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Age-related effects over bilingual language control and executive control*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2013

MARCO CALABRIA ,
FRANCESCA M. BRANZI ,
PAULA MARNE ,
MIREIA HERNÁNDEZ  and
ALBERT COSTA
MARCO CALABRIA
Affiliation:
Center for Brain and Cognition, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain
FRANCESCA M. BRANZI
Affiliation:
Center for Brain and Cognition, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain
PAULA MARNE
Affiliation:
Center for Brain and Cognition, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain
MIREIA HERNÁNDEZ
Affiliation:
Center for Brain and Cognition, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain & Cognitive Neuropsychology Laboratory, Department of Psychology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
ALBERT COSTA*
Affiliation:
Center for Brain and Cognition, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain & Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Spain
*
Address for correspondence: Albert Costa, Departament de Tecnologies de la Informació i les Comunicacions, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, C/Tanger, 122-140, 08014-Barcelona, Spaincostalbert@gmail.com
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Abstract

The aim of the present study is two-fold. First, we investigate age-related changes to bilingual language control (bLC) mechanisms across lifespan. Second, we explore the relation between bLC mechanisms and those of the domain-general executive (EC) system by looking at age effects on these two systems. To do so, we compare the performances of the three age groups of bilinguals (young, middle-aged and elderly) in a language switching task to those of non-linguistic switching task. We found an age-related change in the non-linguistic switch cost but not in the language switch cost. Moreover, we did not find any correlation between the magnitudes of the switch costs. Taken together these results indicate that bLC is not affected by age as the EC system is, and interestingly, we add new evidence that the bLC mechanisms are not fully subsidiary to those of the domain-general EC system.

Keywords

bilingualismagingexecutive controlbilingual language control
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , January 2015 , pp. 65 - 78
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

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Footnotes

*

This work was supported by grants from the Spanish government (PSI2008-01191, PSI2011-23033, Consolider Ingenio 2010 CSD2007-00012, IMSERSO 48/2010) and the Catalan government (Consolidat SGR 2009-1521). Marco Calabria was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Government (Juan de la Cierva fellowship). Francesca M. Branzi was supported by a predoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Government (FPU-2009-2013). This research was also supported by a Marie Curie International Outgoing Fellowship within the 7th European Community Framework Programme awarded to Mireia Hernández. We thank three anonymous reviewers for their comments.

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