My current postdoctoral research explores how Portuguese-English bilinguals process motion lexicalization patterns in their foreign language (L2). This experimental study investigates how conceptual differences between languages influence real-time language processing during reading tasks.

This project builds on my doctoral research at UFPEL, which examined conceptual transfer in bilinguals’ oral descriptions of motion events. The current phase was initiated during my research visit to the Centre for Advanced Research in Experimental and Applied Linguistics - ARIEAL at McMaster University, Canada, where I developed and piloted the experimental design in collaboration with Dr. Daniel Schmidtke.

The study employs a self-paced reading paradigm to analyze how bilinguals process different motion event patterns. These include structures typical of English (a satellite-framed language), Portuguese (a verb-framed language), and hybrid forms combining elements of both languages. Participants’ reading times are measured to understand how linguistic proficiency and other factors influences their processing of these patterns.

Currently based in the Laboratory of Psycholinguistics, Minority Languages and Multilingualism at UFPEL, the project involves data collection from an experimental group of Portuguese-English bilinguals in Brazil and a control group of L1 English speakers in Canada. Statistical analyses are going to performed using advanced modeling techniques to investigate the interplay between linguistic proficiency and conceptual restructuring.

This research contributes to understanding bilingual cognition and offers insights into second language acquisition, with implications for language teaching strategies that address conceptual differences between Portuguese and English. 

Below, a generic example of the self-paced reading experiment: