Previous research has shown that bilingual speakers have higher levels of cognitive control than comparable monolinguals, especially at older ages. The present study investigates a possible neural correlate of this behavioral effect. Given that white matter (WM) integrity decreases with age in adulthood, we tested the hypothesis that bilingualism is associated with maintenance of WM in older pe...

The cognitive and linguistic processes involved in the acquisition and use of two languages are systematically different from those processes engaged in monolingual language use, leading to detectable changes in language and cognitive outcomes for bilinguals. The present article describes these differences and offers speculation on possible mechanisms. Measures of linguistic proficiency and pro...

We all go through a process of perceptual narrowing for phoneme identification. As we become experts in the languages we hear in our environment we lose the ability to identify phonemes that do not exist in our native phonological inventory. This research examined how linguistic experience-i.e., the exposure to a double phonological code during childhood-affects the visual processes involved in...

In two experiments, we examined inhibitory control processes in three groups of bilinguals and trilinguals that differed in nonnative language proficiency and language learning background. German 5- to 8-year-old second-language learners of English, German-English bilinguals, German-English-Language X trilinguals, and 6- to 8-year-old German monolinguals performed the Simon task and the Attenti...

It is uncertain from previous research to what extent the perceptual system retains plasticity after attunement to the native language (L1) sound system. This study evaluated second-language (L2) vowel discrimination by individuals who began learning the L2 as children ("early learners"). Experiment 1 identified procedures that lowered discrimination scores for foreign vowel contrasts in an AXB...

The aim of this study was to analyze the performance of Spanish-English bilinguals on the Golden Stroop Test. The effects of bilingualism, participants' age, age of acquisition of the second language, and proficiency in each language were analyzed. Participants consisted of 71 Spanish-English bilinguals, 40 English monolinguals, and 11 Spanish monolinguals from South Florida. Proficiency in Spa...

Two studies are reported comparing the performance of monolingual and bilingual children on tasks requiring different levels of working memory. In the first study, 56 5-year-olds performed a Simon-type task that manipulated working memory demands by comparing conditions based on two rules and four rules and manipulated conflict resolution demands by comparing conditions that included conflict w...

The present study used a behavioral version of an anti-saccade task, called the 'faces task', developed by [Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. M., & Ryan, J. (2006). Executive control in a modified anti-saccade task: Effects of aging and bilingualism. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 32, 1341-1354] to isolate the components of executive functioning responsible for p...

To succeed at cross-situational word learning, learners must infer word-object mappings by attending to the statistical co-occurrences of novel objects and labels across multiple encounters. While past studies have investigated this as a learning mechanism for infants and monolingual adults, bilinguals' cross-situational word learning abilities have yet to be tested. Here, we compared monolingu...

This study explores the effects of bilingualism in Sardinian as a regional minority language on the linguistic competence in Italian as the dominant language and on non-linguistic cognitive abilities. Sardinian/Italian adult speakers and monolingual Italian speakers living in the same geographical area of Sardinia were compared in two kinds of tasks: (a) verbal and non-verbal cognitive tasks ta...