Universal structures and their functions in bilingual mental lexicon

The paper presents a research of universal structures and their functioning in the mental lexicon of an adult, studying L2 in classroom conditions. Bilingual mental lexicon is modeled in form of associative-verbal network on the basis of the materials of word association tests with native Russian-speaking subjects at different levels of their English language proficiency (beginner level and intermediate level). A universal structure is represented by a local grouping of nodes, expressed by different language code and characterized by integral meaning, which is distributed along two between-node connections. Universal structures preserve their stability in the mental lexicon at different levels of L2 proficiency; are formed in the direction from the surface linguistic level to the deep conceptual one; fulfill the connecting, integrative and mediating functions and provide for the processes of inter-lingual interaction of L1 and L2 in the network.