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Bilingual advantage in executive control when task demands are considered*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 March 2015

LI QU ,
JOEL JIA WEI LOW ,
TING ZHANG ,
HONG LI  and
PHILIP DAVID ZELAZO
LI QU*
Affiliation:
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
JOEL JIA WEI LOW
Affiliation:
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
TING ZHANG
Affiliation:
South West University, China
HONG LI
Affiliation:
South West University, China; Liaoning Normal University, China
PHILIP DAVID ZELAZO
Affiliation:
University of Minnesota, USA
*
Address for correspondence: Li Qu, Division of Psychology, Nanyang Technological University, 14 Nanyang Drive, Singapore637332quli@ntu.edu.sg.
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Abstract

To examine how task demands influence bilingual advantage in executive control over monolinguals, we tested 32 Chinese monolinguals and 32 Chinese–English bilinguals with four versions of a color-shape switching task. During switching trials, the task required participants to suppress one set of conflicting (or non-conflicting) responses and simultaneously to activate another set of conflicting (or non-conflicting) responses. The results showed that compared to monolinguals, (i) when suppressing conflicting responses or (ii) activating non-conflicting responses, bilinguals had significantly smaller switching costs though similar mixing costs; (iii) when suppressing one set of conflicting responses and simultaneously activating another set of conflicting responses, bilinguals had significantly smaller switching costs though larger mixing costs; and (iv) when suppressing one set of non-conflicting responses and simultaneously activating another set of non-conflicting responses, bilinguals had similar switching costs and mixing costs. These findings indicate that task demands affect bilingual advantage in executive control.

Keywords

bilingualexecutive controltask switchingtask demandinhibition
Type
Research Article
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 19 , Issue 2 , March 2016 , pp. 277 - 293
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

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Footnotes

*

We wish to acknowledge the funding support for this project from Nanyang Technological University under the Undergraduate Research Experience on Campus (URECA) programme. We would also like to thank Chong Pei Shan, Lim Wei Li Dawn, Cheng Cheng Jiang, and Qiao Dai for their involvement in data collection. We also thank the two anonymous reviewers for comments on a previous version of the manuscript.

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