Cognitive Advantage in Children Enrolled in a Second-Language Immersion Elementary School Program for One Year

Autor: Cristina Barbu, Audrey Gonzalez, Sophie Gillet, Martine Poncelet
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2019
Předmět:
Zdroj: Psychologica Belgica, Vol 59, Iss 1 (2019)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 2054-670X
DOI: 10.5334/pb.469
Popis: Early bilingualism has been shown to improve attentional and executive functioning. Nicolay and Poncelet (2013a, 2015) have shown that an early immersion program in school of 3 years improves the completion of tasks assessing these skills. This study aimed to determine whether similar benefits might be present after only 1 year of immersion education. The study also observed whether these potential advantages might also have a positive effect on the academic achievement. Participants included 59 immersed children and 57 monolingual controls. The two groups were compared using the same tasks as those employed by Nicolay and Poncelet (2015). The immersed children showed faster responses in comparison to monolinguals on the selective auditory task. No significant differences were observed on the other attentional, executive, or academic tasks. These outcomes suggest that a period of immersion education as short as 1 year can yield cognitive advantages associated with bilingualism.
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