Do Bilingual Children Have an Executive Function Advantage? Results From Inhibition, Shifting, and Updating Tasks

• DOI: 10.1044/2018_lshss-17-0107
• Publication Date: 2018-07-06T13:42:36Z
• Authors: Genesis D. Arizmendi; Mary Alt; Shelley Gray; Tiffany P. Hogan; Samuel Green; Nelson Cowan
• Keywords: Male; 4. Education; Reproducibility of Results; Bayes Theorem; Multilingualism; Hispanic or Latino; Creativity; Executive Function; Inhibition, Psychological; 03 medical and health sciences; 0302 clinical medicine; Task Performance and Analysis; Set, Psychology; Humans; Female; Child

Purpose The purpose of this study was to examine differences in performance between monolingual and Spanish–English bilingual second graders (aged 7–9 years old) on executive function tasks assessing inhibition, shifting, updating contribute more evidence the ongoing debate about a potential advantage. Method One hundred sixty-seven English-speaking children 80 were administered 7 touchscreen computer context pirate game. Bayesian statistics used determine if there groups. Additional analyses involving covariates maternal level education nonverbal intelligence, matching these same variables, also completed. Results Scaled-information Bayes factor scores strongly favored null hypothesis that no groups any tasks. For 2 tasks, we found an advantage favor group. Conclusions If is school-aged children, it not robust across circumstances. We discuss factors might counteract actual advantage, including task reliability environmental influences.