The Effect of Bilingualism and Executive Functions on the Microstructure Elements of Stories Narrated by Bilingual Kurdish-Persian Autistic Children

Morovati, Somayeh; Jamali, Ali

doi:10.30473/il.2024.68622.1609

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Somayeh Morovati ¹
Ali Jamali ²

¹ Ph.D. candidate in Linguistics, Ilam Azad University

² Assistant Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, Ilam Branch, Islamic Azad university, Ilam, Iran.

https://doi.org/10.30473/il.2024.68622.1609

Abstract

Although there are a lot of evidence that refer to the problems of mono-lingual autistic children’s problem in telling stories and executive functions (EFs), there are not enough information regarding the effect of bilingualism on these skills in bilingual children specifically Iranian bilingual children. The present research investigated and compared the effect of bilingualism on the story telling and EFs of twenty 7-12 years old bilingual and monolingual autistic children and 20 bilingual and monolingual normal children. The stories were analyzed with regard to their microstructure elements. Also, two EF tasks namely, a global-local visual attention task and a 2-back working memory task were administered to the same children. The findings of the study showed that bilingual autistic children outperformed their mono-lingual peers in story structure complexity and the use of adverbial clauses. In the global-local visual attention task and a 2-back working memory task, bilingual autistic children were faster and more accurate than their monolingual peers who were more susceptible to inference from local information in compare to other experimental groups. The speed and accuracy of bilingual autistic children were higher in compare to those of their monolingual peers in 2-back task. The correlational analysis between storytelling and EF skills showed that bilingual autistic children in compare to their monolingual peers drew on a broader range of EF in narrating stories. The results of the research showed that bilingual autistic children outperformed their monolingual peers in the production of microstructure elements, visual attention and the working memory skills.

Keywords

Main Subjects

Multilingualism

References

زندی، بهمن و واثق، الهه. (1399). گرایش‌های نام‌گذاری زنان و مردان چهار نسل ایران از دیدگاه زبان‌شناسی اجتماعی. مطالعات زبان و ترجمه. 53 (4). 165-195.

Altman, C, Armon-Lotem, Sh, Fichman, S, & Walters, J. (2016). Macrostructure, microstructure, and mental state terms in the narratives of English– Hebrew bilingual preschool children with and without specific language impairment. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37, 165-193.

Andreou, M., Bongartz, C., Knopp, E., & Tsimpli, I. M. (2015). Character reference in Greek-German bilingual children’s narratives. In L. Roberts, K. McManus, N. Vanek, & D. Trenkic (Vol. Eds.), EUROSLA yearbook: Volume 15, (pp. 1–40). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Baron-Cohen, S., Leslie, A. M., & Frith, U. (1986). Mechanical, behavioral, and intentional understanding of picture stories in autistic children. The British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 4, 113–125.

Bishop, D. V. M., & Norbury, C. F. (2005). Executive functions in children with communication impairments, in relation to autistic symptomatology: 2: Response inhibition. Autism, 9(1), 29–43.

Boucher, J. (2012). Research review: structural language in autistic spectrum disorder—characteristics and causes. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53, 219–233.

Brooks, P., & Tomasello, M. (1999). How children constrain their argument structure constructions. Language, 75, 720–738.

Chen, L., & Yan, R. (2011). Development and use of evaluative expressions in the English narratives of Chinese–English bilinguals. Bilingualism Language and Cognition, 14, 570–578.

Christ, S. E., Holt, D. D., White, D. A., et al. (2007). Inhibitory control in children with autism Spectrum disorder. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 37, 1155–1165.

Diehl, J., Bennetto, L., & Young, C. E. (2006). Story recall and narrative coherence of high functioning children with autism Spectrum disorders. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 34(1), 87–102.

Diessel, H. (2004). The acquisition of complex sentences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Eigsti, I-M. (2011). Executive functions in ASD. In F. Deborah. (Eds). The Neuropsychology of Autism (pp. 185- 203). New York: Oxford University Press.

Friedman, N. P., & Miyake, A. (2004). The relations among inhibition and interference control functions: A latent-variable analysis. Journal of Experimental Psychology General, 133, 101–135.

Gagarina, N, Klop, D, Bohnacker, U, Kunnari, S, Tantele, K, Välimaa, T, Balčiūnienė, I, & Walters, J. (2012). Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives (MAIN). ZAS Papers in Linguistics 56. Berlin: Zentrumfür Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft.

