Functionality in the interactive principle in bilingual speech production

Abstract

This article discusses the existence of interaction between languages in the production of bilingual speech, from the results of a study, developed within the picture-word interference paradigm, with Portuguese-Spanish and Spanish-Portuguese bilinguals. As the interactive principle is directly related to sublexical activation and sharing of phonological traces between words, we analyzed data obtained in testing the effects of interlingual identity (when there is semantic correspondence) and the facilitation of phonological/orthographic aspects (when there is phonological correspondence), involving cognate, non-cognates and false cognates words. The results strengthened the evidence that the interaction is functional among languages of bilinguals because cognates were named faster in all conditions and rapid naming of false cognates occurred in the context of phonological facilitation. It was also observed that, when there is no semantic correspondence between words, the activation of sublexical and phonological similarity facilitates naming.