title: English word frequency and recognition in bilinguals: Inter-corpus comparison and error analysis.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This study is the second of a two-part investigation on lexical effects on bilinguals' performance on a clinical English word recognition test. Focus is on word-frequency effects using counts provided by four corpora.
  
  
  METHODS
  Frequency of occurrence was obtained for 200 NU-6 words from the Hoosier mental lexicon (HML) and three contemporary corpora, American National Corpora, Hyperspace analogue to language (HAL), and SUBTLEX(US). Correlation analysis was performed between word frequency and error rate.
  
  
  METHODS
  Ten monolinguals and 30 bilinguals participated. Bilinguals were further grouped according to their age of English acquisition and length of schooling/working in English.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Word frequency significantly affected word recognition in bilinguals who acquired English late and had limited schooling/working in English. When making errors, bilinguals tended to replace the target word with a word of a higher frequency. Overall, the newer corpora outperformed the HML in predicting error rate.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Frequency counts provided by contemporary corpora predict bilinguals' recognition of English monosyllabic words. Word frequency also helps explain top replacement words for misrecognized targets. Word-frequency effects are especially prominent for bilinguals foreign born and educated.
authors: a Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders , Long Island University , Brooklyn Campus, New York , USA.
authors: Lu-Feng
authors: LF
authors: Shi
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D001302:Audiometry, Speech; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D019303:Multilingualism; D046709:Pattern Recognition, Physiological; D010700:Phonetics; D021641:Recognition, Psychology; D013067:Speech Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Bilingual; corpus; frequency of occurrence; word recognition