Bilingualism: A Cognitive and Neural View of Dual Language Experience
Bilingualism: A Cognitive and Neural View of Dual Language Experience
- Judith F. KrollJudith F. KrollSchool of Education, University of California, Irvine
- , and Guadalupe A. MendozaGuadalupe A. MendozaSchool of Education, University of California, Irvine
Summary
There has been an upsurge of research on the bilingual mind and brain. In an increasingly multilingual world, cognitive and language scientists have come to see that the use of two or more languages provides a unique lens to examine the neural plasticity engaged by language experience. But how? It is now uncontroversial to claim that the bilingual’s two languages are continually active, creating a dynamic interplay across the two languages. But there continues to be controversy about the consequences of that cross-language exchange for how cognitive and neural resources are recruited when a second language is learned and used actively and whether native speakers of a language retain privilege in their first acquired language. In the earliest months of life, minds and brains are tuned differently when exposed to more than one language from birth. That tuning has been hypothesized to open the speech system to new learning. But when initial exposure is to a home language that is not the majority language of the community—the experience common to heritage speakers—the value of bilingualism has been challenged, in part because there is not an adequate account of the variation in language experience. Research on the minds and brains of bilinguals reveals inherently complex and social accommodations to the use of multiple languages. The variation in the contexts in which the two languages are learned and used come to shape the dynamics of cross-language exchange across the lifespan.
Keywords
Subjects
- Cognitive Psychology/Neuroscience