Text Comprehension in Monolingual and Bilingual Adult Readers

The present study examined whether University students who learned English as a second language differed from English monolingual students on their ability to detect inconsistent content in short informational texts about animals. Adults completed a self-paced reading task, performed text recalls, and completed a True/False test. Half of the texts contained information in the 5th sentence that contradicted the 2nd sentence’s information (inconsistent condition). The other half did not contain any contradictions (consistent condition). Participants also completed language and cognitive tasks as individual differences measures. Results revealed a significant interaction between language group and consistency, wherein monolingual adults spent more time processing the 5th sentence when the text contained a contradiction than when it did not, suggesting that they noticed the conflict. In contrast, bilingual adults did not differ in their processing of the two types of texts. This group difference remained when the groups were equated on English vocabulary knowledge. Findings are discussed in terms of individual differences in encoding and retrieving information during text processing and in terms of the potential impact on educational success