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Affect-Language Interactions in Nonnative Speakers

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Affect-Language Interactions in Native and Non-Native English Speakers

Part of the book series: The Bilingual Mind and Brain Book Series ((BMBBS))

Abstract

Most of us live and communicate in a bilingual context. This means that, on a more or less regular basis, we engage in a communicative interaction in our second language(s). For it to be successful, we have to interpret thoughts, intentions, attitudes, and emotions expressed by our interlocutors. In this chapter, I review evidence demonstrating that bilinguals may express and/or perceive affective meaning differently in their first and second language(s), which in turn has substantial implications for everyday communication. I begin by demonstrating findings from clinical and introspective contexts in which bilinguals report to experience affective detachment when communicating in their second language while experiencing full-blown affective experiences when operating in their first language. Bilinguals’ subjective reports often do not find support in cognitive and neurocognitive paradigms, most of which have not documented measurable differences in affective experiences in bilinguals’ respective languages on the psycho- or neurophysiological levels. These contradictory results might stem from the fact that contrary to clinical and introspective studies, cognitive and neurocognitive paradigms have based their findings on bilinguals’ responses to decontextualised affective words that by no means represent natural affective communication.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For example, for evidence of diverse affective repertoires in bilingual/translingual writers, see Pavlenko (2005, 2014) and Grosjean (2010); for differences in affect and emotion terms and concepts across languages, see Pavlenko (also, Dewaele & Pavlenko, 2002; 2005, 2008, 2014) and Wierzbicka (1992, 1994).

  2. 2.

    To date, autobiographic memories in bilinguals have been conducted among Spanish-English (Javier et al., 1993; Otoya, 1988; Schrauf & Rubin, 1998, 2000, 2007), Russian-English (Marian & Kaushanskaya, 2004, 2008; Marian & Neisser, 2000), Polish-Danish (Larsen et al., 2002), and Japanese-English (Matsumoto & Stanny, 2006) bilingual populations.

  3. 3.

    Translated into English as “Other shores” (Pavlenko, 2014, p. 189).

  4. 4.

    English controls did the rating in English only.

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    Rafał Jończyk

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Jończyk, R. (2016). Affect-Language Interactions in Nonnative Speakers. In: Affect-Language Interactions in Native and Non-Native English Speakers. The Bilingual Mind and Brain Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47635-3_4

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