Bilingualism has been shown to contribute to increased resilience against cognitive aging. One of the key brain structures linked to memory and dementia symptom onset, the hippocampus, has been observed to adapt in response to bilingual experience – at least in healthy individuals. However, in the context of neurodegenerative pathology, it is yet unclear what role previous bilingual experience might have in terms of sustaining integrity of this structure or related behavioral correlates. The present study adds to the limited cohort of research on the effects of bilingualism on neurocognitive outcomes in Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) using structural brain data. We investigate whether bilingual language experience (operationalized as language entropy) results in graded neurocognitive adaptations within a cohort of bilinguals diagnosed with MCI. Results reveal a non-linear effect of bilingual language entropy on hippocampal volume, although they do not predict episodic memory performance, nor age of MCI diagnosis.

Text comprehension frequently demands the resolution of no longer plausible interpretations to build an accurate situation model, an ability that might be especially challenging during second language comprehension. Twenty-two native English speakers (L1) and twenty-two highly proficient non-native English speakers (L2) were presented with short narratives in English. Each text required the evaluation and revision of an initial prediction. Eye movements in the text and a comprehension sentence indicated less efficient performance in the L2 than in L1 comprehension, in both inferential evaluation and revision. Interestingly, these effects were determined by individual differences in inhibitory control and linguistic proficiency. Higher inhibitory control reduced the time rereading previous parts of the text (better evaluation) as well as revisiting the text before answering the sentence (better revision) in L2 comprehenders, whereas higher proficiency reduced the time in the sentence when the story was coherent, suggesting better general comprehension in both languages.

While research in heritage language phonology has found that transfer from the majority language can lead to divergent attainment in adult heritage language grammars, the extent to which language transfer develops during a heritage speaker's lifespan is understudied. To explore such cross-linguistic transfer, I examine the rate of glottalization between consonant-to-vowel sequences at word junctures produced by child and adult Spanish heritage speakers (i.e., HSs) in both languages. My results show that, in Spanish, child HSs produce greater rates of vowel-initial glottal phonation than their age-matched monolingually-raised Spanish counterparts, suggesting that the Spanish child HSs’ grammars are more permeable to transfer than those of the adult HSs. In English, child and adult HSs show similarly low rates of glottal phonation when compared to their age-matched monolingually-raised English speakers’ counterparts. The findings for English can be explained by either an account of transfer at the individual level or the community level.

To test effects of German on anticipation in Vietnamese, we recorded eye-movements during comprehension and manipulated i) verb constraints (different vs. similar in German and Vietnamese) and ii) classifier constraints (absent in German). In each of two experiments, participants listened to Vietnamese sentences like “Mai mặc một chiếc áo.” (‘Mai wears a [classifier] shirt.’), while viewing four objects. Between experiments, we contrasted bilingual background: L1 Vietnamese–L2 German late bilinguals (Experiment 1) and heritage speakers of Vietnamese in Germany (Experiment 2). Both groups anticipated verb-compatible and classifier-compatible objects upon hearing the verb/classifier. However, when the (verb) constraints differed (e.g., Vietnamese: mặc ‘wear (a shirt/#earrings)’ – German: tragen ‘wear (a shirt/earrings)’), the heritage speakers were distracted by the object (earrings) compatible with the German (but not the Vietnamese) verb constraints. These results demonstrate that competing information in the two languages can interfere with anticipation in heritage speakers.

Semantic and affective priming have long been treated separately in psycholinguistic studies. Recently, however, the question of whether and how these two primings interact has become controversial, especially in cross-language contexts where such discussions are rare. In the present study, four mixed-design experiments were conducted with Chinese EFL learners to investigate cross-language semantic-affective interactions: 3 (prime valence: negative, positive, neutral) × 2 (semantic relatedness: related, unrelated). Results show that semantic priming effects occurred in the L1L1 and L1L2 conditions, whereas affective priming effects were observed in the L2L2 condition. In the L2L1 priming condition, only emotion primes induced cross-language priming. These results suggest that semantic and emotional accesses are activated automatically and separately, but can facilitate cross-language word processing mutually. The results support the hierarchical representation of semantic features of emotion words from L1 to L2 in the unbalanced bilingual mental lexicon, while affective attributes are spread across a distributed network.

