Bilingual Language Mixing Why Do Bilinguals Code-Switch. Current Directions in Psychological Science-2001-Heredia-164-8

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2001 10: 164Current Directions in Psychological ScienceRoberto R. Heredia and Jeanette Altarriba

Bilingual Language Mixing: Why Do Bilinguals Code-Switch?

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Bilingual Language Mixing: Why DoBilinguals Code-Switch?Roberto R. Heredia1 and Jeanette Altarriba

Psychology and Sociology Department, Texas A&M International University,Laredo, Texas (R.R.H.), and Department of Psychology, University at Albany,State University of New York, Albany, New York (J.A.)

AbstractBilingual speakers often

code-switch from one lan-guage to another, especiallywhen both languages are usedin the environment. This articleexplores the potential theoreti-cal explanations for this lan-

guage behavior, the costs andbenefits associated with lan-guage switching, and the roleof language dominance in thedirection of the switch. Inshort, code switching followsfunctional and grammaticalprinciples and is a complex,rule-governed phenomenon.

Although significant progresshas been made in understand-ing the psycholinguistics ofcode switching, research isneeded to examine the cognitivemechanisms underlying the bi-linguals ability to integrate andseparate two languages during

the communicative process.

Keywordsbilingualism; code switching;bilingual cognition

Although much has been writ-ten on how bilinguals organize

their two languages in memory, lit-tle is known about why bilingualsmix their two languages during thecommunicative process. Codeswitching, or language mixing, oc-curs when a word or a phrase inone language substitutes for aword or phrase in a second lan-

guage (Li, 1996). For example, con-sider the sentence, Dame unahamburguesa sin LETTUCE por fa-vor (Give me a hamburger with-out LETTUCE please). The wordlettuce replaces the Spanishword (lechuga). Why is the wordlettuce chosen instead of the cor-rect Spanish word? Given thespeed with which spoken languageoccurs, and the cognitive resourcesrequired during the comprehen-sion and integration of differentlinguistic factors (e.g., phonologi-cal, grammatical, and semantic in-formation), one would expect bilin-guals not to switch languages,especially if retrieving a word froma second language takes more timethan retrieving a word or conceptfrom the same language. Why do

bilinguals code-switch?

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CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 165

LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY

One of the most frequent explana-tions of why bilinguals code-switchis that they do it to compensate forlack of language proficiency. The ar-

gument is that bilinguals code-switch because they do not knoweither language completely. Not sur-prisingly, when asked about theircode switching, Spanish-English bi-linguals are quick to point out theirlack of formal knowledge inSpanish and English (cf. Grosjean,1982).

One major weakness of thisview is that it does not allow forthe possibility that code switchingis due to failure to retrieve the cor-

rect word. This inability to remem-ber is reminiscent of the classic tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) phenomenon,in which people are sometimes un-able to remember information thatthey know. For example, one of usexperiences this every time he triesto remember the Spanish word for

estimate

(presupuesto). The rea-son for the difficulty is not that hedoes not know the correct word,

but that he does not use this wordfrequently. Switching to English

makes it easier and faster to re-trieve the word. Thus, code switch-ing may be a problem of retrievalaf fected by a combination of closely related factors such as lan-guage use and word frequency.

A second problem with thisview is that it cannot explain thefinding that code switching is gov-erned by a grammatical structure.For example, Spanish and Englishdiffer in relation to how adjectivesare used. In English, the adjectiveprecedes the noun (e.g., I want agreen tomato). In Spanish, thenoun precedes the adjective (e.g.,quiero un tomate verde). Span-ish-English language switching canoccur between an adjective and anoun only if the adjective is placedaccording to the rules of the lan-guage of the adjective (Lederberg

& Morales, 1985). Thus, the sen-tence Pete wants a VERDE motor-cycle would be incorrect becausethe adjective should follow theSpanish grammatical structure.

