Bilingual English-Mandarin and Monolingual Mandarin children’s narrative production: How does the macrostructure of their narratives differ?

Abstract

Aims and Objectives/Purpose/Research Questions:

This study examines the narrative production of English-Mandarin bilingual and monolingual Mandarin-speaking school-aged children (aged 9), focusing on the invariance of narrative abilities across languages and the influence of language proficiency.

Design/Methodology/Approach:

A mixed-methods approach was used, including parent-completed questionnaires on children’s background and language abilities, as well as narrative data collection from 20 English-Mandarin bilingual children in both languages, and 20 monolingual Mandarin-speaking children.

Data and Analysis:

Narratives were analysed both quantitatively and descriptively. Comparisons were made between the Mandarin narratives of the monolingual and bilingual groups, and the English and Mandarin narratives among the bilingual group. The bilinguals were further divided in two groups based on balanced versus unbalanced language proficiency, and differences in narrative production were explored to examine the effect of language proficiency.

Findings/Conclusions:

The English narratives of the bilingual children contained substantially more macrostructural components and provided more behavioural descriptions than their Mandarin narratives. However, the bilinguals produced similar macrostructural complexity across their two languages. The difference in total macrostructural components production may be attributed to the imbalance in language proficiency in the bilinguals’ two languages, though macrostructural complexity is less sensitive to this proficiency disparity. Moreover, compared to their monolingual peers, the bilinguals’ Mandarin narratives included less concrete beginnings yet considerably more internal states, especially the emotions of the story characters.

Originality:

This study contributes original insights into the debate on bilingual narrative development by examining the multifaceted effects of language proficiency across two languages and comparing bilingual and monolingual narrative production in Mandarin.

Significance/Implications:

These findings emphasise the differential impact of language proficiency on various aspects of narrative development and the importance of considering both linguistic and cultural factors when assessing bilingual narrative competence, offering implications for educational practices and future research in bilingualism and language development.