Bilingual children's reading as a function of age of first bilingual language exposure (AoE) was examined. Bilingual (varied AoE) and monolingual children (N = 421) were compared in their English language and reading abilities (6-10 years) using phonological awareness, semantic knowledge, and reading tasks. Structural equation modeling was applied…

This study employs the Specificity Principle to examine the relative impacts of external (input quantity at home and at school, number of books and reading frequency at home, teachers' degree and experience, language usage, socioeconomic status) and internal factors (children's working memory, nonverbal intelligence, learning-related…

Examined acquisition of the mass/count distinction in English. Results indicated that at 7 years bilinguals did not infer from the linguistic context whether new nouns referred to objects or a substance. By 9 years, bilinguals who were strong in English responded similarly to monolingual peers, but bilinguals with lower English abilities still…

The naturalistic acquisition of Dutch by English speakers of different ages was examined longitudinally to test the hypothesis that second language acquisition is most efficient before the age of puberty when cerebral lateralization is complete. Results did not support this critical period hypothesis for language acquisition. (JMB)