A third problem concerning thishypothesis is that the notion of lan-

guage proficiency is not clearly de-fined. Do reading and writing takeprecedence over spoken language?Most language proficiency testsconsider written language the de-termining variable. However, it isnot clear whether reading andwriting language skills should takeprecedence over spoken language.This reliance on reading and writ-ing is problematic because most bi-linguals receive their formal educa-tion in one language although a

majority of their personal interac-tions take place in the other lan-guage. When their reading andwriting abilities are tested in bothlanguages, the language in whichthey received more formal educa-tion will usually fare better. For ex-ample, Spanish-English bilingualsin south Texas typically receivetheir formal education in English,and most of their personal interac-tion and communication withother bilinguals takes place in

Spanish or in both languages.When their reading and writingabilities are tested, these bilingualsappear less fluent and less profi-cient in Spanish. This disparity isnot due to their lack of knowledgeof Spanish, but due to a differentialin usage.

Finally, the notion that peoplecode-switch as a strategy in orderto be better understood is anotherplausible alternative. Some ideasare better communicated in onelanguage than another. For exam-ple, the Spanish word cario im-plies a combination of liking andaffection. Neither of these Englishwords alone truly conveys themeaning of the Spanish word.Thus, two Spanish-English bilingualsconversing in English would achievea greater level of understanding by

using this Spanish word if theywanted to refer to this concept.

IS CODE SWITCHING ATIME-CONSUMING

PROCESS?

A general finding in the bilin-gual literature is that sentencescontaining code-switched wordstake longer to read and compre-hend than monolingual sentences.In a classic study, French-English

bilinguals read both monolingualand mixed-language passages.Sentences in the monolingual con-dition were entirely in English or

French. In the mixed-language con-dition, the code-switched wordswere haphazardly in English orFrench, with some passages favor-ing the English and others favoringthe French grammatical structure.When bilinguals answered ques-tions about passages they read si-lently, no differences were found

between the code-switched and themonolingual sentences. However,when the participants read the sen-tences aloud, they were slower to

read the mixed-language passagesthan the monolingual ones (Kolers,1966). Although these findingshave been challenged on method-ological grounds, these resultshave been replicated using othermethodologies.

Why is code switching a time-consuming process? Macnamaraand Kushnir (1971) proposed that atwo switch mechanism deter-mines which of the bilinguals twomental lexicons will be on oroff during the course of languageprocessing. They viewed the inputswitch as functioning at lower lev-els of perception and the outputswitch as a higher-order mecha-nism that is under the bilingualsvoluntary control and responsiblefor the selection of the languageused in producing speech.



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According to this model, the in-put switch is responsible for select-ing the appropriate lexicon to beemployed during the comprehen-sion of a sentence. Although thisswitch is automatic and beyondvoluntary control, it takes an ob-

servable amount of time to operate.Thus, during the presentation of aspoken sentence, if the acoustic sig-nal matches English, this switch se-lects the English linguistic systemto process the sentence. One im-portant assumption is that once theEngl i sh l i ngu i s t i c sys te m i sturned on, the Spanish linguisticsystem is turned off. Because

both linguistic systems cannot beactive simultaneously, the process-ing of code-switched material is

slowed down.How is the input switch trig-

gered? Macnamara and Kushnir(1971) suggested that this mecha-nism relies on the distinctiveness ofthe linguistic code of each lan-guage. Thus, before selecting theappropriate lexicon, the bilingualanalyzes the incoming acoustic sig-nal at the lowest perceptual levelpossible (i.e., the phonetic level).Other researchers have suggestedthat the input switch may be regu-

lated by a continuous monitoringsystem that remains active duringlanguage processing. However, re-cent findings suggest that this in-put mechanism may function onlywhen bilinguals know what lan-guage to expect and when they aregiven enough time to activate theappropriate language.

Current research is more con-cerned than previous studies withstudying the on-line processing ofspoken language and identifyingsome of the factors influencing therecognition of code-switchedwords. For instance, the Englishlanguage allows both consonant-consonant (CC) and consonant-vowel (CV) clusters at the begin-ning of a word (e.g., flight vs.bear). Chinese, in contrast, al-lows CV clusters but lacks CC clus-

ters. Li (1996) found that this differ-ence in phonological structureaffected Chinese bilinguals pro-cessing of English code-switchedwords: They took longer to recog-nize English code-switched wordscontaining CC initial clusters than

those containing CV initial clusters.Other important factors reported toinfluence the recognition of code-switched words include context(e.g., semantic context), phonetics(e.g., whether the code-switchedword is pronounced according tothe phonetics of the first or secondlanguage), and homophonic over-lap (e.g., whether there are wordsthat are pronounced similarly)across the two languages. Discuss-ing whether or not code switching

is a time-consuming process, Li ar-gued that when experimental stud-ies utilize the appropriate method-ology and take into considerationsome of these factors, the resultsshow that recognizing code-switchedwords is no different from recog-nizing monolingual words.

