Yulia Oganian

Language Switching--but Not Foreign Language Use Per Se--Reduces the Framing Effect.

Recent studies reported reductions of well-established biases in decision making under risk, such as the framing effect, during foreign language (FL) use. These modulations were attributed to the use of FL itself, which putatively entails an increase in emotional distance. A reduced framing effect in this setting, however, might also result from enhanced cognitive control associated with language-switching in mixed-language contexts, an account that has not been tested yet. Here we assess predictions of the 2 accounts in 2 experiments with over 1,500 participants. In Experiment 1, we tested a central prediction of the emotional distance account, namely that the framing effect would be reduced at low, but not high, FL proficiency levels. We found a strong framing effect in the native language, and surprisingly also in the foreign language, independent of proficiency. In Experiment 2, we orthogonally manipulated foreign language use and language switching to concurrently test the validity of both accounts. As in Experiment 1, foreign language use per se had no effect on framing. Crucially, the framing effect was reduced following a language switch, both when switching into the foreign and the native language. Thus, our results suggest that reduced framing effects are not mediated by increased emotional distance in a foreign language, but by transient enhancement of cognitive control, putting the interplay of bilingualism and decision making in a new light. (PsycINFO Database Record

Interplay of bigram frequency and orthographic neighborhood statistics in language membership decision

Language-specific orthography (i.e., letters or bigrams that exist in only one language) is known to facilitate language membership recognition. Yet the contribution of continuous sublexical and lexical statistics to language membership decisions during visual word processing is unknown. Here, we used pseudo-words to investigate whether continuous sublexical and lexical statistics bias explicit language decisions (Experiment 1) and language attribution during naming (Experiment 2). We also asked whether continuous statistics would have an effect in the presence of orthographic markers. Language attribution in both experiments was influenced by lexical neighborhood size differences between languages, even in presence of orthographic markers. Sublexical frequencies of occurrence affected reaction times only for unmarked pseudo-words in both experiments, with greater effects in naming. Our results indicate that bilinguals rely on continuous language-specific statistics at sublexical and lexical levels to infer language membership. Implications are discussed with respect to models of bilingual visual word recognition.

Slower Perception Followed by Faster Lexical Decision in Longer Words: A Diffusion Model Analysis

Effects of stimulus length on reaction times (RTs) in the lexical decision task are the topic of extensive research. While slower RTs are consistently found for longer pseudo-words, a finding coined the word length effect (WLE), some studies found no effects for words, and yet others reported faster RTs for longer words. Moreover, the WLE depends on the orthographic transparency of a language, with larger effects in more transparent orthographies. Here we investigate processes underlying the WLE in lexical decision in German-English bilinguals using a diffusion model (DM) analysis, which we compared to a linear regression approach. In the DM analysis, RT-accuracy distributions are characterized using parameters that reflect latent sub-processes, in particular evidence accumulation and decision-independent perceptual encoding, instead of typical parameters such as mean RT and accuracy. The regression approach showed a decrease in RTs with length for pseudo-words, but no length effect for words. However, DM analysis revealed that the null effect for words resulted from opposing effects of length on perceptual encoding and rate of evidence accumulation. Perceptual encoding times increased with length for words and pseudo-words, whereas the rate of evidence accumulation increased with length for real words but decreased for pseudo-words. A comparison between DM parameters in German and English suggested that orthographic transparency affects perceptual encoding, whereas effects of length on evidence accumulation are likely to reflect contextual information and the increase in available perceptual evidence with length. These opposing effects may account for the inconsistent findings on WLEs.

A hard-to-read font reduces the framing effect in a large sample

How can apparent decision biases, such as the framing effect, be reduced? Intriguing findings within recent years indicate that foreign language settings reduce framing effects, which has been explained in terms of deeper cognitive processing. Because hard-to-read fonts have been argued to trigger deeper cognitive processing, so-called cognitive disfluency, we tested whether hard-to-read fonts reduce framing effects. We found no reliable evidence for an effect of hard-to-read fonts on four framing scenarios in a laboratory (final N = 158) and an online study (N = 271). However, in a preregistered online study with a rather large sample (N = 732), a hard-to-read font reduced the framing effect in the classic “Asian disease” scenario (in a one-sided test). This suggests that hard-read-fonts can modulate decision biases—albeit with rather small effect sizes. Overall, our findings stress the importance of large samples for the reliability and replicability of modulations of decision biases.

