attention, but not for creativity. - On the other hand, CS induced by a particular
emotional state and by a lack of specific
vocabulary in a target language appeared to
relate to increase in both generative and
innovative capacities.
32- Participants who code switch to achieve special
communicative effect revealed lower selective
attention capacity. In these cases, they are
likely to consider several alternatives in
different languages to select a lexical entry
that communicates their message in the best
possible manner. The success of this process
partially relies on the ability to keep the
entries in several languages active. - Code switchers seem to be unlikely to focus on
one language and suppress the other that is,
they should be less readily involved in
interference suppression. This explains the
findings that individuals who code switch to
achieve special communication effect might be
less involved in habitual interference
suppression and therefore showed poorer selective
attention performance.
33- At the same time, this performance was not
related to any impairment in creative
functioning. Despite the fact that CS could be
detrimental to selective attention, those
individuals who code switch to say something
unusual do not suffer from limited selective
control. They may code switch to exercise their
verbal creative capacity, which compensates for
the lack of selective attention. - In an attempt to convey the message with special
communication effects, they deliberately code
switch to achieve an expressive and creative
performance. This idea is supported by our
finding of a clear tendency for bilinguals to
code switch in order to convey a message better
and with more precision. This finding is
consistent with the arguments put forward by
sociolinguists who suggest that one of the
primary motivations for CS by bilingual speakers
is to convey messages more effectively, often
through reiteration and elaboration in different
languages (e.g. Gumperz, 1982). Moreover, there
is an argument that it is the contrast in
language choice that is built by the act of CS
rather than the directionality of language choice
(e.g. Li, 2005).
34Discussion of the findings of the selective
attention and creativity tests
- When we talk about the relationship between CS
and selective attention, we assume that
bilinguals employ this capacity only to suppress
one language while speaking the other. This may
not be the case in the CS mode, as one still has
to select elements from different languages and
mix them in order to produce grammatical and
meaningful utterances. It could be argued that
habitual code-switchers exercise more selective
control when they are engaged in CS, albeit at a
much fine-grained level. - This consideration could explain the findings of
no selective attention performance differences
between participants who indicated that they code
switch in a particular emotional state, to convey
a message better, and due to the lack of a word
in a target language and those who do not code
switch for these reasons.
35- Definitely, the impact of CS on selective
attention appears to have no negative
consequences for ones creative capacity.
Different CS conditions were found to be
facilitatory for creative functioning, including
both generative and innovative capacities. - In particular, emotion-triggered and
culturally-specific concept/word-triggered CS
results in higher scores in creative capacity
measure.
36Future research
- CS, the defining characteristic behavior of
bilingual speakers, has not been systematically
studied in cognitive psycholinguistic research. - We have tried to investigate the consequence of
codeswitching on social cognition of
multilinguals, and the relationship between CS,
selective attention and creativity, partly to
counter the negative views of CS by educators and
others. - Further research is required to examine other
aspects of social cognition and how CS
contributes to creativity does CS require more
or less selective attention what cognitive
mechanisms and psychological states may have an
impact on the relationships between CS, selective
attention and creativity, and different types of
codeswitching (motivations, modalities). - A model of cognitive control of CS is needed,
that does not focus exclusively on
differentiation/separation/deactivation. - Moreover, individual variations need to be taken
seriously and investigated systematically in
psycholinguistics studies of CS, going beyond
comparisons between monolinguals and
bilingualism, recognizing the diversity and the
ecology of different types of bilingual and
multilingual language users.
37- 2014 A control process model of codeswitching
(with David Green). Language, Cognition and
Neuroscience 29,4 499-511 DOI10.1080/23273798.20
14.882515 - 2014 The role of codeswitching in bilingual
creativity and selective attention (with Anatoliy
Kharkhurin). International Journal of Bilingual
Education and Bilingualism. DOI
10.1080/13670050.2014.884211 - 2013 Is multilingualism linked to a higher
tolerance of ambiguity? Bilingualism Language
and Cognition. 16.1 231-240 (with Jean-Marc
Dewaele) - 2012 Multilingualism, empathy and
multicompetence. International Journal of
Multilingualism 9.4 352-366 (with Jean-Marc
Dewaele)
38Thank you
- Li Wei
- li.wei_at_bbk.ac.uk
- Birkbeck College, University of London