Bilinguals are more successful than monolinguals in novel language learning due to the transfer of prior learning strategies and experiences with two languages. The extent of such transfer may depend on the similarity between previously acquired languages and a novel language. This hypothesis was tested in relation to vocabulary learning in…

The paper describes the role parental language ideology and the home literacy environment play in heritage language (HL) literacy learning of bilingual Arabic-English-speaking children in the UK. Information about the under-reported literacy practices of Arabic-English-speaking families will enhance current knowledge about HL literacy practices…

As in teaching other languages, the most difficult of the four basic skills in teaching Turkish as a foreign language is writing; it includes very different strategies from sequencing to analysis and synthesis. In addition, foreign language learners tend to transfer the forms and meanings of their own culture and language to the target language…

Purpose: The purpose of the current study was to evaluate the effect of bilingual narrative intervention on vocabulary gains in Hebrew (school language) and English (home language) among English-Hebrew bilinguals, using a block design (one language at a time), and to determine whether there was cross-linguistic transfer to the language that was…

This qualitative, exploratory research study is positioned within the field of Family Language Policy (FLP). Contextualised in bilingual Malta, where Maltese is the majority language, the study inquires into the effects of a plurilingual family language programme on the language ideologies within English-speaking Maltese families. The programme…

In this article, I examine how repairs in adult-child conversations guide children's acquisition of language. Children make unprompted self-repairs to their utterances. They also respond to prompts for repair, whether open ("Hm?," "What?") or restricted ("You hid what?"), and to restricted offers (Child: "I…

Different languages, dialects, accents, or other forms of language (a.k.a. codes or varieties of language) are used in various healthcare facilities around the world. However, only a limited number of studies have explored the switching of varieties in healthcare environments. Hospitals in Saudi Arabia are multilingual and multicultural…

The present study aimed to catalogue and compare usage patterns of verb-particle constructions (VPCs) in Modern Standard Arabic and English by native and learner writers. Building upon an analysis of a multi-genre monolingual Arabic corpus, use of both Arabic and English VPCs was explored in a bilingual L1 (first language) Arabic L2 (second…

This study explores typically developing bilingual children's performance in their English as a heritage language. The aim of this study is to advance our understanding of heritage language expectations and the role of chronological age and bilingual exposure. A broad range of receptive and expressive linguistic domains are investigated as a…

Politeness strategies are of significant importance to maintain the face of the addressee. Senders of formal congratulatory letters seek to create a positive image in the minds of their addresses by performing particular illocutionary acts and face-saving acts (FSAs) in the form of written texts. To the best knowledge of the researcher, this topic…

This study examines first language (L1) English transfer in the acquisition of plural noun semantics in second language (L2) Arabic. Drawing on previous research on the L2 acquisition of plural noun interpretation, the study presents and discusses new production data of specific and generic definite plurals by English-speaking learners of Arabic…

The study was conducted to investigate the L2 acquisition of English generics by L1 Arabic speakers. The present study considered the two types of genericity (NP-level vs. sentence-level). Since generics in Arabic are always definite, the study investigated whether L1 Arabic speakers perform similarly in both types. The study recruited 43…

Facilitation of memory for target stimuli due to similar context in the learning and testing phases is known as "context effect" (CE). The present study aimed to investigate the interaction between CE as elicited by the consistency of the language of presentation (Hebrew vs. English) with the native language (Hebrew vs. English) in both…

This study examined to what extent English-speaking learners of Arabic demonstrated varied metalinguistic knowledge of a salient feature (head-direction) vs. an unsalient feature (definiteness) in the Arabic construct state. In addition, it examined whether this knowledge was utilized in form-focused task performance. In the target construction,…

Migration-related multilingualism is a core issue of academic discussion regarding educational inequality in German schools. While existing studies have analysed the discrimination against children's languages from linguistic minorities in school, this paper focuses on social practices in a primary school that seeks to recognise and value…