Educator Panel - KROLL

8/10/2019 Educator Panel - KROLL

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The Cognitive Advantages of

Language Abilities

Judith F. Kroll

Department of PsychologyCenter for Language Science

Pennsylvania State University

University Park, PA 16802 USA

January 25, 2011


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More people in the world are bilingual than monolingual.

But until very recently, most research on language and cognition

examined only monolingual speakers of a single language and

typically speakers of English as the native language.


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There are many reasons to learn a second language


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Some of these reasons are more positive than self defense!

Current research demonstrates that both of a bilinguals languages are

active regardless of the intention or requirement to use one language alone.

The parallel activity of the two languages is hypothesized to produce

competition.

Skilled bilinguals rarely make the error of speaking the wrong language

yet they often code switch with other similar bilinguals in the middle of a

sentence, suggesting that they possess an exquisite mechanism of cognitive

control.

A life of resolving cross-language competition appears to confer

positive consequences for cognition


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bike fiets

Dutch-English speaker

The bilingual is a mental magician: Both languages appear to be

active regardless of the requirement to use one language alone:

Parallel activation in listening, reading, and speaking


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What is the consequence of parallel activity and competition across

the bilinguals two languages? The hypothesis is that mental juggling

creates expertise.

Bilingualism may confer specific cognitive benefits to executive

function and attention to enable bilinguals to:

ignore irrelevant information

resolve conflict among competing alternatives

minimize the costs associated with task switching


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To illustrate:

Bilingualism may offer protection against the normal declines in

attentional control associated with aging.

Bialystok et al. (2005):Older bilinguals outperform age-matched monolingual counterparts on the Simon Task and on

other non-linguistic measures of inhibitory control.

Bialystok et al. (2007): Bilingualism delays the onset of

Alzheimers-type dementia by four years. Languageexperience may provide protection to the brain.


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Congruent Trial Incongruent Trials

The Simon Task

Press the button on the left for Red and button on the right for Green


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Bialystok et al. (2004):

Magnitude of the Simon Effect by Decade:

How much do individuals suffer the consequences of conflict?

Hypothesis: The bilingual advantage arises from a life ofresolving competition across the two languages.


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Does the brain reveal the consequences

of using a second language?

Mechelli et al. (2004):

Learning an L2 increases

the density of grey matter


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These benefits can be seen for young bilingual children, who seem

better able to resist the allure of misleading information.

To illustrate: Towers Task (Bialystok & Codd, 1997)

Each block is one apartment; each apartment has one family

Count the blocks in each towerWhich apartment tower has more families living in it?

Bilingual children are better than their

monolingual counterparts at recognizing

that the shorter tower has the larger number.


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And even for very young bilingual infants

Kovacs & Mehler (2009) compared bilingual and monolingual

7 month old infants on a switching task involving speech-like

cues.

Babies in a bilingual environment (crib bilinguals)

were better able to switch their attention in response

to a cue in watching a little puppet show than babies

in a monolingual environment.


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How does the mental juggling of two languagescreate these advantages for cognition?

The evidence to date is largely correlational. Bilinguals areadvantaged relative to monolinguals on measures of attentionalcontrol and executive function.

But what aspect of language use is responsible for thesebenefits to cognition?

Hypothesis: Speaking! When you speak two languages you

must choose between them before you utter a single word. Althoughbabies do not speak so we might consider the baby bilingualadvantages to suggest that there is more than one factor that benefits

bilinguals.


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Methods to investigate language learning and language processing

include behavioral measures, e.g., eye tracking and acoustic

analyses of spoken language, and also neuroscience methods to

examine brain activity.


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Research on producing speech in the L2 suggests that even highly

proficient bilinguals must inhibit their stronger L1.

That inhibition may impose a set of cognitive demands to allowproficient speech in the L2 without intrusions from the L1.

Evidence on brain imaging shows that the areas of the brain

associated with cognitive control are particularly active when

bilinguals use their L2.

Is there any context that makes this easier for someone

learning a second language as an adult?

Language immersion: Learners inhibit their L1 when in the L2

environment (e.g., Linck, Kroll, & Sunderman, 2009)


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On the 125thanniversary of the journal Science, Kennedy and Norman (2005)

identified the biological basis of second language (L2) learning as one of the top

125 questions to be answered in the next 25 years of research:

0

200

400

600

800

1000

1200

Number ofPapers

1985-89 1990-94 1995-99 2000-04 2005-09

Time Period

Second Language Acquisition Bilingualism

Research articles published on Second Language Acquisition

and Bilingualismsince 1985 (Web of Science)


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Penn State University The Netherlands

University Park, PA Spain

Germany

UK

China

But we need more than language immersion for learners. We

need research immersion to enable national and international

research collaborations and to develop networks for training that

will allow the next generation of researchers to become globalscientists:

Bilingualism takes different forms in different places


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The Penn State Center for Language Science Bilingualism Network

Support from NSF PIRE (Partnerships for International Research and Education):

2010-2015:Bilingualism, mind, and brain: An interdisciplinary program in cognitive

psychology, linguistics, and cognitive neuroscience


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Thank you!

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