The present study was aimed to compare the semantic systems accessed by the lexicon between L1 and L2 in Korean-English late bilinguals. The participants performed the word-picture matching task. The functional MR imaging technique was adapted to examine brain activation involved in the task performance. The task was to decide whether the pictures presented after the words represent the words' meaning or not. The basic level words in L1 and L2 were selected. The stimuli were consisted of common object belonged to two different semantic categories (naturals and artificials). In the L1, the naturals evoked activations mostly in the visual processing association areas. On the other hand, artificials recruited areas related to object manipulation. These results suggest that the semantic knowledge of L1 is represented systematically in the brain according to the categories (natural and artificial). In the case of the L2, however, similar pattern of activation was seen for both semantic categories, demonstrating that the L2 semantic system seems to be undifferentiated. In summary, the results of the current study showed the differences in the organization of semantic representations in the brain through the bilinguals' two languages. While L1 semantic knowledge might be more systematically organized, the one of L2 seems to be less well organized and working memory system has to be strongly involved to do the presented task, at least by late bilinguals who participated in the present study.
1. 들어가는 말
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4. 종합 논의
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