Article published In:
Aging and BilingualismEdited by Ellen Bialystok and Margot D. Sullivan
[Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 6:1/2] 2016
► pp. 64–85
Edited by Ellen Bialystok and Margot D. Sullivan
[Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 6:1/2] 2016
► pp. 64–85
Individual differences in cognitive control advantages of elderly late Dutch-English bilinguals
This study addresses a gap in the literature on executive function advantages among bilingual speakers by investigating a group of elderly, long-term, immersed bilinguals. Our participants are native Dutch speakers who emigrated to Australia as adults and have spent many years in that country. They are compared on a range of cognitive and linguistic measures to native Dutch and native English control groups. We argue that, due to the massive differences in the bilingual experience, group analyses may fall short of capturing the full picture. We argue instead for a more qualitative approach, which takes into account as detailed a picture of bilingual development, daily language habits and, in particular, code-switching habits as possible.
Keywords: language and aging, executive function, language attrition, late bilinguals, bilingual advantage
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.The bilingual advantage
- 3.The study
- 3.1Participants
- 3.2Materials
- Cognitive tasks
- Language tasks
- 3.3Data analysis
- 4.Results
- Step 1: quantitative group comparison
- Step 2: qualitative individual differences examined
- 5.Discussion
- 6.Conclusion
- Acknowledgements
- Notes
-
References
References (37)
Alho, J.M. (2008). Migration, fertility, and aging in stable populations. Demography, 45(3), 641–650. 
Bialystok, E. (2009). Bilingualism: The good, the bad, and the indifferent. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 12(1), 3–11.
(2011). Reshaping the mind: The benefits of bilingualism. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 65(4), 229–235.
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I., Klein, R. & Viswanathan, M. (2004). Bilingualism, aging, and cognitive control: evidence from the Simon task. Psychology and aging, 19(2), 290.
Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. & Freedman, M. (2007). Bilingualism as a protection against the onset of symptoms of dementia. Neuropsychologia, 45(2), 459–464.
Burke, D. M. & Shafto, M. A. (2008). Language and aging. In F. I. M. Craik & T. A. Salthouse (eds.), The handbook of aging and cognition (pp. 373–443). New York: Psychology Press.
Craik, F. I., Bialystok, E. & Freedman, M. (2010). Delaying the onset of Alzheimer disease Bilingualism as a form of cognitive reserve. Neurology, 75(19), 1726–1729.
Daneman, M. & Carpenter, P.A. (1980). Individual differences in working memory and reading. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 191, 450–466.
de Bruin, A. & Della Sala, S. (2015). The importance of language use when studying the neuroanatomical basis of bilingualism. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience.
Dunn, L.M & Dunn, D.M. (2007). The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test – Fourth Edition. Bloomington, MN: NCS Pearson, Inc.
Dunn, L. M., Dunn, L. M., Schlichting, L. (2005). Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-III-NL. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Pearson.
Festman, J. & Münte, T.F. (2012). Cognitive control in Russian-German bilinguals. Frontiers in Psychology, 31.
Folstein, M.F., Folstein, S.E. & McHugh, P.R. (1975). “Mini-Mental State”: A practical method for grading the cognitive state of patients for the clinician. Journal of Psychiatric Research, 121, 189–198.
Gass, S. & Lee, J. (2010). Working memory capacity, inhibitory control, and proficiency in a second language. In M.S. Schmid & Lowie, W. (Eds.), Modeling bilingualism: from structure to chaos (pp. 59–84). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Grant, D.A. & Berg E.A. (1948). A behavioral analysis of degree of reinforcement and ease of shifting to new responses in a Weigl-type card sorting problem. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 341, 404–411.
Green, D.W. (2011). Language control in different contexts: the behavioral ecology of bilingual speakers. Frontiers in Psychology 2011(2).
Green, D. W. & Abutalebi, J. (2013). Language control in bilinguals: The adaptive control hypothesis. Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 25(5), 515–530.
Grotjahn, R. (1987). How to construct and evaluate a C-test: A discussion of some problems and some statistical analyses. Quantitative Linguistics, 231, 219–253.
Hartsuiker, R. (2015). Why it is pointless to ask under which specific circumstances the bilingual advantage occurs. Cortex.
Heaton, R.K., Chelune, G.J., Talley, J.L., Kay, G.C. & Curtiss, G. (1993). Wisconsin card sorting test: manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.
Keijzer, M.. (2007). Last in first out? An investigation of the regression hypothesis in Dutch emigrants in Anglophone Canada. Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, PhD dissertation.
Kirk, N. W., Fiala, L., Scott-Brown, K. C. & Kempe, V. (2014). No evidence for reduced Simon cost in elderly bilinguals and bidialectals. Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 26(6), 640–648.
Kroll, J. F. & Bialystok, E. (2013). Understanding the consequences of bilingualism for language processing and cognition. Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 251, 497–514.
Luk, G., Bialystok, E., Craik, F. I. & Grady, C. L. (2011). Lifelong bilingualism maintains white matter integrity in older adults. The Journal of Neuroscience, 31(46), 16808–16813.
Maguire, E. A., Gadian, D. G., Johnsrude, I. S., Good, C. D., Ashburner, J., Frackowiak, R. S. & Frith, C. D. (2000). Navigation-related structural change in the hippocampi of taxi drivers. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 97(8), 4398–4403.
Oller, J.W. & Streiff, V. (1975). Dictation: A test of grammar-based expectancies. In R.L. Jones & B. Spolsky (Eds.), Testing language proficiency (pp. 71–82). Arlington, VA: Center for Applied Linguistics.
Polk, T. A. & Farah, M. J. (1995). Late experience alters vision. Nature, 3761, 648–649
Schmid, M. S. & Jarvis, S. (2014). Lexical access and lexical diversity in first language attrition. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 17(4), 729–748.
