Learning to read Chinese: Cognitive consequences of cross-language and writing system differences

The Chinese language includes a number of varieties or dialects of the language. Mandarin, the most widely spoken Chinese language, forms the basis for Standard Mandarin, or Putonghua. Putonghua serves as the national lingua franca in China and is the official form of Chinese that is used as the language of instruction in schools in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). As such, it is also a second language for the many speakers of Chinese dialects other than Mandarin. Therefore, the language described as Chinese in this chapter is Mandarin unless otherwise noted.