Recall and Articulation of English and Chinese Words Under Memory Preload Conditions

Two groups of subjects were tested to investigate the effect of language on recall span under different memory preload conditions (two, four, or six digits). Native English-speaking monolinguals in Group 1 recalled 1-, 2-, and 3-syllable English words. Chinese-English bilinguals in Group 2 recalled both English words and 1-, 2-, and 3-syllable Chinese words. Word articulation rates for the English monolinguals and the Chinese-English bilinguals in each language were also obtained. An advantage for 1-syllable words over 2- and 3-syllable words was obtained for both articulation and recall. Whereas the effects of word length on recall were constant for English words in all preload conditions, the effect of word length varied with preload condition for the Chinese words: The advantage for 1-syllable Chinese words was very large when preload was small but diminished as digit preload increased. The notion of the “articulatory loop” alone fails to account for this cross-linguistic difference.

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