How does bilingualism improve executive control? A comparison of active and reactive inhibition mechanisms.

Colzato, Lorenza S.; Bajo, M. Teresa; Wildenberg, Wery van den; Paolieri, Daniela; Nieuwenhuis, Sander; Heij, Wido La

doi:10.1037/0278-7393.34.2.302

Cited by 239 publications

(283 citation statements)

References 66 publications

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“…local inhibition). Colzato et al (2008), for instance, proposed that selection of a word in the target language involves selective activation for that specific word, resulting in the inhibition of the translation equivalent in the non-target language. For example, when Dutch-English bilinguals name the picture of a frog in English (''frog''), according to this view only the Dutch translation equivalent (''kikker'') would be inhibited.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Morphological priming survives a language switch

et al. 2012

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a b s t r a c tIn a long-lag morphological priming experiment, Dutch (L1)-English (L2) bilinguals were asked to name pictures and read aloud words. A design using non-switch blocks, consisting solely of Dutch stimuli, and switch-blocks, consisting of Dutch primes and targets with intervening English trials, was administered. Target picture naming was facilitated by morphologically related primes in both non-switch and switch blocks with equal magnitude. These results contrast some assumptions of sustained reactive inhibition models. However, models that do not assume bilinguals having to reactively suppress all activation of the non-target language can account for these data.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Morphological priming survives a language switch

et al. 2012

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“…Because of the routine engagement of inhibition in language control, bilingual speakers might outperform monolingual speakers in linguistic as well as nonlinguistic tasks involving inhibitory control. This prediction has been borne out in studies using the Simon and Eriksen flanker tasks engaging selective inhibition (Bialystok, Craik, Klein, & Viswanathan, 2004;Costa et al, 2008), but it has so far not been confirmed for other tasks requiring inhibition (Colzato et al, 2008). This suggests that bilingual speakers might primarily recruit selective inhibition in language control.…”

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confidence: 94%

Selective and nonselective inhibition of competitors in picture naming

2013

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The present study examined the relation between nonselective inhibition and selective inhibition in picture naming performance. Nonselective inhibition refers to the ability to suppress any unwanted response, whereas selective inhibition refers to the ability to suppress specific competing responses. The degree of competition in picture naming was manipulated by presenting targets along with distractor words that could be semantically related (e.g., a picture of a dog combined with the word cat) or unrelated (tree) to the picture name. The mean naming response time (RT) was longer in the related than in the unrelated condition, reflecting semantic interference. Delta plot analyses showed that participants with small mean semantic interference effects employed selective inhibition more effectively than did participants with larger semantic interference effects. The participants were also tested on the stop-signal task, which taps nonselective inhibition. Their performance on this task was correlated with their mean naming RT but, importantly, not with the selective inhibition indexed by the delta plot analyses and the magnitude of the semantic interference effect. These results indicate that nonselective inhibition ability and selective inhibition of competitors in picture naming are separable to some extent.Keywords Delta plot . Lexical access . Nonselective inhibition . Picture-word interference . Selective inhibition A key component of the human ability to speak is the retrieval of words from the mental lexicon. This process, called lexical access, has been widely studied using a range of different paradigms, including analyses of speech errors in healthy and brain-damaged speakers (e.g

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“…There is ongoing debate about whether language selection takes place via a process of inhibition (e.g. Abutalebi and Green, 2007;Green, 1998;Prior;Van Heuven et al, 2008), by the maintenance of goals and self-monitoring (Colzato et al, 2008;Costa et al, 2009) or a combination of these (Bialystok et al, 2012;Green and Abutalebi, 2013). Similarly, the neural bases of bilingual language control are not yet fully elucidated.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Brain functional plasticity associated with the emergence of expertise in extreme language control

2015

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We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to longitudinally examine brain plasticity arising from long-term, intensive simultaneous interpretation training. Simultaneous interpretation is a bilingual task with heavy executive control demands. We compared brain responses observed during simultaneous interpretation with those observed during simultaneous speech repetition (shadowing) in a group of trainee simultaneous interpreters, at the beginning and at the end of their professional training program. Age, sex and languageproficiency matched controls were scanned at similar intervals. Using multivariate pattern classification, we found distributed patterns of changes in functional responses from the first to second scan that distinguished the interpreters from the controls. We also found reduced recruitment of the right caudate nucleus during simultaneous interpretation as a result of training. Such practice-related change is consistent with decreased demands on multilingual language control as the task becomes more automatized with practice. These results demonstrate the impact of simultaneous interpretation training on the brain functional response in a cerebral structure that is not specifically linguistic, but that is known to be involved in learning, in motor control, and in a variety of domain-general executive functions. Along with results of recent studies showing functional and structural adaptations in the caudate nuclei of experts in a broad range of domains, our results underline the importance of this structure as a central node in expertise-related networks.

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How does bilingualism improve executive control? A comparison of active and reactive inhibition mechanisms.

Cited by 239 publications

References 66 publications

Morphological priming survives a language switch

Morphological priming survives a language switch

Selective and nonselective inhibition of competitors in picture naming

Brain functional plasticity associated with the emergence of expertise in extreme language control

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