Search

Lexical access and lexical diversity are often assumed to be vulnerable to first language (L1) attrition. They also differ between monolinguals and nonimmersed bilinguals. This raises the question whether lexical attrition can be ascribed to nonuse or to competition between the two languages. We compare two populations of late L2 learners of Dutch living in the Netherlands. One of them was largely monolingual prior to emigration (Turkish migrants), while the other comes from a highly multilingual society (Morocco). While both experimental populations should be affected by erosion due to nonuse, we expect competition effects to be more strongly pronounced when compared against a monolingual versus a multilingual baseline population. The results show that this is not the case with attrition effects being even stronger in the Moroccan group than in the Turkish group. Furthermore, there is no impact of individual measures of frequency of exposure or language attitudes among the attriters. We conclude that being immersed in an L2 environment leads to weakening of lexical access.

The present article provides an exploration of ultimate attainment in second language (L2) and its limitations. It is argued that the question of maturational constraints can best be investigated when the reference population is bilingual and exposed on a regular basis to varieties of their first language (L1) that show cross-linguistic influence. To this end, 20 advanced Dutch-English bilinguals are compared to 9 English native speakers immersed in a Dutch environment. All participants are teachers or students of English at a Dutch institution of higher education. The populations are shown to be at similar global proficiency levels. Two phonetic variables (voice onset time or VOT and vowel discrimination) and one grammatical variable (verb phrase ellipsis), which are assumed to present particular challenges to Dutch learners of English, are explored, and speakers are furthermore rated for their global nativeness. The findings show no differences between populations on VOT but some variance on the production of a vowel that has no correlate in Dutch (the English trap vowel). However, all but one of the L2ers are rated outside the range of the natives on perceived foreign accent. There are also differences between groups where acceptance of different sentence types with verb phrase ellipsis are concerned. We interpret these findings to indicate that there are areas of L2 knowledge and production that are persistently difficult to acquire even under circumstances that are highly favourable for L2 acquisition.

This article examines so-called secondary transfer effects of intergroup contact, a phenomenon whereby positive intergroup contact experiences can influence attitudes not only toward encountered (primary) outgroups but also toward other (secondary) outgroups that were not initially involved in the intergroup encounter. The current study relies on a unique cross-sectional sample of the general population drawn from eight European countries (N = 7,042) to examine the relationship between intergroup contact with immigrants and attitudes toward primary (immigrants) and secondary (homosexuals and Jews) outgroups. Results showed that intergroup contact was not only directly related with primary outgroup attitudes but also indirectly associated with secondary outgroup attitudes, via attitude generalization. These relationships occurred primarily for individuals low in social dominance orientation. Findings are discussed in terms of their contribution to understanding secondary transfer effects of contact as well as the role of social dominance orientation as a moderator of such effects. (Contains 10 footnotes, 2 tables, and 1 figure.)

Based on an analysis of the speech of long-term emigres of German and Dutch origin, the present investigation discusses to what extent hesitation patterns in language attrition may be the result of the creation of an interlanguage system, on the one hand, or of language-internal attrition patterns on the other. We compare speech samples elicited by a film retelling task from German emigres in Canada (n = 52) and the Netherlands (n = 50) and from Dutch emigres in Canada (n = 45) to retellings produced by predominantly monolingual control groups in Germany (n = 53) and the Netherlands (n = 45). Findings show that the attriting groups overuse empty pauses, repetitions, and retractions, whereas the distribution of filled pauses appears to conform more closely to the second language norm. An investigation of the location at which disfluency markers appear within the sentence suggests that they are indicators of difficulties that the attriters experience largely in the context of lexical retrieval.

The primary aim of this study was to determine whether native speakers of German living in either Canada or the Netherlands are perceived to have a foreign accent in their native German speech. German monolingual listeners (n = 19) assessed global foreign accent of 34 L1 German speakers in Anglophone Canada, 23 L1 German speakers in the Dutch Netherlands, and five German monolingual controls in Germany. The experimental subjects had moved to either Canada or the Netherlands at an average age of 27 years and had resided in their country of choice for an average of 37 years. The results revealed that the German listeners were more likely to perceive a global foreign accent in the German speech of the consecutive bilinguals in Anglophone Canada and the Dutch Netherlands than in the speech of the control group and that nine immigrants to Canada and five immigrants to the Netherlands were clearly perceived to be non-native speakers of German. Further analysis revealed that quality and quantity of contact with the native German language had a more significant effect on predicting global foreign accent in native speech than age of arrival or length of residence. Two types of contact were differentiated: (i) C-M represented communicative settings in which little code-mixing between the L1 and L2 was expected to occur, and (ii) C+M represented communicative settings in which code-mixing was expected to be more likely. The variable C-M had a significant impact on predicting foreign accent in native speech, whereas the variable C+M did not. The results suggest that contact with the L1 through communicative settings in which code-mixing is inhibited is especially conducive to maintaining the stability of native language pronunciation in consecutive bilinguals living in a migrant context. (Contains 1 footnote and 2 tables.)

Most linguistic processes--acquisition, change, deterioration--take place in and are determined by a complex and multifactorial web of language internal and language external influences. This implies that the impact of each individual factor can only be determined on the basis of a careful consideration of its interplay with all other factors. The present study investigates to what degree a number of sociolinguistic and extralinguistic factors, which have been previously demonstrated or claimed to be relevant in the context of language attrition, can account for individual differences in first language (L1) proficiency. Data were collected from attriting populations with German as their L1: one in a Dutch language context (n = 53) and one in a Canadian English setting (n = 53). These groups were compared to a reference group of Germans in Germany (n = 53). Overall, the proposed outcome measures (derived from both formal tasks and a free speech task) are argued to be stable and valid indicators of attrition effects. The predictor variables under investigation are shown to fall into several reliable factor groups, for example, identification and affiliation with L1, exposure to German language and attitude towards L1. These are the factor groups that have, so far, been considered the most important for the process of L1 attrition or maintenance. However, the predictive power exercised by these factor groups in the present study is shown to be relatively weak. (Contains 12 tables, 3 figures, and 4 footnotes.)

.

The in vitro antibacterial activity of cefquinome (INN), an aminothiazolyl-cephalosporin of the fourth generation of cephalosporins, was investigated by determining the minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC, microgram/ml) for 714 bacterial isolates of bovine origin and comparing it with those of amoxicillin, amoxicillin and clavulanic acid, ceftiofur, cephapirin, enrofloxacin, gentamicin, kanamycin and oxytetracycline. Drug resistance was determined by using break-points, which consider the dosage regimen and pharmacokinetics of the veterinary antimicrobials investigated. Cefquinome demonstrated a very high in vitro activity against bacterial isolates of Pasteurella spp., Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. Overall, the level of resistance against the different anti-infectives tested was lowest for cefquinome. For the remaining substances examined, in vitro activity and the level of resistance showed considerable differences. The chemical and pharmaceutical features of cefquinome are discussed.