Welcome to the Center for Research on Language (CRL)

CRL brings together faculty, students and research associates who share an interest in the nature of language, the processes by which language is acquired and used, and the mediation of language in the human brain.

CRL is housed in the Cognitive Science Building on the Thurgood Marshall Campus at the University of California, San Diego and boasts an interdisciplinary academic staff comprised of specialists in a wide variety of fields:

  • Cognitive science
  • Communication
  • Communication disorders
  • Computer science
  • Developmental psychology
  • Linguistics
  • Neurosciences
  • Pediatrics
  • Psycholinguistics

CRL Talks

May 9

Language control in trilinguals

Clara Martin

Basque Center on Cognition Brain and Language (BCBL); Ikerbasque Research Professor

Studies on third language (L3) acquisition suggest that L3 learners experience more L2→L3 than L1àL3 interference despite the L1 being the most proficient language. However, little is known about how a trilingual’s languages interact after the initial stages of language learning. In a series of three experiments in two studies, we investigated the influence of the L3 and the L1 on L2 production (Study 1; two experiments with Spanish-Basque-English and English-French-Spanish trilinguals), and the influence of the L3 on L1 and L2 production (Study 2; one experiment with Spanish-Basque-English trilinguals). Study 1 showed more L3 than L1 lexical intrusions during L2 speeded naming (L3→L2 stronger than L1àL2), possibly because trilinguals apply more inhibition over their L1 than over their L3 when speaking in L2. Study 2 showed more L3 phonetic and lexical influence during L2 production than during L1 production (L3→L2 stronger than L3àL1). Taken together, those studies reveal a stronger link between two non-native languages than between any of those non-native languages and the L1 (L3-L2 link stronger than L3-L1 or L2-L1 link).