Activation patterns throughout the word processing network of l1-dominant bilinguals reflect language similarity and language decisions

A crucial aspect of bilingual communication is the ability to identify the language of an input. Yet, the neural and cognitive basis of this ability is largely unknown. Moreover, it cannot be easily incorporated into neuronal models of bilingualism, which posit that bilinguals rely on the same neural substrates for both languages and concurrently activate them even in monolingual settings. Here we hypothesized that bilinguals can employ language-specific sublexical (bigram frequency) and lexical (orthographic neighborhood size) statistics for language recognition. Moreover, we investigated the neural networks representing language-specific statistics and hypothesized that language identity is encoded in distributed activation patterns within these networks. To this end, German–English bilinguals made speeded language decisions on visually presented pseudowords during fMRI. Language attribution followed lexical neighborhood sizes both in first (L1) and second (L2) language. RTs revealed an overall tuning to L1 bigram statistics. Neuroimaging results demonstrated tuning to L1 statistics at sublexical (occipital lobe) and phonological (temporoparietal lobe) levels, whereas neural activation in the angular gyri reflected sensitivity to lexical similarity to both languages. Analysis of distributed activation patterns reflected language attribution as early as in the ventral stream of visual processing. We conclude that in language-ambiguous contexts visual word processing is dominated by L1 statistical structure at sublexical orthographic and phonological levels, whereas lexical search is determined by the structure of both languages. Moreover, our results demonstrate that language identity modulates distributed activation patterns throughout the reading network, providing a key to language identity representations within this shared network.

The framing effect in a monetary gambling task is robust in minimally verbal language switching contexts

Decision-making biases, in particular the framing effect, can be altered in foreign language settings (foreign language effect) and following switching between languages (the language switching effect on framing). Recently, it has been suggested that the framing effect is only affected by foreign language use if the task is presented in a rich textual form. Here, we assess whether an elaborate verbal task is also a prerequisite for the language switching effect on framing. We employed a financial gambling task that induces a robust framing effect but is less verbal than the classical framing paradigms (e.g., the Asian disease problem). We conducted an online experiment (n = 485), where we orthogonally manipulated language use and language switching between trials. The results showed no effects of foreign language use or language switching throughout the experiment. This online result was confirmed in a laboratory experiment (n = 27). Overall, we find that language switching does not reduce the framing effect in a paradigm with little verbal content and thus that language switching effects seem contingent on the amount of verbal processing required.

A speech envelope landmark for syllable encoding in human superior temporal gyrus

Listeners use the slow amplitude modulations of speech, known as the envelope, to segment continuous speech into syllables. However, the underlying neural computations are heavily debated. We used high-density intracranial cortical recordings while participants listened to natural and synthesized control speech stimuli to determine how the envelope is represented in the human superior temporal gyrus (STG), a critical auditory brain area for speech processing. We found that the STG does not encode the instantaneous, moment-by-moment amplitude envelope of speech. Rather, a zone of the middle STG detects discrete acoustic onset edges, defined by local maxima in the rate-of-change of the envelope. Acoustic analysis demonstrated that acoustic onset edges reliably cue the information-rich transition between the consonant-onset and vowel-nucleus of syllables. Furthermore, the steepness of the acoustic edge cued whether a syllable was stressed. Synthesized amplitude-modulated tone stimuli showed that steeper edges elicited monotonically greater cortical responses, confirming the encoding of relative but not absolute amplitude. Overall, encoding of the timing and magnitude of acoustic onset edges in STG underlies our perception of the syllabic rhythm of speech.

Low foreign language proficiency reduces optimism about the personal future

Optimistic estimates about the personal future constitute one of the best-described and most-debated decision biases related to emotion. Nevertheless, it has been difficult to isolate manipulations that reduce optimistic estimates. Eliciting estimates in a foreign language is a promising candidate manipulation because foreign language use alters decision biases in scenarios with emotional components. Consequently, we tested whether foreign language use reduces optimistic estimates. In a laboratory experiment, participants (n = 45) estimated their probability of experiencing life events either in their native language or a foreign language, in which they were highly proficient. We found no differences in these estimates or in the updating of these estimates after receiving feedback about the population baseline probability. Importantly, three online experiments with large sample sizes (ns = 706, 530, and 473) showed that using a foreign language with low proficiency reduced comparative optimism. Participants in the online experiments had diverse proficiency levels and were matched on a variety of control metrics. Fine-grained analyses indicated that low proficiency weakens the coupling between probability estimates and rated arousal. Overall, our findings suggest that an important decision bias can be reduced when using a foreign language with low proficiency.