As an advocate of bilingual education and multilingualism in general, I was pleased to come across the New York Times: The Bilingual Advantage article today. A female cognitive neuroscientist "has spent almost 40 years learning about how bilingualism sharpens the mind" and her research demonstrates how "the regular use of two languages appears to delay the onset of Alzheimer’s disease symptoms." And this is only part of what her research has found.
Among Dr. Ellen Bialystok's findings "that bilingualism helps forestall the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease", she also says that her research shows that bilinguals...
- "manifested a cognitive system with the ability to attend to important information and ignore the less important"
- use an "executive control system" that is found in our brain that is responsible for helping us focus on what is important and ignore irrelevant details. Apparently bilinguals use this system more and therefore, "it’s that regular use that makes that system more efficient."
- can use their knowledge and constant use of two languages to aid in multitasking (hence, the constant use of the "executive control system")
What this article does conclude is that it is the constant use of both languages that leads to cognitive advantages.
What can we learn from this? I believe we should be proud of our multilingualism and realize the numerous benefits of our ability to communicate (fluently) in more than one language and continue to take pride in it as we pass it on to our children and encourage them. I also feel that we should not let ourselves discontinue the use of one or more languages that we have learned (if this is the case). I think parents should teach their children their native language and encourage second language acquisition.
Thank you for your time (and check out the NYTimes article),
Gracias por su tiempo,
Obrigada pelo seu tempo,
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