Dear Pablo,

Regarding your question, I should say that you have broached up an important issue which dominates the whole of language teaching / learning process. In fact, Methods like TPR and Suggestopedia provide support to your interesting question. The language teachers today should help learners use the  resources that are potentially dormant but can be activated by proper types of input. Indubitably, modern demands about teachers' professionalism  and professional development call for use of techniques like story telling that give vent to the release of full cognitive energy sources.

Best regards,

Hi,

I find both of your contributions very interesting. For one, teaching should indeed profit from any advancement on this. As for Hull and Vaid's article, that's really spot-on for what I was seeking. 

Thank you both

Hello,

You should look at Kara Morgan-Short's and Karsten Steinhauer's work showing that the way you teach a second language (implicit and explicit) can lead to more native-like (or less native-like) ERP brain signatures for second language learners.

Thank you, Phaedra! Very relevant indeed.

I've just read a (possibly relevant-ish) paper by Wuerger et al. (2012) on colour categorisation in Mandarin-English unbalanced bilinguals. They found faster processing of colour categories in the right visual field (left hemisphere) versus the left visual field (right hemisphere) when the participants were performing in L2 English, but slower processing when they were performing in L1 Mandarin. The result is a bit hard to source because, in this design, colour categorisation was indicated by reading colour terms in either English or Mandarin script (the latter of which is supposed to be more efficiently processed in LVF anyway), but it might be worth a read as a 'thought-provoker' at least.

Estimado Pablo,

From Transcursive Logic (the only scientific theory of psychic functioning) I give an explanation of how the mother tongue and the second language, which suggests that both are supported in different parts of the same structure are processed: the transitory memory. To better understand this proposal, I suggest that you consult my book PSIQUIS (p 117 -. Structural Memory and p 131 -. Memory, memories and oblivion, according to the Transcursive Logic) (for English speakers in PSYCHE - p 100 and p.. 112, respectively) (both books can be downloaded from RG).

Maybe can come in handy some useful definitions: Subjectivon (universal linguistic pattern) is each of the domains in which the subjective reality is structured, and represents the basis of the various forms of 'seeing reality'.

Universal Maternal Tongue: tells of how reality is viewed from the psychical point of view.

Natural Maternal Tongue: tells of how reality is viewed from the biological point of view.

Conventional Maternal Tongue: tells of how reality is viewed from a social point of view.

Regards,

Dante.

Hi all,

> Kristin and Steven: thank you! I'll look into these two promising leads. Perhaps they can offer me support on my current master's thesis, about dual-code semantic representation, i.e., supported on linguistic knowledge alongside perceptual information. It might be that L1 and L2 engage these two systems to different degrees.

> Dante: ¡gracias! I keep your reference well noted. From a more personal perspective, it seems fascinating.

There has been a number of interesting publications on bilingual and multilingual aphasia as well as intraoperative stimulation of the brain performed on awake patients that show a significant degree of individual variability among patients who speak more than one language. Here is a link to a case study by Kin et al. (2013) on awake bilingual language mapping. 

I work with a team doing both non-invasive (fMRI) and invasive language mapping (Wada test, awake surgeries). Bilingual and multilingual patients tend to have partially overlapping and partially separate functional areas for each of the languages thy speak. The amount of overlap depends on numerous factors, such as, e.g., age of acquisition, proficiency level, and amount of daily exposure.

Thank you very much, Monika. I'll make use of that note. 

Pablo, I am glad the information was helpful. Best, Monika

Hi Pablo,

The respondents have provided some excellent information -- mainly from experimental studies.  You should look at the work of Michel Paradis who has done extensive work in this area...especially with bilingual aphasia.  A book to avoid due to the quality of the work and the over-interpretation of the results is Albert and Obler's "The Bilingual Brain"...full of problematic conclusions.

Hi Jack. Thank you very much!