The Perception of Vocal Cues of Emotion by Spanish-Speaking Limited English Proficient Children

Abstract

There is a paucity of data comparing the abilities of bilingual children to distinguish nonverbal, emotional cues of speech in their first language (L1) and their second language (L2). This study, conducted with 9 Spanish-speaking bilingual children with limited English proficiency, addressed two questions: (a) is there a difference in the accuracy with which normally-developing bilingual children judge vocal cues of emotion in their L1 and L2, and, (b) is their ability to accurately judge these cues in L2 related to their degree of L2 proficiency? The subjects listened to a tape-recorded sentence, in English and Spanish, which conveyed the emotions of happiness, sadness, and anger. A MANOVA with repeated measures two by two factorial design (language by gender) revealed that there was a significant difference between the children's responses to the English and Spanish sentences. Results yielded higher accurate responses in L1. This result could be attributed to the English-speaking male speaker, who did not convey the amount of emotion that the other three speakers did. The subjects did respond quite accurately to the emotions portrayed by the female English speaker and the male and female Spanish speakers. Implications for distinguishing potential language differences from language-learning disabilities are discussed.