Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control
Despite the increase in studies on Spanish as a heritage language (SHL), few focus on spelling, with research limited to the U.S. According to the adaptive control hypothesis, language production is governed by control processes, which adapt to the demands of real-world interactional contexts. In th...
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MDPI AG
2025-05-01
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| author | Alicia Mariscal |
| author_facet | Alicia Mariscal |
| author_sort | Alicia Mariscal |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Despite the increase in studies on Spanish as a heritage language (SHL), few focus on spelling, with research limited to the U.S. According to the adaptive control hypothesis, language production is governed by control processes, which adapt to the demands of real-world interactional contexts. In this article, these control processes are inferred from the interlingual spelling errors observed in Gibraltarian SHL speakers. The hypothesis is that the Gibraltar dense code-switching context will be manifested in a high number of interlingual misspellings in Spanish due to English interference. Misspellings were identified in the written productions of a sample of 80 Gibraltarian pre-college SHL students (N = 40 in Spanish; N = 40 in English), collected via availability tests and stored in the Dispolex dataset by the members of the project “Lenguas en contacto y disponibilidad léxica: la situación lingüística e intercultural de Ceuta y Gibraltar”. Gibraltarians’ Spanish misspellings were then compared with those found in the U.S. The high percentage of spelling errors in SHL students in Gibraltar might be explained in light of lower inhibitory control of interferences in dense code-switching interactional contexts. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-4093ce1de7c5434fabe8cea3343e462d |
| institution | Kabale University |
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| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-05-01 |
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| series | Languages |
| spelling | doaj-art-4093ce1de7c5434fabe8cea3343e462d2025-08-20T03:27:14ZengMDPI AGLanguages2226-471X2025-05-0110612610.3390/languages10060126Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference ControlAlicia Mariscal0Institute of Applied Linguistics (ILA), University of Cádiz, 11003 Cádiz, SpainDespite the increase in studies on Spanish as a heritage language (SHL), few focus on spelling, with research limited to the U.S. According to the adaptive control hypothesis, language production is governed by control processes, which adapt to the demands of real-world interactional contexts. In this article, these control processes are inferred from the interlingual spelling errors observed in Gibraltarian SHL speakers. The hypothesis is that the Gibraltar dense code-switching context will be manifested in a high number of interlingual misspellings in Spanish due to English interference. Misspellings were identified in the written productions of a sample of 80 Gibraltarian pre-college SHL students (N = 40 in Spanish; N = 40 in English), collected via availability tests and stored in the Dispolex dataset by the members of the project “Lenguas en contacto y disponibilidad léxica: la situación lingüística e intercultural de Ceuta y Gibraltar”. Gibraltarians’ Spanish misspellings were then compared with those found in the U.S. The high percentage of spelling errors in SHL students in Gibraltar might be explained in light of lower inhibitory control of interferences in dense code-switching interactional contexts.https://www.mdpi.com/2226-471X/10/6/126adaptive control hypothesiserror analysisGibraltarinhibitory controlinterferenceorthographic processing |
| spellingShingle | Alicia Mariscal Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control Languages adaptive control hypothesis error analysis Gibraltar inhibitory control interference orthographic processing |
| title | Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control |
| title_full | Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control |
| title_fullStr | Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control |
| title_full_unstemmed | Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control |
| title_short | Orthographic Processing of Spanish as a Heritage Language in Gibraltar: The Role of Interactional Context in Interference Control |
| title_sort | orthographic processing of spanish as a heritage language in gibraltar the role of interactional context in interference control |
| topic | adaptive control hypothesis error analysis Gibraltar inhibitory control interference orthographic processing |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2226-471X/10/6/126 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT aliciamariscal orthographicprocessingofspanishasaheritagelanguageingibraltartheroleofinteractionalcontextininterferencecontrol |