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Research papers on Bilingualism and cognition

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  1. Bilingualism, Aging, and Cognitive Control: Evidence From the Simon Task.

    Ellen Bialystok, Fergus I. M. Craik, Raymond M. Klein, et al. · 2004 · Psychology and Aging · 1,618 citations

    Previous work has shown that bilingualism is associated with more effective controlled processing in children; the assumption is that the constant management of 2 competing languages enhances executive functions (E. Bialystok, 2001). The present research attempted to determine whether this bilingual advantage persists for adults and whether bilingualism attenuates the negative effects of aging on cognitive control in older adults. Three studies are reported that compared the performance of monolingual and bilingual middle-aged and older adults on the Simon task. Bilingualism was associated with smaller Simon effect costs for both age groups; bilingual participants also responded more rapidly

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  2. Bilingual experience and executive functioning in young children

    Stephanie M. Carlson, Andrew N. Meltzoff · 2008 · Developmental Science · 1,050 citations

    Advanced inhibitory control skills have been found in bilingual speakers as compared to monolingual controls (Bialystok, 1999). We examined whether this effect is generalized to an unstudied language group (Spanish-English bilingual) and multiple measures of executive function by administering a battery of tasks to 50 kindergarten children drawn from three language groups: native bilinguals, monolinguals (English), and English speakers enrolled in second-language immersion kindergarten. Despite having significantly lower verbal scores and parent education/income level, Spanish-English bilingual children's raw scores did not differ from their peers. After statistically controlling for these f

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  3. Cognitive control and lexical access in younger and older bilinguals.

    Ellen Bialystok, Fergus I. M. Craik, Gigi Luk · 2008 · Journal of Experimental Psychology Learning Memory and Cognition · 924 citations

    Ninety-six participants, who were younger (20 years) or older (68 years) adults and either monolingual or bilingual, completed tasks assessing working memory, lexical retrieval, and executive control. Younger participants performed most of the tasks better than older participants, confirming the effect of aging on these processes. The effect of language group was different for each type of task: Monolinguals and bilinguals performed similarly on working memory tasks, monolinguals performed better on lexical retrieval tasks, and bilinguals performed better on executive control tasks, with some evidence for larger language group differences in older participants on the executive control tasks.

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  4. Is bilingualism associated with enhanced executive functioning in adults? A meta-analytic review.

    Minna Lehtonen, Anna Soveri, Aini Laine, et al. · 2018 · Psychological Bulletin · 635 citations

    Because of enduring experience of managing two languages, bilinguals have been argued to develop superior executive functioning compared with monolinguals. Despite extensive investigation, there is, however, no consensus regarding the existence of such a bilingual advantage. Here we synthesized comparisons of bilinguals' and monolinguals' performance in six executive domains using 891 effect sizes from 152 studies on adults. We also included unpublished data, and considered the potential influence of a number of study-, task-, and participant-related variables. Before correcting estimates for observed publication bias, our analyses revealed a very small bilingual advantage for inhibition, sh

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  5. Musical expertise, bilingualism, and executive functioning.

    Ellen Bialystok, Anne-Marie R. DePape · 2009 · Journal of Experimental Psychology Human Perception & Performance · 437 citations

    The authors investigated whether intensive musical experience leads to enhancements in executive processing, as has been shown for bilingualism. Young adults who were bilinguals, musical performers (instrumentalists or vocalists), or neither completed 3 cognitive measures and 2 executive function tasks based on conflict. Both executive function tasks included control conditions that assessed performance in the absence of conflict. All participants performed equivalently for the cognitive measures and the control conditions of the executive function tasks, but performance diverged in the conflict conditions. In a version of the Simon task involving spatial conflict between a target cue and it

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  6. Bilingualism and the Development of Executive Function: The Role of Attention

    Ellen Bialystok · 2015 · Child Development Perspectives · 375 citations

    This paper reviews research examining the effect of bilingualism on children's cognitive development, and in particular, executive function. Studies reporting bilingual advantages in various tasks are described with the purpose of identifying the process or executive function component that might be responsible for this bilingual advantage. Several possibilities are discussed, such as inhibitory control. Finally, the role of attention is proposed as a fundamental process that initiates developmental differences in bilingual children from as early as infancy.