The aim of the present study was to determine whether bilinguals activate the figurative meaning of an idiom that is specific to one language when they are exposed to its translation in their other language. We used a cross-modal priming task in which participants heard L2 English sentences that ended with an idiom translated from their L1. They then saw a visually presented stimulus that was either related to the meaning of the L1 idiom, a matched control word, or a nonword, and made a lexical decision. Three experiments were run, each with a different group of bilinguals (French–English, Vietnamese–English, and Indonesian–English), and each with a monolingual English control group. In all three studies, the effect of relatedness for bilinguals and monolinguals differed, demonstrating cross-language activation of idiom meanings. Evidence was obtained that suggested that culture-specific information in idioms influenced processing.

The current study explores the interplay between central and peripheral processes in second language (L2) handwriting among bilinguals with diverse orthographic backgrounds. Our investigation delves into the cross-linguistic transfer effect in Spanish–English and Chinese–English bilinguals, emphasizing lexical frequency and phoneme-grapheme (P-O) consistency in spelling-to-dictation and immediate copying tasks. Results reveal that the interaction between central and peripheral processes in L2 handwritten production is shaped by the bilinguals' native language (L1) orthographic characteristics. Spanish–English bilinguals exhibited sensitivity to P-O consistency and the spread of this effect from central to peripheral processes throughout both tasks. Conversely, Chinese–English bilinguals showed heightened sensitivity to lexical frequency during orthographic planning and motor execution, particularly in the immediate copying task. In a broader context, these findings suggest that the parallel and cascading coordination of the L2 writing system is modulated by cross-linguistic variations. The implications of our findings hold relevance for handwriting production and bilingualism research.

Bilingualism is thought to confer advantages in executive functioning, thereby contributing to cognitive reserve and a later age of dementia symptom onset. While the relation between bilingualism and age of onset has been explored in Alzheimer's dementia, there are few studies examining bilingualism as a contributor to cognitive reserve in frontotemporal dementia (FTD). In line with previous findings, we hypothesized that bilinguals with behavioral variant FTD would be older at symptom onset compared to monolinguals, but that no such effect would be found in patients with nonfluent/agrammatic variant primary progressive aphasia (PPA) or semantic variant PPA. Contrary to our hypothesis, we found no significant difference in age at symptom onset between monolingual and bilingual speakers within any of the FTD variants, and there were no notable differences on neuropsychological measures. Overall, our results do not support a protective effect of bilingualism in patients with FTD-spectrum disease in a U.S. based cohort.

The purpose of the current report is to study the effects of language distance on noun and verb processing in bilingual speakers. We recruited two groups of bilingual speakers: one group spoke two typologically distant languages (Cantonese and English) and the other group spoke two typologically similar languages (Mandarin and Cantonese). Participants named object and action pictures in their first language. We controlled psycholinguistic properties of words such as frequency, AoA, imageability, name agreement, visual complexity, familiarity, and participants’ bilingual language experiences. Our findings revealed a significant role for language distance. We observed a difference between noun and verb processing in the similar language pair (Mandarin–Cantonese) due to interference induced by language similarity. However, in the distant language pair (Cantonese–English), the difference disappeared because of the lack of cross-language interference. Our findings support that current and future models of bilingual language processing should take into account the effects of language distance.

The effects of bilingual language experience on cognitive control are still debated. A recent proposal is that being bilingual enhances attentional control. This is based on studies showing smaller effects of the nature of the preceding trial on the current trial in bilinguals (Grundy et al., 2017). However, performance on such tasks can also be accounted for by lower-level processes such as the binding and unbinding of stimulus and response features. The current study used a Partial Repetition Cost paradigm to explicitly test whether language experience can affect such processes. Results showed that bi- and monolinguals did not differ in their responses when the stimulus features were task-relevant. However, the bilinguals showed smaller partial repetition costs when the features were task-irrelevant. These findings suggest that language experience does not affect lower-level processes, and supports the view that bilinguals exhibit enhanced attentional disengagement.

