Jubin Abutalebi

Brendan S. Weekes

The Cognitive Neurology of Bilingualism in the Age of Globalization

Background. Bilingualism results in an added advantage with respect to cognitive control. The interaction between bilingual language control and general purpose cognitive control systems can also be understood by studying executive control among individuals with bilingual aphasia. Objectives. The current study examined the subcomponents of cognitive control in bilingual aphasia. A case study approach was used to investigate whether cognitive control and language control are two separate systems and how factors related to bilingualism interact with control processes. Methods. Four individuals with bilingual aphasia performed a language background questionnaire, picture description task, and two experimental tasks (nonlinguistic negative priming task and linguistic and nonlinguistic versions of flanker task). Results. A descriptive approach was used to analyse the data using reaction time and accuracy measures. The cumulative distribution function plots were used to visualize the variations in performance across conditions. The results highlight the distinction between general purpose cognitive control and bilingual language control mechanisms. Conclusion. All participants showed predominant use of the reactive control mechanism to compensate for the limited resources system. Independent yet interactive systems for bilingual language control and general purpose cognitive control were postulated based on the experimental data derived from individuals with bilingual aphasia.

Tanya Dash

Bhoomika R. Kar

Bilingual Language Control and General Purpose Cognitive Control among Individuals with Bilingual Aphasia: Evidence Based on Negative Priming and Flanker Tasks

Neuroimaging studies suggest that the neural network involved in language control may not be specific to bi-/multilingualism but is part of a domain-general executive control system. We report a trilingual case of a Cantonese (L1), English (L2), and Mandarin (L3) speaker, Dr. T, who sustained a brain injury at the age of 77 causing lesions in the left frontal lobe and in the left temporo-parietal areas resulting in fluent aphasia. Dr. T&#x2019;s executive functions were impaired according to a modified version of the Stroop color-word test and the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test performance was characterized by frequent perseveration errors. Dr. T demonstrated pathological language switching and mixing across her three languages. Code switching in Cantonese was more prominent in discourse production than confrontation naming. Our case suggests that voluntary control of spoken word production in trilingual speakers shares neural substrata in the frontobasal ganglia system with domain-general executive control mechanisms. One prediction is that lesions to such a system would give rise to both pathological switching and impairments of executive functions in trilingual speakers.

Anthony Pak-Hin Kong

Karen Sze-Yan Lam

Brendan Weekes

Executive and Language Control in the Multilingual Brain

Background. Despite a growing clinical need, there are no clear guidelines on assessment of lexical access in the two languages in individuals with bilingual aphasia. Objective. In this study, we examined the influence of language proficiency on three tasks requiring lexical access in English and Spanish bilingual normal controls and in bilingual individuals with aphasia. Methods. 12 neurologically healthy Spanish-English bilinguals and 10 Spanish-English bilinguals with aphasia participated in the study. All participants completed three lexical retrieval tasks: two picture-naming tasks (BNT, BPNT) and a category generation (CG) task. Results. This study found that across all tasks, the greatest predictors for performance were the effect of group and language ability rating (LAR). Bilingual controls had a greater score or produced more correct responses than participants with bilingual aphasia across all tasks. The results of our study also indicate that normal controls and bilinguals with aphasia make similar types of errors in both English and Spanish and develop similar clustering strategies despite significant performance differences between the groups. Conclusions. Differences between bilingual patients and controls demonstrate a fundamental lexical retrieval deficit in bilingual individuals with aphasia, but one that is further influenced by language proficiency in the two languages.

Swathi Kiran

Isabel Balachandran

Jason Lucas

The Nature of Lexical-Semantic Access in Bilingual Aphasia

Introduction. Globalization imposes challenges to the field of behavioural neurology, among which is an increase in the prevalence of bilingual aphasia. Thus, aphasiologists have increasingly focused on bilingual aphasia therapy and, more recently, on the identification of the most efficient procedures for triggering language recovery in bilinguals with aphasia. Therapy in both languages is often not available, and, thus, researchers have focused on the transfer of therapy effects from the treated language to the untreated one. Aim. This paper discusses the literature on bilingual aphasia therapy, with a focus on cross-linguistic therapy effects from the language in which therapy is provided to the untreated language. Methods. Fifteen articles including two systematic reviews, providing details on pre- and posttherapy in the adult bilingual population with poststroke aphasia and anomia are discussed with regard to variables that can influence the presence or absence of cross-linguistic transfer of therapy effects. Results and Discussion. The potential for CLT of therapy effects from the treated to the untreated language depends on the word type, the degree of structural overlap between languages, the type of therapy approach, the pre- and postmorbid language proficiency profiles, and the status of the cognitive control circuit.

Ana In&#xe9;s Ansaldo

Ladan Ghazi Saidi

Aphasia Therapy in the Age of Globalization: Cross-Linguistic Therapy Effects in Bilingual Aphasia

We investigated the effects of age as well as the linked factors of education and bilingualism on confrontation naming in rural Kashmir by creating a culturally appropriate naming test with pictures of 60 objects. We recruited 48 cognitively normal participants whose ages ranged from 18 to 28 and from 60 to 85. Participants in our study were illiterate monolinguals <svg style="vertical-align:-2.3205pt;width:62.487499px;" id="M1" height="15.0875" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 62.487499 15.0875" width="62.487499" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
	
		
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</svg> and educated Kashmiri-Urdu bilinguals <svg style="vertical-align:-2.3205pt;width:62.487499px;" id="M2" height="15.0875" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 62.487499 15.0875" width="62.487499" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
	
		
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</svg>. Hierarchical multiple regression revealed that younger adults performed better than older adults <svg style="vertical-align:-2.3205pt;width:70.474998px;" id="M3" height="15.0875" version="1.1" viewBox="0 0 70.474998 15.0875" width="70.474998" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
	
		
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</svg> and the age effect was quadratic (age2). It also showed Age X Education and Age X L2 Speaking interactions predicted naming performance. The Age X Education interaction indicated that the advantages of greater education increased with advancing age. Since education is in the second language (L2) in our population, this finding is no doubt linked to the Age X L2 Speaking interaction. This suggests that L2 speaking proficiency contributed more to first language (L1) naming with advancing age.

Sameer Ashaie

Loraine Obler

Effect of Age, Education, and Bilingualism on Confrontation Naming in Older Illiterate and Low-Educated Populations

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The Cognitive Neurology of Bilingualism in the Age of Globalization

The Cognitive Neurology of Bilingualism in the Age of Globalization

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