Tzeng, A. K.
Chung Yuan Christian University
Whorfian hypothesis (SWH) proposes a systematic relationship between grammatical categories of a language and the way the users understand the world. SWH is robust but sometimes misleading (Martin, 1986; Pullman, 1991). Kay has done extensive work using color names. The purpose of current study was to further investigate color SWH with Mandarin-English bilinguals. Mandarin and English differ significantly in their composition rules to form color terms. Three experiments were conducted. In Study one, more Stroop interference was found in L1 than L2. In study two, participants were to categorically judge two color patches presented simultaneously. In study three, participants were to decide color categories of congruent color words in L1 and L2. As expected, behavioral and ERP results both showed no difference in study two. Larger N400 was found in L1 than L2 in study three. We then concluded SWH was accounted for by the difference of the two languages.