English Loanwords in Norwegian: A Loanword Processing Study in Young Speakers of Norwegian

Abstract

Using loanwords in everyday speech is something most people do on a daily basis. This project examines, which factors come into play when processing loanwords. A test sample of 40 university students was tested on the processing of English loanwords used in Norwegian, using a lexical decision task. The two dependent variables of this project were reaction times, and accuracy. The results of the project showed that the most salient factors in processing English loanwords in Norwegian was the subjective native speaker rating on how Norwegian the loanword was perceived to be, the frequency of its usage, the level of English language competence and the length of the word. The results from this project highlight which factors play a role in the processing of English loanwords in Norwegian.