Life-long experience of using two or more languages has been shown to enhance cognitive control abilities in young and elderly bilinguals in comparison to their monolingual peers. This advantage has been found to be larger in older adults in comparison to younger adults, suggesting that bilingualism provides advantages in cognitive control abilities. However, studies showing this effect have used a variety of tasks (Simon Task, Stroop task, Flanker Task), each measuring different subcomponents of attention and raising mixed results. At the same time, attention is not a unitary function but comprises of subcomponents which can be distinctively addressed within the Attention Network Test (ANT) (1, 2). The purpose of this work was to examine the neurofunctional correlates of the subcomponents of attention in healthy young and elderly bilinguals taking into account the L2 age of acquisition, language usage, and proficiency. Participants performed an fMRI version of the ANT task, and speed, accuracy, and BOLD data were collected. As expected, results show slower overall response times with increasing age. The ability to take advantage of the warning cues also decreased with age, resulting in reduced alerting and orienting abilities in older adults. fMRI results showed an increase in neurofunctional activity in the frontal and parietal areas in elderly bilinguals when compared to young bilinguals. Furthermore, higher L2 proficiency correlated negatively with activation in frontal area, and that faster RTs correlated negatively with activation in frontal and parietal areas. Such a correlation, especially with L2 proficiency was not present in young bilinguals and provides evidence for a bilingual advantage in the alerting subcomponent of attention that characterizes elderly bilinguals' performance. This study thus provides extra details about the bilingual advantage in the subcomponent of attention, in older bilinguals. Consequently, speaking more than one language impacts cognition and the brain later in life.

Background. Bilingualism results in an added advantage with respect to cognitive control. The interaction between bilingual language control and general purpose cognitive control systems can also be understood by studying executive control among individuals with bilingual aphasia. Objectives. The current study examined the subcomponents of cognitive control in bilingual aphasia. A case study approach was used to investigate whether cognitive control and language control are two separate systems and how factors related to bilingualism interact with control processes. Methods. Four individuals with bilingual aphasia performed a language background questionnaire, picture description task, and two experimental tasks (nonlinguistic negative priming task and linguistic and nonlinguistic versions of flanker task). Results. A descriptive approach was used to analyse the data using reaction time and accuracy measures. The cumulative distribution function plots were used to visualize the variations in performance across conditions. The results highlight the distinction between general purpose cognitive control and bilingual language control mechanisms. Conclusion. All participants showed predominant use of the reactive control mechanism to compensate for the limited resources system. Independent yet interactive systems for bilingual language control and general purpose cognitive control were postulated based on the experimental data derived from individuals with bilingual aphasia.

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Introduction: If ever attained, adopting native-like accent is achieved late in the learning process. Resemblance between L2 and mother tongue can facilitate L2 learning. In particular, cognates (phonologically and semantically similar words across languages), offer the opportunity to examine the issue of foreign accent in quite a unique manner.Methods: Twelve Spanish speaking (L1) adults learnt French (L2) cognates and practiced their native-like pronunciation by means of a computerized method. After consolidation, they were tested on L1 and L2 oral picture- naming during fMRI scanning.Results and Discussion: The results of the present study show that there is a specific impact of accent on brain activation, even if L2 words are cognates, and belong to a pair of closely related languages. Results point that the insula is a key component of accent processing, which is in line with reports from patients with foreign accent syndrome following damage to the insula (e.g., Katz et al., 2012; Moreno-Torres et al., 2013; Tomasino et al., 2013), and healthy L2 learners (Chee et al., 2004). Thus, the left insula has been consistently related to the integration of attentional and working memory abilities, together with fine-tuning of motor programming to achieve optimal articulation.

Bilingualism has been associated with age-related cognitive advantage. It is important to study cognitive control mechanisms to better understand this phenomenon. We sought to examine proactive and reactive control, as measured by fast and slow responses, respectively. The neural underpinnings of these modes of control were studied in rigorously matched elderly monolinguals and bilinguals, using fMRI performance on a Simon task. The results indicate that bilinguals performed efficiently in proactive mode, as more activation and connectivity were observed in the monolinguals. On the other hand, the monolinguals functioned more efficiently in reactive mode, recruiting fewer brain areas than the bilinguals. These results suggest that bilinguals’ function effortlessly and economically in proactive mode, which is preserved through lifelong use of languages, whereas monolinguals are efficient in reactive mode, which they use more often as a consequence of aging. Thus, frequent use in daily life contributes to efficient functioning in the respective mode of control.

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A better understanding and more reliable classification of bilinguals has been progressively achieved through the fine-tuning methodology and simultaneously optimizing the measurement tools. However, the current understanding is far from generalization to a larger population varying in different measures of bilingualism—L2 Age of acquisition (L2 AOA), L2 usage and exposure, and L2 proficiency. More recent studies have highlighted the importance of modeling bilingualism as a continuous variable. An in-depth look at the role of bilingualism, comparing groups, may be considered a reductionist approach, i.e., grouping based on one measure of bilingualism (e.g., L2 AOA) may not account for variability in other measures of bilingualism (L2 exposure, L2 use or L2 proficiency, amongst others) within and between groups. Similarly, a multifactorial dimension is associated with cognitive performance, where not all domains of cognition and subcomponents are equally influenced by bilingualism. In addition, socio-cultural and demographical factors may add another dimension to the impact of bilingualism on cognitive performance, especially in older adults. Nevertheless, not many studies have controlled or used the multiple socio-cultural and demographical factors as a covariate to understand the role of different aspects of bilingualism that may influence cognitive performance differently. Such an approach would fail to generalize the research findings to a larger group of bilinguals. In the present review paper, we illustrate that considering a multifactorial approach to different dimensions of bilingual study may lead to a better understanding of the role of bilingualism on cognitive performance. With the evolution of various fine-tuned methodological approaches, there is a greater need to study variability in bilingual profiles that can help generalize the result universally.