Sep. 10,
2013 — Bilingual speakers can switch languages seamlessly, likely
developing a higher level of mental flexibility than monolinguals,
according to Penn State linguistic researchers.
"In the
past, bilinguals were looked down upon," said Judith F. Kroll,
Distinguished Professor of Psychology, Linguistics and Women's Studies.
"Not only is bilingualism not bad for you, it may be really good. When
you're switching languages all the time it strengthens your mental
muscle and your executive function becomes enhanced."
Fluent
bilinguals seem to have both languages active at all times, whether both
languages are consciously being used or not, the researchers report in a
recent issue of Frontiers in Psychology. Both languages are active whether either was used only seconds earlier or several days earlier.
Bilinguals
rarely say a word in the unintended language, which suggests that they
have the ability to control the parallel activity of both languages and
ultimately select the intended language without needing to consciously
think about it.
The
researchers conducted two separate but related experiments. In the
first, 27 Spanish-English bilinguals read 512 sentences, written in
either Spanish or English -- alternating language every two sentences.
Participants read the sentences silently until they came across a word
displayed in red, at which point they were instructed to read the red
word out loud, as quickly and accurately as possible. About half of the
red words were cognates -- words that look and sound similar and have
the same meaning in both languages.
"Cognate
words were processed more quickly than control words," said Jason W.
Gullifer, a graduate student in psychology, suggesting that both
languages are active at the same time.
Participants
in the second experiment performed the same tasks as those in the first
experiment, but this time were presented one language at a time. The
second experiment's results were similar to the first, suggesting that
context does not influence word recognition.
"The
context of the experiment didn't seem to matter," said Gullifer. "If you
look at bilinguals there seems to be some kind of mechanistic control."
Paola E.
Dussias, professor of Spanish and head of the Spanish, Italian and
Portuguese, department also collaborated on this research.
Journal Reference:
- Paola E. Dussias, Judith F. Kroll, Jason W. Gullifer. When Language Switching has No Apparent Cost: Lexical Access in Sentence Context. Frontiers in Psychology, 2013; 4 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00278
Penn State (2013, September 10). Think twice, speak once: Bilinguals process both languages simultaneously. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 29, 2013, from http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130910121521.htm
