A staff writer for Science, Y. Bhattacharjee, reported in the NY Times (March 18, 2012) on research into the positive effects of juggling two languages. Previously bilinguals were assumed to be cognitively hindered by the interference presented by the second language. Now several studies have shown that that interference actually improves brain functioning in problem solving, ignoring distractions, and holding information while switching attention between subjects. The explanation for this benefit seems to be that suppressing one language in order to speak another “requires keeping track of changes around you in the same way that we monitor our surroundings when driving,” Bilinguals not only performed better on multiple tests but did so more efficiently.

Good news:  it appears that the benefits of bilingualism can apply to those who learn a second language later in life.

More good news: bilingualism seems to offer resistance to dementia. The higher the degree of bilingualism, the later the onset.

Some questions:

Does learning yet another and another language continue to improve brain functioning? and

Do bilinguals do better on all the tests or just certain ones? Are the functions that have been tested—sorting by color or shape, threading a line of sequential numbers scattered on a sheet—a measure of a certain aspect of intelligence or of many aspects? Are there aspects of intelligence that are unaffected by bilingualism?

All very intriguing.

topics: culture