The representation of lexical and syntactic information in bilinguals: Evidence from syntactic priming

To what extent do bilinguals have a single, integrated representation of syntactic information? According to Hartsuiker et al. (2004) [Hartsuiker, R. J., Pickering, M. J., & Veltkamp, E. (2004). Is syntax separate or shared between languages? Cross-linguistic syntactic priming in Spanish–English bilinguals. Psychological Science, 15, 409–414.], bilinguals represent syntactic information in terms of links between lexical representations and combinatorial nodes that specify syntactic structure, in a single cross-linguistic network. We describe predictions of this account and test them in two pairs of syntactic priming experiments with Dutch–English bilinguals. In Experiments 1 and 2, we tested priming in English (L2) production. Experiment 1 showed priming within English, and found that this priming was boosted by lexical repetition. Experiment 2 showed priming from Dutch to English, and found that this priming was boosted when prime and target used translation-equivalent verbs. However, this boost was weaker than the lexical boost in Experiment 1. In Experiments 3 and 4, we tested priming in Dutch (L1) production. Experiment 3 showed priming within Dutch, again boosted by lexical repetition. Experiment 4 showed priming from English to Dutch, but found no boost when prime and target were translation-equivalent verbs. We interpret these results in terms of an integrated model of lexical-syntactic representation.