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  9. Executive Control in Bilingual Language Processing

    Antoni Rodríguez‐Fornells, Ruth de Diego‐Balaguer, Thomas Frank Münte · 2006 · Language Learning · 185 citations

    Little is known in cognitive neuroscience about the brain mechanisms and brain representations involved in bilingual language processing. On the basis of previous studies on switching and bilingualism, it has been proposed that executive functions are engaged in the control and regulation of the languages in use. Here, we review the existing evidence regarding the implication of executive functions in bilingual processing using event‐related brain potentials and functional magnetic resonance imaging. Several brain potential experiments have shown an increased negativity at frontocentral areas in bilinguals, probably related to the activation of medial prefrontal regions, for different tasks,

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  10. Musical training, bilingualism, and executive function: working memory and inhibitory control

    A. D’Souza, L. Moradzadeh, M. Wiseheart · 2018 · Cognitive Research · 68 citations

    The current study investigated whether long-term experience in music or a second language is associated with enhanced cognitive functioning. Early studies suggested the possibility of a cognitive advantage from musical training and bilingualism but have failed to be replicated by recent findings. Further, each form of expertise has been independently investigated leaving it unclear whether any benefits are specifically caused by each skill or are a result of skill learning in general. To assess whether cognitive benefits from training exist, and how unique they are to each training domain, the current study compared musicians and bilinguals to each other, plus to individuals who had expertis

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  11. Early Executive Function: The Influence of Culture and Bilingualism

    Crystal D. Tran, Maria M. Arredondo, Hanako Yoshida · 2018 · Bilingualism (Cambridge, England) · 57 citations

    Evidence suggests that cultural experiences and learning multiple languages have measurable effects on children's development of executive function (EF). However, the precise impact of how bilingualism and culture contribute to observed effects remains inconclusive. The present study aims to investigate how these factors shape the development of early EF constructs longitudinally, between monolingual and bilingual children at ages 3, 3½ and 4 years, with a set of EF tasks that are uniquely relevant to the effects of bilingualism and cultural practices. We hypothesize that the effects of bilingualism and cultural backgrounds (i.e., Eastern) are based on different, though related, cognitive co

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  12. Alerting, Orienting, and Executive Control: The Effect of Bilingualism and Age on the Subcomponents of Attention

    Tanya Dash, P. Berroir, Y. Joanette, et al. · 2019 · Frontiers in Neurology · 54 citations

    Life-long experience of using two or more languages has been shown to enhance cognitive control abilities in young and elderly bilinguals in comparison to their monolingual peers. This advantage has been found to be larger in older adults in comparison to younger adults, suggesting that bilingualism provides advantages in cognitive control abilities. However, studies showing this effect have used a variety of tasks (Simon Task, Stroop task, Flanker Task), each measuring different subcomponents of attention and raising mixed results. At the same time, attention is not a unitary function but comprises of subcomponents which can be distinctively addressed within the Attention Network Test (ANT)

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  13. Second language acquisition of grammatical rules: The effects of learning condition, rule difficulty, and executive function

    Marta Rivera, D. Paolieri, Antonio Iniesta, et al. · 2023 · Bilingualism: Language and Cognition · 15 citations

    Learning a new language is an important goal that many individuals find difficult to achieve, particularly during adulthood. Several factors have related this variability to different extrinsic (learning condition, difficulty of the materials) and intrinsic (cognitive abilities) factors, but the interaction between them is barely known. In two experiments, participants learned English grammar rules in intentional (Experiment 1) or explicit (Experiment 2), and incidental learning-contexts. Overall, results of this study indicated that intentional-explicit conditions benefitted rule-learning, as compared to incidental conditions. This benefit was mainly present when participants were learnin

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  14. Degree of bilingualism and executive function in early childhood

