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Bilingualism and Executive Function: An interdisciplinary approach
Edited by Irina A. Sekerina and Lauren Spradlin
[Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 6:5] 2016
► pp. 549–564

What cognitive processes are likely to be exercised by bilingualism and does this exercise lead to extra-linguistic cognitive benefits?

 | Dalhousie University
I begin with some personal history that illuminates my background and my interest in the questions posed in this article’s title (What cognitive processes are likely to be exercised by bilingualism and does this exercise lead to extra-linguistic cognitive benefits?). A brief overview of historical interest in these questions follows, with emphasis on the landmark study by Peel and Lambert (1962) and the seminal ideas in Bialystok’s (2001) book: Bilingualism in Development: Language, Literacy and Cognition. Three cognitive processes (monitoring, selection mediated by inhibition, and switching) are likely to be “exercised” in the bilingual mind and, especially, in the bilingual context. Yet, despite a few early studies that reported evidence for bilingual advantages in these cognitive processes, the thorough empirical reviews presented here and in previous papers by Hilchey (Hilchey & Klein, 2011; Hilchey, Saint-Aubin & Klein, 2015) and others, suggest that there are no extra-linguistic cognitive benefits of multi-lingual mastery.
Keywords: Bilingualism, executive function, switching
Article outline
  • 1.Some pertinent personal history
  • 2.Some pertinent history from the literature: from Peal and Lambert to Bialystok
  • 3.Are there extra-linguistic cognitive benefits of multilingual mastery?
    • 3.1What cognitive processes are likely to be exercised in bilingualism?
    • 3.2Circa 2011: Bilingual inhibitory control advantage (BICA)?
    • 3.3Circa 2011: Bilingual executive processing advantage (monitoring, BEPA)?
    • 3.42015: Update on BICA and BEPA
    • 3.52015: Bilingual Switching Advantage (BSA)?
  • 4.Summary & conclusion
    • 4.1Some lessons from history
    • 4.2In conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 26 July 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.15045.kle
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