BILINGUAL MEMORY

MODELS

An important limitation of theresearch on code switching is thelack of models from which to gen-erate testable research hypotheses.Currently, some investigators areaddressing this issue utilizingmodels that propose a bilingualstructure composed of separate butinterconnected language-specificlexicons (i.e., mental dictionaries)and a conceptual memory storethat contains information abouthow the world works (e.g., Kroll &Stewart, 1994). An important issuefor these models is the extent towhich the lexicons and the generalstore are interconnected.

Other models explain bilingualmemory by referring to specificfeatures of various word types

(e.g., De Groot, 1993). These mod-els emphasize the relationships be-tween words across languages.Concrete words (e.g., house) aremore likely than abstract words(e.g., faith) to share a number ofsemantic features across lan-

guages; therefore, concrete wordswill have similar meaning acrosslanguages. Because abstract wordsoverlap less, they are more likely tohave language-specific meanings.To date, these models have beenmost successful in explaining find-ings from studies involving wordtranslation and differences be-tween abstract and concrete words.Unfortunately, these models can-not be easily extended to explainthe process involved in code

switching across languages.However, certain connectionist,

or network, models that assumemany language-processing activi-ties occur simultaneously deservespecial mention. The bilingualmodel of lexical access (Lwy &Grosjean, 2000) was designed tosimulate the ongoing processesthat occur during the recognitionof a code-switched word. Thismodel relies on the assumptionthat during the course of spoken-

language recognition, the incomingsignals activate phonemes, whichin turn activate words. How thephonemes and words from the ap-propriate language are recognizeddepends on the preceding contextand the phonological structure ofthe language. Thus, according tothese models, the bilinguals twolanguages can be activated or deac-tivated to different degrees de-pending on the similarities or dif-ferences between the two languagesunder consideration (e.g., Li, 1996).

LANGUAGE DOMINANCE

One important shortcoming ofmost models and general accounts



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CURRENT DIRECTIONS IN PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE 167

of bilingualism is that they rely onthe assumption that the bilingualsfirst language has special status.Some models (e.g., Kroll & Stewart,1994) depict the first-language lexi-con as bigger and containing moreinformation than the second-lan-

guage lexicon. As a consequence,the first language is always ac-cessed faster, and is always the pri-mary language. Given this argu-ment, one would expect that codeswitching would take place onlywhen the bilingual is speaking thesecond language. That is, bilin-guals would experience more first-language interference as they com-municate in their second languagethan second-language interferenceas they communicate in their first

language. This would be becauseof their limited knowledge of theirsecond language. Although thismay be the case for beginning bi-linguals, Spanish-English bilin-guals in south Texas report moreEnglish interference when theycommunicate in Spanish, and littleor no interference from Spanishwhen they communicate in En-glish. In other words, these bilin-guals code-switch more when theycommunicate in Spanish than

when they use English.Are these observations sup-

ported by research? In a recentstudy, Spanish-English bilingualslistened to English sentences (e.g.,It is difficult to admit that a WARsometimes brings profits) andtheir Spanish translations. Immedi-ately after the critical word (e.g.,war or guerra) in each sen-tence, the participants named a vi-sually presented English or Span-ish target word that was eitherrelated (peace, paz) or unre-lated (light, luz) to the criticalword. The results showed that bi-linguals were faster to name En-glish target words while listeningto Spanish sentences than to nameSpanish words while listening toEnglish sentences. Also, when lis-tening to English sentences, bilin-

guals retrieved English wordsfaster than Spanish words, as ex-pected. In fact, participants werefaster to retrieve English thanSpanish words in all conditionseven when listening to Spanishsentences (Heredia, 2000a). These

results suggest a reliance on thesecond language rather than thefirst language. They seem some-what counterintuitive if we assumethat the bilinguals first language isthe reference, or base, language. IfSpanish were the bilinguals baselanguage, they should have beenfaster to access words in Spanishthan in English. Likewise, theyshould have been faster to accessSpanish words than English wordsas they listened to English sen-

tences.How can these results be ex-

plained? We suggest that after acertain level of fluency and fre-quency of use is attained in a sec-ond language, a language shift oc-curs and the second language

behaves as if it were the bilingualsfirst language. In other words, thesecond language becomes morereadily accessible than the first lan-guage, and the bilingual comes torely more on it. Other studies have

had similar findings (e.g., Altarriba,1992, 2000; Heredia, 1997), lendingsupport for this interpretation.