    M. V. H. Nguyen, Lindsey A. Hutchison, Gabrielle Norvell, et al. · 2023 · Language and Cognition · 14 citations

    This study explores the relationship between executive functioning (EF) and degree of bilingualism in a sample (N = 79) of 5- to 7-year-old monolingual and bilingual children. The bilingual group included children who are fully fluent in two languages (balanced bilinguals) and children who are still learning their second language (dual-language learners (DLLs). In general, findings revealed mixed associations between bilingualism and EF. There were no language group differences for one type of simple inhibitory control (i.e., go or no-go task). However, a bilingual advantage was demonstrated for another type of simple inhibitory control (the Head–Toes–Knees–Shoulders task), for complex inh

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  15. Cognitive Control and Bilingualism: The Bilingual Advantage Through the Lens of Dimensional Overlap

    Melodie Bellegarda, P. Macizo · 2021 · Frontiers in Psychology · 11 citations

    Past research shows that the bilingual experience may enhance cognitive executive function. In this experiment, we evaluated cognitive control in bilinguals relative to monolinguals by using a dimensional overlap model to predict performance in a task composed of Stroop and Simon stimuli. A group of 24 Spanish monolinguals and 24 bilinguals with differing first languages and all having Spanish as a second language (L2) did a picture naming task and a task composed of Stroop and Simon stimuli, where the effect of different overlap conditions (spatial/color) between stimuli and responses were examined. The tasks were performed in Spanish for both groups and performance was indexed with behavio

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  16. Effects of Bilingualism on Cognitive Processing

    C. Mackenzie · 2024 · European Journal of Linguistics · 5 citations

    Purpose: The general purpose of the study was to examine the effects of bilingualism on cognitive processing. Methodology: The study adopted a desktop research methodology. Desk research refers to secondary data or that which can be collected without fieldwork. Desk research is basically involved in collecting data from existing resources hence it is often considered a low cost technique as compared to field research, as the main cost is involved in executive’s time, telephone charges and directories. Thus, the study relied on already published studies, reports and statistics. This secondary data was easily accessed through the online journals and library. Findings: The findings reveal tha

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  17. Language switching ability and executive function development in English learners: a longitudinal investigation of bilingual cognitive control

    Shuai Wang · 2025 · BMC Psychology · 5 citations

    This longitudinal study examines the developmental relationships between language switching ability and executive function components in English learners across multiple proficiency levels. Drawing on bilingual cognitive control theory, we investigated how working memory, inhibitory control, and cognitive flexibility interact with language switching performance over an 18-month period. Participants (N = 266) completed comprehensive assessments of language switching tasks, executive function measures, and English proficiency tests at six time points. Results revealed systematic improvements in both language switching efficiency and executive function performance, with switching costs and mixi

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  18. Is dialect proficiency associated with improved executive function?

    A. Privitera · 2024 · Applied Psycholinguistics · 3 citations

    A broad and extensive literature has investigated the cognitive consequences of bilingualism on cognitive control. Results from these studies, while controversial, support the conclusion that speaking a second language confers non-linguistic benefits. Whether other related linguistic experiences, such as dialect use, confer similar benefits remains an underexplored and open question. The common use of a diverse range of local dialects across China provides ideal conditions under which to explore this question. Using a dialectally heterogeneous sample of Mandarin-English bilingual young adults (n = 74), the present study investigated whether differences in dialect proficiency impacted on in

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  19. Effects of Bilingualism on Executive Function of Children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders: A Scoping Review

    H. Yuen, Haoyan Ge, Caicai Zhang, et al. · 2025 · Children · 1 citations

    Highlights What are the main findings? Compared with their monolingual peers, bilingual children with ASD show advantages in working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibitory control on performance-based tasks. The evidence is limited to ASD, with no studies found on other neurodevelopmental disorders, such as ADHD or dyslexia, highlighting a research gap. Inconsistencies exist between performance-based and parent-reported executive function measures, with bilingual participants performing better in laboratory tasks. What is the implication of the main finding? Bilingualism may be beneficial for specific executive function skills in children with ASD, suggesting potential complementary v

