PROCESSING ACROSS THE LANGUAGE BOUNDARY - A CROSS-MODAL PRIMING STUDYOF SPANISH-ENGLISH BILINGUALS

A cross-modal naming paradigm was used to assess within- and between-l anguage sentential priming in Spanish-English bilinguals. The paradigm used single-language auditory texts with visual target words under no rmal, visually degraded, speeded, and delayed naming conditions. Cross -language priming was always observed when the target language was pre dictable (in the blocked condition), even under speeded conditions. Wh en the target language was unpredictable (in the mixed condition), cro ss-language priming was observed only when response was delayed (delay ed naming) and under a subset of conditions when word recognition was delayed (visual degradation). Results are compatible with the idea tha t cross-language priming in a sentence context is more likely to invol ve the use of expectations, strategic processes, or both that allow bi linguals to tune themselves to external conditions. There are enough e xceptions to the general rule, however, to warrant a reconsideration o f the lexical-postlexical dichotomy. Implications for modular versus i nteractive models of lexical access are discussed.