Simon, J. R. & Wolf, J. D. (1963). Choice reaction time as a function of angular stimulus-response correspondence and age. Ergonomics, 6(1), 99–105.
Sorace, A. (2010). Using magnitude estimation in developmental linguistic research. In E. Blom & S. Unsworth (Eds.), Experimental methods in language acquisition research (pp. 57–72). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Stroop, J.R. (1935). “Studies of interference in serial verbal reactions.”Journal of Experimental Psychology, 181, 643–662.
Tao, L., Marzecová, A., Taft, M., Asanowicz, D. & Wodniecka, Z. (2011). The efficiency of attentional networks in early and late bilinguals: the role of age of acquisition. Frontiers in psychology, 21.
Tzelgov, J., Henik, A. & Leiser, D. (1990). Controlling Stroop interference: Evidence from a bilingual task. Journal of experimental psychology: Learning, memory, and cognition, 16.5, 760–771.
Valian, V. (2015). Bilingualism and cognition. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 181, 3–24.
Van den Noort, M.W.M.L., Bosch, P., Haverkort, M. & Hugdahl, K. (2008). “A standard computerized version of the Reading Span Test in different languages.” European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 24.1: 35–42.
Verreyt, N., Woumans, E., Vandelanotte, D., Szmalec, A. & Duyck Verreyt, N., Woumans, E., Vandelanotte, D., Szmalec, A. & Duyck, W. (2016). Influence of language switching on the bilingual cognitive control advantage. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 19(1), 181-190
.
Wingfield, A. & Grossman, M. (2006). Language and the aging brain: patterns of neural compensation revealed by functional brain imaging. Journal of Neurophysiology, 96(6), 2830–2839.
Cited by (19)
Cited by 19 other publications
Rayo, William, Aldo M. Barrita, Lianelys Cabrera Martinez & Ivan Carbajal
2024. The Complexity in Bilingual Code-Switching Research: A Systematic Review. Languages 9:6 ► pp. 217 ff. 
Yasa Kostas, Rabia, Kahraman Kostas, Sarah E. MacPherson & Maria K. Wolters
2024. Semantic verbal fluency in native speakers of Turkish: a systematic review of category use, scoring metrics and normative data in healthy individuals. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology 46:3 ► pp. 272 ff.
Carthery-Goulart, Maria Teresa, Adam John Privitera & Brendan Stuart Weekes
2023. Does Language Distance Modulate the Contribution of Bilingualism to Cognitive Reserve in Seniors? A Systematic Review. American Journal of Alzheimer's Disease & Other Dementias® 38
Giovannoli, Jasmine, Diana Martella & Maria Casagrande
2023. Executive functioning during verbal fluency tasks in bilinguals: A systematic review. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders 58:4 ► pp. 1316 ff.
Liu, Hong
2023. Attention: The Cognitive Effects of Learning to Read in Arabic by Chinese Learners at an Old Age. Sage Open 13:3
Dash, Tanya, Yves Joanette & Ana Inés Ansaldo
2022. Multifactorial approaches to study bilingualism in the aging population: Past, present, future. Frontiers in Psychology 13
Armstrong, Bonnie A, Natalie Ein, Brenda I Wong, Sara N Gallant & Lingqian Li
2021. Retracted: The Effect of Bilingualism on Older Adults’ Inhibitory Control: A Meta-Analysis. The Gerontologist 61:3 ► pp. e102 ff.
Cox, Jessica G., Ashley LaBoda & Najee Mendes
2020. “I'm gonna Spanglish it on you”: Self-reported vs. oral production of Spanish–English codeswitching. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 23:2 ► pp. 446 ff.
Johannessen, Janne Bondi & Michael T. Putnam
2020. Heritage Germanic Languages in North America. In The Cambridge Handbook of Germanic Linguistics, ► pp. 783 ff.
Ortega, Lourdes
2020. The Study of Heritage Language Development From a Bilingualism and Social Justice Perspective. Language Learning 70:S1 ► pp. 15 ff.
Ware, Anna T., Melissa Kirkovski & Jarrad A. G. Lum
2020. Meta-Analysis Reveals a Bilingual Advantage That Is Dependent on Task and Age. Frontiers in Psychology 11
Paap, Kenneth
2019. The Bilingual Advantage Debate. In The Handbook of the Neuroscience of Multilingualism, ► pp. 701 ff.
Pfenninger, Simone E. & David Singleton
2019. Starting Age Overshadowed: The Primacy of Differential Environmental and Family Support Effects on Second Language Attainment in an Instructional Context. Language Learning 69:S1 ► pp. 207 ff.
Pfenninger, Simone E. & David Singleton
2019. A critical review of research relating to the learning, use and effects of additional and multiple languages in later life. Language Teaching 52:4 ► pp. 419 ff.
Poarch, Gregory J, Jan Vanhove & Raphael Berthele
2019. The effect of bidialectalism on executive function. International Journal of Bilingualism 23:2 ► pp. 612 ff.
Annick De Houwer & Lourdes Ortega
2018. The Cambridge Handbook of Bilingualism,
Putnam, Michael T., Tanja Kupisch & Diego Pascual y Cabo
2018. Chapter 12. Different situations, similar outcomes. In Bilingual Cognition and Language [Studies in Bilingualism, 54], ► pp. 251 ff.
Titone, Debra, Jason Gullifer, Sivaniya Subramaniapillai, Natasha Rajah & Shari Baum
2017. Chapter 13. History-inspired reflections on the Bilingual Advantages Hypothesis. In Growing Old with Two Languages [Studies in Bilingualism, 53], ► pp. 265 ff.
[no author supplied]
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 21 october 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.