Dual coding and bilingual memory

Abstract

Two experiments compared the effects of verbal—nonverbal and bilingual dual coding on recall. Experiment 1 required French—English bilinguals to code a mixed list of pictures, French words, and English words by writing the English names of the pictures, translating the French words, and copying the English words. The participants were then asked unexpectedly to recall the generated English words. Experiment 2 reversed the coding task in that bilinguals were presented only English words along with coding cues that prompted them to sketch the refrents of one-third of the items, translate another third into French, and copy a third. The incidental memory test in this case required the participants to free recall the English words they had been presented. Both experiments showed that item recall increased significantly from unilingual to bilingual to verbal—nonverbal dual coding. The results favored a bilingual version of dual-coding theory over levels-of-processing and generation-effort interpretations.