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  20. The impact of bilingualism and code-switching on executive function performance

    Basak Özkara, R. Schneider, Gülay Cedden, et al. · 2025 · Frontiers in Psychology · 1 citations

    Bilingualism, characterized by the use of two or more languages, places unique demands on executive functions (EFs), which are essential for managing cross-linguistic interference. This study investigates EF performance in Turkish-German bilinguals and German monolinguals across five domains: response inhibiton, working memory, task-switching, interference control, and attention. Additionally, the influence of habitual code-switching behavior on EF outcomes in bilinguals was explored using a novel scene description game designed to elicit naturalistic code-switching patterns, which approximate participants’ habitual bilingual language use. Results revealed that bilinguals outperformed monoli

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  21. The bilingual effect on cognitive development: not an executive function advantage, but a differentiation of mental abilities

    Elisavet Chrysochoou, A. B. Vivas, Likane Cana, et al. · 2021 · Journal of Cognitive Psychology · 1 citations

    ABSTRACT Adopting a different theoretical framework from the one dominating the field, this study explored bilingualism influences on the development and differentiation of mental abilities. Albanian-Turkish bilingual (N = 122) and Albanian-speaking monolingual (N = 129) children, adolescents, and adults were assessed on monitoring, inhibitory control, processing efficiency, fluid reasoning, and vocabulary, and were asked to specify their own language efficiency (a cognizance index). Analyses showed a bilingual advantage in monitoring—adjusting for any fluid reasoning effects—which was larger in children. Moreover, a more pronounced bilingual benefit was observed for the incongruent conditio

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  22. Executive Function Performance in Bilingual and Monolingual Individuals with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): a Comparative Analysis of Cold (Inhibitory Control and Cognitive Flexibility) and Hot (Theory of Mind) Executive Functions

    Hossein Mehrafshan, Mehdi Purmohammad · 2026 · Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology

    OBJECTIVE: This research had three main objectives. The first objective was to compare the performance of individuals with ADHD and normal individuals in hot (theory of mind) and cold (cognitive flexibility and inhibitory control) executive functions. The second objective was to compare hot and cold executive functions in bilingual and monolingual individuals. The third objective of the study was to examine the interactive effect of bilingualism and ADHD on hot and cold executive functions. METHODS: To conduct the research, a variety of tools were employed, including the language experience and proficiency questionnaire, socio-economic status questionnaire (SES), Conners' Adult ADHD Rating S

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  23. Neural recruitment of inhibitory control in executive function among monolingual and bilingual preterm-born children: An fNIRS study

    Ashley Darcy Mahoney, Wei-Chiang Lin, Noble Amadi, et al. · 2026 · Bilingualism: Language and Cognition

    Preterm-born children are at increased risk for executive function (EF) deficits, particularly in inhibitory control. While bilingualism has been linked to enhanced EF in term-born children, its effects on preterm populations are less understood. This study explored whether bilingualism supports inhibitory control in preterm-born children using behavioral and functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) data during a Go/No-Go task. Sixteen preterm-born children (ages 6–7), both bilingual and monolingual, were assessed. Bilingual participants demonstrated faster reaction times (RTs) without compromising accuracy and showed lower levels of oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO) in the frontal lobe, in

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  24. Bilingualism predicts executive function resilience after COVID-19 in aging.

    John G. Grundy, Melanie Pujols-Beltran · 2026 · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

    Bilingualism has been associated with enhanced executive functions (EFs), particularly attentional control, and may confer protection against cognitive decline in older age. At the same time, the COVID-19 pandemic has emerged as a factor negatively affecting EF in older adults. Bilingualism might offer resilience against these COVID-related cognitive declines, especially in late adulthood, by bolstering cognitive reserve. The present study collected data from 312 community-dwelling individuals spanning the adult lifespan (aged 18 to 80) to address two goals. Goal 1 was to identify a latent structure linking bilingualism and EF across the adult lifespan, using a continuous multivariate approa

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