Garcia-Frazier, G. E. (2013). Concept-based teaching and Spanish modality in heritage language learners: A Vygotskyan approach. (Doctoral Dissertation), University of Massachusetts, Amherst MA.

Gonzalez-Barrero, A. M., & Nadig, A. S. (2017). Can bilingualism mitigate set-shifting difficulties in children with autism spectrum disorders? Child Development, 90(4),1043-1060.

Greenberg, A, Bellana, B, & Bialystok, E. (2013). Perspective taking ability in bilingual children: Extending advantages in executive control to Spatial reasoning. Cognitive Development, 28(1), 41–50.

Hilchey D, M, & Klein, M. R. (2011). Are there bilingual advantages on nonlinguistic interference tasks? Implications for the plasticity of executive control processes. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 18(4), 625-58.

Haegeman, L. (2010). The internal syntax of adverbial clauses. Lingua, 120, 628–648.

Happé, F., & Frith, U. (2006). The weak coherence account: Detail-focused cognitive style in autism spectrum disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 36(1), 5–25.

Hasher, L., Chung, C., May, C. P., & Foong, N. (2002). Age, time of testing, and proactive interference. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 56(3), 200–207.

Hughes, L. D., McGillivray, L., & Schmidek, M. (1997). Guide to narrative language. Eau Claire, WI: Thinking Publications.

Joseph, R. M., Keehn, B., Connolly, C., Wolfe, M. J., & Horowitz, S. T. (2009). Why is visual search superior in autism spectrum disorder? Developmental Science, 12(6), 1083–1096.

Kelley, Elizabeth. (2011). Language in autism. In F. Deborah. (Eds). The neuropsychology of autism (pp. 123- 137). New York: Oxford University Press.

Lord, C., Rutter, M., & Le Couteur, A. (1994). Autism diagnostic interview-revised: A revised version of a diagnostic interview for caregivers of individuals with possible pervasive developmental disorders. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 24(5), 659–685.

Losh, M., & Capps, L. (2003). Narrative ability in high-functioning children with autism or Asperger’s syndrome. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 33(3), 239–251.

Luyster, R., Lopez, K., & Lord, C. (2007). Characterizing communicative development in children referred for autism spectrum disorders using the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory (CDI). Journal of Child Language, 34(3), 623–654.

Shook, A., & Marian, V. (2012). Bimodal bilinguals co-activate both languages during spoken comprehension. Cognition, 124(3), 314–324.

Marinis, T., Terzi, A., Kotsopoulou, A., & Francis, K. (2013). Pragmatic abilities of high-functioning Greek-speaking children with autism. Psychology, 20, 321–337.

Morales, Julia, Calvo, Alejandra, & Bialystok, Ellen. (2010). Working memory development in monolingual and bilingual children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 114(2), 187–202.

Navon, D. (1977). Forest before trees: The precedence of global features in visual perception. Cognitive Psychology, 9(3), 353–383.

Peristeri, E., Andreou, M., & Tsimpli, I. M. (2017). Syntactic and story structure complexity in the narratives of high- and low-language ability children with autism Spectrum disorder. Frontiers in Psychology.

Roid, G. H., & Miller, L. J. (1997). Leiter international performance scale-revised. Wood Dale, IL: Stoelting.

Tunmer, E. W., & Herriman, L. Michael. (1984). The development of metalinguistic awareness: A conceptual overview. In W. E. Tunmer, C. Pratt, & M. L. Herriman (Eds.), Metalinguistic awareness in children: Theory, research and implications (pp.12- 35). Berlin: Springer-Verlag.

Tsimpli, I. M., Peristeri, E., & Andreou, M. (2016). Narrative production in monolingual and bilingual children with specific language impairment. Applied Psycholinguistics, 37(1), 195–216.

Wardhaugh, R. (2006). An introduction to sociolinguistics (5^th Ed.). Blackwell publishing.

Journal of Sociolinguistics

The Effect of Bilingualism and Executive Functions on the Microstructure Elements of Stories Narrated by Bilingual Kurdish-Persian Autistic Children

References

References

Volume 6, Issue 4 - Serial Number 24
December 2023
Pages 77-94

The Effect of Bilingualism and Executive Functions on the Microstructure Elements of Stories Narrated by Bilingual Kurdish-Persian Autistic Children

References

References

Volume 6, Issue 4 - Serial Number 24December 2023Pages 77-94

Volume 6, Issue 4 - Serial Number 24
December 2023
Pages 77-94