Recent studies suggest that similarity in emotional features and concreteness are critical cues underlying word association in native speakers. However, the lexical organization of a foreign language is less understood. This study aims to examine the structure of word associations within the mental lexicon of a foreign (English) and a native language. To this end, 145 native Spanish-speakers produced three lexical associates to cue words in both the foreign and native language. We observed that the associates were more neutrally valenced in the foreign language. Moreover, as cue words increased in their arousal, the produced associates were less arousing in the foreign language. Thus, the structure of these lexical associations could account for prior evidence of emotional detachment in foreign languages. Finally, as cues were more abstract, the foreign language associates were more abstract. Our findings revealed that the linguistic context modulated the lexical associations.

Previous research examining the factors that determine language choice and voluntary switching mainly involved early bilinguals. Here, using picture naming, we investigated language choice and switching in late Dutch–English bilinguals. We found that naming was overall slower in cued than in voluntary switching, but switch costs occurred in both types of switching. The magnitude of switch costs differed depending on the task and language, and was moderated by L2 proficiency. Self-rated rather than objectively assessed proficiency predicted voluntary switching and ease of lexical access was associated with language choice. Between-language and within-language switch costs were not correlated. These results highlight self-rated proficiency as a reliable predictor of voluntary switching, with language modulating switch costs. As in early bilinguals, ease of lexical access was related to word-level language choice of late bilinguals.

The umbrella term cognitive reserve-enhancing factors refers to those experiential and lifestyle factors (such as intellectual activities, regular physical exercise, healthy nutrition, educational attainment, etc.) that may help individuals to compensate for age-related neural deterioration, thus enabling them to maintain relatively stable cognitive functioning during senescence. In the last 10 years, mounting evidence has shown that speaking a second language is a powerful cognitive reserve contributor, which could mitigate the consequences of healthy aging and contribute to the delay of dementia onset. In this piece, we argue that bilingualism may play a unique role among the well-known cognitive reserve-enhancing factors, thus contributing to the achievement of successful aging in a distinctive fashion. After reviewing behavioral and neuroimaging evidence for bilingualism-induced protection against healthy and pathological cognitive aging, we discuss theoretical reasons and experimental findings supporting the view that bilingualism should be granted an individual spot among reserve-enhancing life experiences.

In a between-language lexical priming study, we examined to what extent the two languages in a simultaneous bilingual child's lexicon interact, while taking individual differences in language exposure into account. Primary-school-aged Dutch–Greek bilinguals performed a primed picture selection task combined with eye-tracking. They matched pictures to auditorily presented Dutch target words preceded by Greek prime words. Their reaction times and eye movements were recorded. We tested for effects of between-language phonological priming, translation priming, and phonological priming through translation. Priming effects emerged in reaction times and eye movements in all three conditions, at different stages of processing, and unaffected by language exposure. These results extend previous findings for bilingual toddlers and bilingual adults. Processing similarities between these populations indicate that, across different stages of development, bilinguals have an integrated lexicon that is accessed in a language-nonselective way and is susceptible to interactions within and between different types of lexical representation.

Bilinguals often show evidence of cross language influences, such as facilitation in processing cognates. Here we use computational methods for analyzing spontaneous English texts written by hundreds of speakers of different L1s, at different levels of English proficiency, to investigate writers’ preference for using cognates over alternative word choices. We focus on English, since a majority of its lexicon is either of Romance or Germanic origin, allowing an investigation of the preference of speakers of Germanic and Romance L1s towards cognates between their L1 and English. Results show that L2 writers tend to prefer English cognates, and that this tendency is weaker as English proficiency level increases, suggesting diminishing effects of CLI. However, a comparison of the L2 writers with native English writers shows general overuse of cognates only for the Germanic, but not the Romance, L1 speakers, most likely due to the register of argumentative writing.

