Theme 1: Language and Communication

Cognitive and Developmental Aspects of Multilingualism

Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour

The PI-group investigates how languages act and interact in the brain of monolinguals and multilinguals at lexical, morphosyntactic, and semantic levels.

By studying the acquisition, processing, control, and attrition of languages during the life-span, (psycho)linguistic mechanisms underlying monolingual and multilingual language use are clarified. Behavioral, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging methods are applied to inform (non-)computational models of language use (such as BIA+ and MULTILINK), and to relate multilingual theories to monolingual theories.

Special attention is paid to societally-relevant topics, such as foreign language learning, (word) translation, and the relation between embodiedness and emotion to language use by monolinguals and multilinguals.

Contact
Name:	Ton Dijkstra
Telephone:	024-3615639
Email:	ton.dijkstra@donders.ru.nl
Visiting address:	Donders Centre for Cognition Thomas van Aquinostraat 4 6525 GD Nijmegen The Netherlands
Postal address:	Donders Centre for Cognition P.O. Box 9104 6500 HE Nijmegen The Netherlands

Key publications

Lam, K. J. Y., Bastiaansen, M. C. M., Dijkstra, T., &
Rueschemeyer, S-A. (2016). Making sense: Motor activation
and action plausibility during sentence processing.
Language, Cognition, & Neuroscience. doi:10.1080/23273798.2016.1164323.

Sianipar, A., Middelburg, R., & Dijkstra, T. (2015). When
feelings arise with meanings: How emotion and meaning
of a native language affect second language processing
in adult learners. PLoS ONE, 10(12): e0144576. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0144576.

Bultena, S., Dijkstra, T., & Van Hell, J.G. (2015). Language
switch costs in sentence comprehension depend on language
dominance: Evidence from self-paced reading. Bilingualism:
Language and Cognition, 18, 453-469.
DOI:10.1017/S1366728914000145.

Dijkstra, T., Van Hell, J. G., & Brenders, P. (2015).
Sentence context effects in bilingual word recognition:
cognate processing, sentence language, and semantic constraint. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 18, 597-613.

Bruin, A.M.T. de, Roelofs, A.P.A., Dijkstra, T., &
FitzPatrick, I. (2014). Domain-general inhibition areas
of the brain are involved in language switching: fMRI
evidence from trilingual speakers. NeuroImage, 90, 348–359.

Back to:
Theme 1:
Language and Communication

Research Group
Cognitive and Developmental Aspects of Multilingualism

Principal Investigator
Prof. dr. Ton Dijkstra
Prof. dr. Rob Schoonen
Dr. Sharon Unsworth (CLS)

Senior Researchers
dr. Sybrine Bultena
dr. Stefan Frank
dr. Ferdy Hubers
Jeske Klatter
dr. Eva Knopp
dr. Gerrit Jan Kootstra

Group members

PhD's
Lukas Ansteeg
Peta Baxter
Jan Willem Chevalking
Chantal van Dijk
Figen Karaca
Elly Koutamanis
Saskia Mooijman
Tineke Prins
Josh Ring
Xiaoru Yu