What is the mechanism underly-ing this language shift? One possi-

bility is that it is due to frequencyof language usage. That is, regard-less of which language a bilinguallearned first, perhaps the more ac-tive (dominant) language deter-mines which lexicon is accessedfaster (Heredia, 1997). Consider thecase of most Spanish-English bilin-guals in the United States. Al-though their first language is Span-ish, they obtain most of theirformal education in English. Like-wise, many of their everyday inter-actions involve English. As a re-sult, the words and concepts ofEnglish become more readily ac-cessible than the words and con-

cepts of Spanish. An implication ofthis interpretation is that duringearly stages of bilingualism, when

bi linguals tend to re ly more ontheir first language, their codeswitching would mostly involveintrusions from their first language

as they communicate in their sec-ond language. However, as the sec-ond language becomes the domi-nant language, their code switchingwould tend to consist of intrusionsfrom the second language as theycommunicate in their first lan-guage. In short, we suggest thatlanguage dominance plays an im-portant role in how bilinguals ac-cess their two languages. We arguethat bilingual lexical representationis not a static but a dynamic repre-

sentational system in which thefirst language can fall in strength,while the second language be-comes the dominant language.

CONCLUSIONS ANDFUTURE DIRECTIONS

The research we have reviewedsuggests that language accessibilitymay be the key factor in code switch-

ing. Bilinguals switch languageswhenever a word in a base languageis not currently accessible. At issue iswhether or not this switch is time-consuming. Although some evi-dence suggests that languageswitching is strategic and occursonly when bilinguals have enoughtime to select the appropriate lexi-con, empirical research is needed toclarify the linguistic as well as thepsycholinguistic factors influencingthis language switch.

Although significant progresshas been made in formulating mod-els of bilingual memory, it is un-clear how these models can be ap-plied to code switching. Theoreticalwork is needed to explain how the

bilinguals two linguistic systemsinteract. For example, why is it that

bilinguals experience interference



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across languages while processingthem, and, simultaneously, have theability to keep the languages sepa-rate? Is the input switch a viableconstruct? Theories explaining howlanguages are integrated and howthey remain separate should pro-

vide the foundation for research onhow switching occurs in normal,spoken language.

Finally, applied research (e.g., Al-tarriba & Santiago-Rivera, 1994) hasrevealed that code switching is oftenused strategically in counseling set-tings, as clients choose to speak in asecond language when trying to dis-tance themselves from emotionalevents. Because the first language isoften associated with a broaderrange of emotions than the second

language, language switching be-comes a defense mechanism. Furtherresearch should address how code-switching techniques might providean effective means of directing theaccess of information from memo-ries of different emotional content.

Recommended Reading

Altarriba, J., Kroll, J.F., Sholl, A., &Rayner, K. (1996). The influence of

lexical and conceptual constraintson reading mixed-language sen-tences: Evidence from eye fixa-tions and naming times.Memory& Cognition

, 24

, 477492.Grosjean, F. (1988). Exploring the rec-

ognition of guest words in bilin-gual speech. Language and Cognitive

Processes

, 3

, 233274.Myers-Scotton, C. (1993). Social moti-vation for code switching: Evidence

fro m Af ri ca

. Oxford, England:Clarendon.

Note

1. Address correspondence to Rob-erto R. Heredia, Psychology and Soci-o l ogy Depar tment , Texas A&MInternational University, Laredo, TX78041-1900.

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Altarriba, J. (1992). The representation of transla-tion equivalents in bilingual memory. In R.J.Harris (Ed.), Cognitive processing in bilinguals

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Altarriba, J. (2000). Language processing andmemory retrieval in Spanish-English bilin-guals. Spanish Applied Linguistics

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Altarriba, J., & Santiago-Rivera, A.L. (1994). Cur-rent perspectives on using linguistic and cul-tural factors in counseling the Hispanic client.

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