For more than a decade, research on heritage speakers’ (HSs’) mood selection has documented a high degree of variability in their interpretation and use of mood morphology in variable contexts. Most of the previous literature, however, has focused on late-acquired alternations, and often limited analyses to one form (i.e., subjunctive), making it difficult to draw conclusions about HSs’ knowledge of mood distinctions. This study intends to fill this gap by examining Spanish HSs’ (n = 76) and Spanish-dominant controls’ (n = 25) interpretation and use of an early acquired mood alternation, where the presence of indicative or subjunctive conveys the report of an assertion or a command. Results from two experimental tasks reveal that, even though HSs’ performance tends to differ from that of controls’—especially at lower levels of proficiency—the nature and extent of their divergences suggests the need to embrace a more nuanced analysis of HSs’ linguistic outcomes when examining modal contrasts.

十多年来，对传统说话者（HSs）情绪选择的研究记录了他们在不同语境中对情绪形态的解释和使用的高度可变性。然而，以前的大多数文献都集中在后期获得的交替上，并且经常将分析限制在一种形式（即虚拟语气）上，因此很难得出关于 HS 对情绪差异的了解的结论。本研究旨在通过检查西班牙 HSs' ( n = 76) 和以西班牙为主的对照' ( n =25）解释和使用早期获得的情绪变化，其中指示性或虚拟语气的存在传达了断言或命令的报告。两项实验任务的结果表明，尽管 HS 的表现往往与对照组的表现有所不同——尤其是在熟练程度较低的情况下——它们差异的性质和程度表明需要对 HS 的语言结果进行更细致的分析在检查模态对比时。