1. Bilingualism and healthy aging: Aging effects and neural maintenance
- Author
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Daniela Perani, Jubin Abutalebi, Lucia Guidi, Brendan S. Weekes, Rita Franceschini, Gerda Videsott, Pasquale Anthony Della Rosa, Virgina M. Borsa, Borsa, Virgina M., Perani, Daniela, Della Rosa, Pasquale A., Videsott, Gerda, Guidi, Lucia, Weekes, Brendan S., Franceschini, Rita, and Abutalebi, Jubin
- Subjects
Male ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Bilingualism ,Cognitive Neuroscience ,education ,Cognitive reserve ,Experimental and Cognitive Psychology ,Multilingualism ,Audiology ,Grey matter ,behavioral disciplines and activities ,050105 experimental psychology ,Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) ,Conflict, Psychological ,Healthy Aging ,03 medical and health sciences ,Behavioral Neuroscience ,0302 clinical medicine ,Cognitive Reserve ,medicine ,Image Processing, Computer-Assisted ,Humans ,0501 psychology and cognitive sciences ,Healthy aging ,Daily exposure ,Gray Matter ,Neuroscience of multilingualism ,Anterior cingulate cortex ,Neural reserve ,Aged ,05 social sciences ,Brain ,Cognition ,Organ Size ,Middle Aged ,Magnetic Resonance Imaging ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,Female ,Psychology ,Neurocognitive ,psychological phenomena and processes ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery - Abstract
Speaking more than one language is associated with neurocognitive benefits in seniors (Alladi et al. 2013). Few studies however have tested this hypothesis directly by comparing bilingual seniors who vary in chronological age. We report a Voxel-Based Morphometry (VBM) study showing cumulative effects of age on grey matter volume (GMV) in brain structures that are involved in cognitive control in bilingual seniors and found no differences in RT or accuracy between bilingual and monolingual seniors on a behavioral test of cognitive control called the Attentional Network Task (ANT), and no differences in GMV for selected ROIs between groups. However, chronological age predicted the size of interference and conflict effects for monolingual speakers only. We also observed a more widespread pattern of bilateral aging-effcts in brain regions that are classically associated with aging in monolingual speakers compared to bilingual speakers. Notably, GMV in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and the level of daily exposure to a second language (L2) independently predict performance on the ANT in bilingual speakers. We conclude that regular (daily) bilingual experience mitigates the typical effects of aging on cognitive control at the behavioral and the neural level.
- Published
- 2017