Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
919803 | Acta Psychologica | 2013 | 7 Pages |
•Inhibition of non-target languages occurs in trilingual word production.•Efficiency of establishing the target language schema influences the inhibition.•CSIs have an effect on the n-2 language repetition cost.
The present study examined the hypothesis whether non-target languages are inhibited during multilingual language production by examining the n-2 language repetition cost. In two experiments, Uighur–Chinese–English trilinguals named Arabic digits in one of their three languages according to a visually presented cue. Significant n-2 repetition costs were obtained in both experiments, which indicate that inhibition exists during multilingual word production. In addition, in Experiment 1, it was also found that the n-2 repetition cost was reduced when cues were highly compatible with the task, which means non-target languages are less inhibited. In Experiment 2, the n-2 repetition cost was increased at a shorter CSI. Taken together, these results indicate that inhibition of non-target languages occurs during multilingual language production, and that efficiency of establishing the target language task schema has an effect on the inhibitory control process.