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The construct of language proficiency in the study of bilingualism from a cognitive perspective*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 March 2012

JAN H. HULSTIJN
JAN H. HULSTIJN*
Affiliation:
Amsterdam Center for Language and Communication, University of Amsterdam
*
Address for correspondence: Amsterdam Center for Language and Communication, University of Amsterdam, Spuistraat 134, 1012 VB Amsterdam, the Netherlandsj.h.hulstijn@uva.nl
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Abstract

This article aims at revitalizing the debate concerning the measurement of language proficiency (LP) in the study of bilingualism (Grosjean, 1998). A review is presented of the way in which LP was measured in a corpus of 140 empirical papers published in volumes 1–14 (1998–2011) of the journal Bilingualism: Language and Cognition. In 55% of these papers, in which the assessment of LP as an independent or moderating variable was a necessary or preferred requirement, LP was not measured with an objective LP test. Seldom were participants’ LP scores used in explaining variance obtained in the dependent variable(s). After the discussion of some unresolved problems concerning cross-language comparisons of LP in bilinguals’ languages, recommendations are offered for the measurement of LP. One of the recommendations is that, in studies investigating between-group contrasts, researchers carefully consider the assessment of participants’ proficiency in the language(s) concerned, even in native-speaker comparison groups.

Keywords

bilingualismlanguage proficiencylanguage dominancenative speaker
Type
Opinion
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , April 2012 , pp. 422 - 433
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

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Footnotes

*

Work on this paper was funded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (grant 360-70-230).

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