The present study examined the role of script in bilingual speech planning by comparing the performance of same and different-script bilinguals. Spanish-English bilinguals (Experiment 1) and Japanese-English bilinguals (Experiment 2) performed a picture-word interference task in which they were asked to name a picture of an object in English, their second language, while ignoring a visual distractor word in Spanish or Japanese, their first language. Results replicated the general pattern seen in previous bilingual picture-word interference studies for the same-script, Spanish-English bilinguals but not for the different-script, Japanese-English bilinguals. Both groups showed translation facilitation, whereas only Spanish-English bilinguals demonstrated semantic interference, phonological facilitation, and phono-translation facilitation. These results suggest that when the script of the language not in use is present in the task, bilinguals appear to exploit the perceptual difference as a language cue to direct lexical access to the intended language earlier in the process of speech planning.

An important aim of research on bilingualism is to understand how the brain adapts to the demands of using more than one language.In this paper, we argue that pursuing such an aim entails valuing our research as a discovery process that acts on variety.Prescriptions about sample size and methodology, rightly aimed at establishing a sound basis for generalization, should be understood as being in the service of science as a discovery process. We propose and illustrate by drawing from previous and contemporary examples within brain and cognitive sciences, that this necessitates exploring the neural bases of bilingual phenotypes:the adaptive variety induced through the interplay of biology and culture. We identify the conceptual and methodological prerequisites for such exploration and briefly allude to the publication practices that afford it as a community practice and to the risk of allowing methodological prescriptions, rather than discovery, to dominate the research endeavor.

Proficient bilinguals use two languages actively, but the contexts in which they do so may differ dramatically. The present study asked what consequences the contexts of language use hold for the way in which cognitive resources modulate language abilities. Three groups of speakers were compared, all of whom were highly proficient Spanish-English bilinguals who differed with respect to the contexts in which they used the two languages in their everyday lives. They performed two lexical production tasks and the "AX" variant of the Continuous Performance Task (AX-CPT), a nonlinguistic measure of cognitive control. Results showed that lexical access in each language, and how it related to cognitive control ability, depended on whether bilinguals used their languages separately or interchangeably or whether they were immersed in their second language. These findings suggest that even highly proficient bilinguals who speak the same languages are not necessarily alike in the way in which they engage cognitive resources. Findings support recent proposals that being bilingual does not, in itself, identify a unique pattern of cognitive control. An important implication is that much of the controversy that currently surrounds the consequences of bilingualism may be understood, in part, as a failure to characterize the complexity associated with the context of language use. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).