Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-v9fdk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T21:23:52.741Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

How does linguistic competence enhance cognitive functions in children? A study in multilingual children with different linguistic competences*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 May 2012

GERDA VIDESOTT ,
PASQUALE ANTHONY DELLA ROSA ,
WERNER WIATER ,
RITA FRANCESCHINI  and
JUBIN ABUTALEBI
GERDA VIDESOTT
Affiliation:
Faculty of Education and Language Study Unit, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy
PASQUALE ANTHONY DELLA ROSA
Affiliation:
Faculty of Psychology, University Vita Salute San Raffaele, Milano, Italy
WERNER WIATER
Affiliation:
Faculty of Philosophy and Social Sciences, University of Augsburg, Augsburg, Germany
RITA FRANCESCHINI
Affiliation:
Faculty of Education and Language Study Unit, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Italy
JUBIN ABUTALEBI*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Psychology, University Vita Salute San Raffaele, Milano, Italy & Division of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
*
Address for correspondence: Jubin Abutalebi, Faculty of Psychology, University Vita Salute San Raffaele, Via Olgettina 58, 20132 Milan, Italy[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The aim of the present study was to investigate the attentional mechanisms of multilingual children with differential degrees of language competence. For this purpose, 118 children (61 female/57 male; mean age 10.9 years (SD = 0.29); early acquisition multilinguals) from the Ladin valleys in South Tyrol, Italy, performed the Attentional Network Test (ANT). Our results proved that proficiency levels in early multilingual children may play a crucial role in the development and enhancement of the alerting component of the attentional system. Interestingly enough, we were able to deduce that linguistic competence rather than competence in other skill domains may have a decisive role in the alerting component. We suggest that the peculiarity of highly competent multilinguals relies on their ability to better detect, and consequently react faster to, the target stimulus than their less competent multilingual peers.

Keywords

multilingualismbilingualismalertingchild developmentAttentional Network Test (ANT)
Type
Research Notes
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , October 2012 , pp. 884 - 895
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

The research reported in this paper was funded by the Central Research Committee of the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano. We would like to thank the children who participated in this study and the school staff involved for their valuable collaboration. We also are grateful to Mrs. Sheila Sernoff for her much appreciated help and two anonymous reviewers for the valuable suggestions.

References

Abutalebi, J., Brambati, S. M., Annoni, J. M., Moro, A., Cappa, S. F., & Perani, D. (2007). The neural cost of the auditory perception of language switches: An event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging study in bilinguals. Journal of Neuroscience, 27 (50), 13762–13769.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Abutalebi, J., & Green, D. W. (2008). Control mechanisms in bilingual language production: Neural evidence from language switching studies. Language and Cognitive Processes, 23 (4), 557–582.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Abutalebi, J., Della Rosa, P. A., Green, D. W., Hernández, M., Scifo, P., Keim, R., Cappa, S. F., & Costa, A. (2011). Bilingualism tunes the anterior cingulate cortex for conflict monitoring. Cerebral Cortex, doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhr287.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. M., Klein, R., & Viswanathan, M. (2004). Bilingualism, aging, and cognitive control: Evidence from the Simon Task. Psychology & Aging, 19, 290–303.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. M., & Luk, G. (2008). Cognitive control and lexical access in younger and older bilinguals. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory and Cognition, 34 (4), 859–873.Google ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E., & Feng, X. (2009). Language proficiency and executive control in proactive interference: Evidence from monolingual children and adults. Brain and Language, 109, 93–100.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E., & Viswanathan, M. (2009). Components of executive control with advantages for bilingual children in two cultures. Cognition, 112, 494–500.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E. (2010). Bilingualism. WIREs Cognitive Science, 1, 599–572.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bialystok, E. (2011). Coordination of executive functions in monolingual and bilingual children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 110 (3), 461–468.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Botvinick, M., Nystrom, L. E., Fissell, K., Carter, C. S., & Cohen, J. D. (1999). Conflict monitoring versus selection-for-action in anterior cingulate cortex. Nature, 402 (6758), 179–181.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Carlson, S. M., & Meltzoff, A. N. (2008). Bilingual experience and executive functioning in young children. Developmental science, 11 (2), 282–298.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Carter, C. S., & van Veen, V. (2007). Anterior cingulate cortex and conflict detection: An update of theory and data. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience, 7 (4), 367–79.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Costa, A., Hernández, M., Costa-Faidella, J., & Sebastián-Gallés, N. (2009). On the bilingual advantage in conflict processing: Now you see it, now you don't. 2009. Cognition, 113, 135–149.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Costa, A., Hernández, M., & Sebastián-Gallés, N. (2008). Bilingualism aids conflict resolution: Evidence from the ANT task. Cognition, 106, 59–86.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Eriksen, B. A., & Eriksen, C. W. (1974). Effects of noise letters upon the identification of a target letter in a nonsearch task. Perception & Psychophysics, 16, 143–149.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fan, J., McCandliss, B. D., Sommer, T., Raz, A., & Posner, M. I. (2002). Testing the efficiency and independence of attentional networks. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 14, 340–347.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Franceschini, R. (2009). The genesis and development of research in multilingualism: Perspectives for future research. In Larissa, L. & Hufeisen, B. (eds.), The exploration of multilingualism: Development of research on L3, multilingualism and multiple language acquisition, pp. 27–61. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franceschini, R. (2011). Multilingualism and multicompetence: A conceptual view. The Modern Language Journal, 95 (3), 344–355.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hilchey, M. D., & Klein, R. M. (2011). Are there bilingual advantages on nonlinguistic interference tasks? Implications for the plasticity of executive control processes. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 18, 625–658.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mechelli, A., Crinion, J. T., Noppeney, U., O'Doherty, J., Ashburner, J., Frackowiak, R. S., & Price, C. J. (2004). Neurolinguistics: Structural plasticity in the bilingual brain. Nature, 431 (7010), 757.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Luk, G., De Sa, E., & Bialystok, E. (2011). Is there a relation between onset age of bilingualism and enhancement of cognitive control? Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 14 (4), 588–595.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Posner, M. I., & Petersen, S. E. (1990). The attention systems of the human brain. Annual Review of Neuroscience, 13, 25–42.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Prior, A., & MacWhinney, B. (2010). A bilingual advantage in task switching. Bilingualism: language and Cognition, 13, 253–262.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Simon, J. R., & Wolf, J. D. (1963). Choice reaction times as a function of angular stimulus–response correspondence and age. Ergonomics, 6, 99–105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wei, L. (2006). Bilingualism. In Brown, K. (ed.), Encyclopedia of language and linguistics (vol. 2), pp. 1–12. London & Oxford: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Zhou, L., Ding, G., Abutalebi, J., Shu, H., & Peng, D. (2011). Structural plasticity of the left caudate in bimodal bilinguals. Cortex, doi:10.1016/j.cortex.2011.05.022.Google Scholar