We investigated the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying bi-alphabetic reading using event-related potentials (ERPs). Brain activity was recorded using EEG in a group of Russian–English biliterates during a reading-aloud task with familiar and novel words. Capitalizing on a partial overlap between the Roman and Cyrillic alphabets, the stimuli were presented in L1 Cyrillic, L2 Roman, or in an ambiguous script, in a counterbalanced fashion. The results revealed functional dissociation between the stimuli in terms of processing their graphemic ambiguity. The interference caused by L1-L2 script inconsistencies in novel wordforms was detected at a late processing stage, reflected in N400 response enhancement for unfamiliar script-ambiguous items. Conversely, familiar ambiguous and L2 words showed no N400 increase but demonstrated an early enhancement of the P200 component in comparison to those presented in L1. These results indicate the use of a whole-word reading strategy for familiar words even in ambiguous script, likely triggered by an automatic activation of well-established lexico-semantic representations. The absence of similar top-down mechanisms for novel ambiguous-script words likely results in increased grapheme-to-phoneme decoding effort, with important implications for L2 reading and vocabulary acquisition.

This study aims to examine the influence of dialectal experience on logographic visual word recognition. Two groups of Chinese monolectals and three groups of Chinese bi-dialectals performed Stroop color-naming in Standard Chinese (SC), and two of the bi-dialectal groups also in their regional dialects. The participant groups differed in dialectal experiences. The ink-character relation was manipulated in semantics, segments, and tones separately, as congruent, competing, or different, yielding ten Stroop conditions for comparison. All the groups showed Stroop interference for the conditions of segmental competition, as well as evidence for semantic activation by the characters. Bi-dialectal experience, even receptive, could benefit conflict resolution in the Stroop task. Chinese characters can automatically activate words in both dialects. Comparing naming in Standard Chinese and naming in the bi-dialectals’ regional dialects, still, a regional-dialect disadvantage suggests that the activation is biased with literacy and lexico-specific inter-dialectal relations.

The present study asked whether oral vocabulary training can facilitate reading in a second language (L2). Fifty L2 speakers of English received oral training over three days on complex novel words, with predictable and unpredictable spellings, composed of novel stems and existing suffixes (i.e., vishing, vishes, vished). After training, participants read the novel word stems for the first time (i.e., trained and untrained), embedded in sentences, and their eye movements were monitored. The eye-tracking data revealed shorter looking times for trained than untrained stems, and for stems with predictable than unpredictable spellings. In contrast to monolingual speakers of English, the interaction between training and spelling predictability was not significant, suggesting that L2 speakers did not generate orthographic skeletons that were robust enough to affect their eye-movement behaviour when seeing the trained novel words for the first time in print.

Early bilingual language experience can enhance children's social-cognitive skills for effective communication. This study examined whether individual variability in bilingual language diversity, measured by language entropy, influenced 3- to 5-year-old children's engagement of contextual information in their selective trust strategies. One-hundred-and-forty Singaporean children (58 girls, Mage = 53.64 months, 97.1% Asian) were presented with an informant who provided either accurate or inaccurate information in a context with either adequate or limited information access. Bilingual children with greater language diversity, compared to those with less language diversity, were more likely to adapt their accuracy-based selective trust strategy to the informant's circumstances (i.e, information access). Results provide new insights into the role of diverse linguistic experiences in shaping children's social cognitive development.

Do bilinguals have similar bilingual control mechanisms in speaking and writing? The present study investigated the patterns of switch costs (reflecting reactive language control) and mixing costs (reflecting proactive language control) between Chinese (L1) and English (L2) in spoken and written productions and whether these patterns could be modulated by response-stimulus intervals (RSIs). In two experiments, unbalanced Chinese–English bilinguals completed a cued language switching task in spoken naming (Experiment 1) and written naming (Experiment 2), respectively. The results revealed asymmetrical switch costs (i.e., the larger cost in L1 than in L2) in spoken and written productions in the short RSI condition. However, there were asymmetrical mixing costs in spoken production and symmetrical mixing costs in written production both in the short and long RSIs. These findings suggest that for spoken and written productions, reactive language control operates in similar mechanisms, while proactive language control operates in specific mechanisms.