In the critical condition of noun and adjective pairs, there was no signifi-
cant difference between bilinguals and monolinguals (t(32) = 0.415, p = 0.681)
and no grammaticality by group interaction (F(1,32) = 1.129, p = 0.296).
There was no significant difference between the two groups in the grammar
test overall (t(32) = 0.906), and no equivalence by group interaction in the
ungrammatical conditions (F(1,32) = 0.696, p = 0.41). Performance of both
groups in all conditions was consistently high (above 90%). In sum, the test
revealed no differences in the two populations’ grammatical knowledge
of English.
Stimuli
We exposed both participant groups to written English sentences that
contained adjective–noun pairs, for example: The blue car is on the right. The
adjective–noun pairs followed either the order adjective first, noun second (as
above, blue car), which is grammatically correct in English, or the opposite
word order, noun first, adjective second (car blue), which is ungrammatical in
English, but grammatical in Welsh.
We used line drawings of six objects (book, car, pen, box, shirt, phone)
in eight different colours (red, blue, green, yellow, pink, brown, white, black),
thus creating a total of 48 pictures. In no instances was the association of an
object with a colour semantically aberrant or impossible. Each of the 48 pic-
tures was matched with a colour adjective and noun such that the adjective
either provided an accurate description of the colour of the picture (adjective
match) or not (adjective mismatch). Similarly, the noun either accurately
described the picture (noun match) or not (noun mismatch). Finally, in the
adjective–noun pair, syntax was either correct (SC) or incorrect (SI), depend-
ing on whether the order of adjective and noun was syntactically correct in
English or not. The experimental design was therefore a two-by-two-by-two
design, featuring eight conditions. For example, the picture of a red book was
paired with the sequences red book, book red, blue book and so on. Two filler
conditions, in which the noun was presented unaccompanied by a colour
adjective, were also included to prevent participants from forming a system-
atic expectancy of an adjective in second position when a noun was pre-
sented in first position.
(4) Sequences matched with picture of red book
Sequence
a red book
b book red
c blue book
d book blue
e red car
f car red
218 Part 5: The Bilingual Brain