This study examined how newly learned emotional meanings influence word processing in first-language (L1) and second-language (L2) speakers. Participants learned Chinese pseudowords paired with disgusted, sad or neutral faces. Generalization and refreshing tests assessed whether the learned meanings extended beyond specific pairings, and event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded during a modified lexical decision task to probe neural processing. Both groups successfully learned and generalized the emotional associations, although L2 speakers showed reduced cross-modal generalization for sadness. ERP analyses revealed that unlearned pseudowords elicited stronger early posterior negativity (EPN) while emotional pseudowords elicited larger late positive complex (LPC). Also, L2 participants exhibited greater LPC amplitudes and broader cortical recruitment than L1 counterparts. Moreover, disgust and sadness diverged in early neural responses, with disgust eliciting enhanced EPNs. These findings indicate rapid affective binding to novel words and greater neural effort for L2 processing, suggesting similar temporal dynamics but increased resource demands in L2.

Multilingual experience is seen as a cognitive reserve factor that may protect against neurodegeneration. Accurate language use measurement is essential to understand its cognitive and neural effects. Traditional assessments often rely on a single retrospective questionnaire, which may not reflect the dynamic, context-dependent nature of multilingualism. This study introduces complementary tools – Language History Questionnaire (LHQ), Daily Report Form (DR), Online Messages (OM) and In-lab Language Tasks (EXP) – to assess language use across social contexts in native and non-native languages. Correlational, ANOVA and network analyses showed that self-report tools had high internal consistency, while objective and experimental methods varied in sensitivity to context and modality. Consistency across tools was higher for native language use, especially when aggregating data across contexts. In contrast, non-native English assessments were more affected by contextual variability and tool-specific biases. Findings highlight the need for multimodal, context-rich assessments to improve validity and comparability in real-world multilingual research.

Recent research suggests that a cognitive bias, the illusion of causality, can be attenuated when the task is presented in a foreign language (Díaz-Lago & Matute, 2019a, Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 72(1), 41–51), supporting the well-known foreign language effect on decision making and reasoning. We conducted a replication study with a large sample (N = 220), determined through a Bayes factor design analysis, but our results did not support the original findings. This finding challenges the generalizability of the foreign language effect on reducing cognitive biases. Additionally, we found that the magnitude of the illusion decreased with increasing years of formal education and was generally weaker among male participants compared to females. These findings emphasize the importance of using samples with balanced demographic characteristics to avoid potential confounds in between-group comparisons. Overall, our study highlights the need for further research to clarify the conditions under which the foreign language effect can influence cognitive biases.

This study examines how linguistic differences between Chinese and European languages influence cognitive functions. Two experiments compared cognitive performance between Chinese and European undergraduates. Experiment 1 compared Chinese and European bilinguals (e.g., Chinese-English versus French-English) studying at an English university. Chinese bilinguals exhibited stronger executive control, inhibitory control and mental rotation, suggesting that greater linguistic distance enhances cognitive control. Experiment 2 examined native Chinese and English speakers in their respective countries, isolating language-script effects. Chinese speakers performed better in visual attention (i.e., orienting and facilitation) and mental rotation, while English speakers exhibited superior performance in auditory attention (i.e., attentional switching). These differences likely stem from language-script characteristics: logographic Chinese engages visuospatial processing, while alphabetic English reinforces auditory attention flexibility. Collectively, these findings underscore specific cognitive effects associated with linguistic distance and language script and provide comprehensive insights into how language structure modulates domain-specific cognitive adaptations.

This study investigates how individual differences in proficiency, exposure and language attitudes influence bilingual reactive control during forced language switching in Dutch–English bilinguals. Thirty-four late bilinguals completed a picture naming task switching between Dutch (L1) and English (L2) in response to visual cues, naming cognate and noncognate words. Linear mixed-effects models indicated that bilinguals with higher L2 proficiency showed reduced asymmetric (L2 to L1) switch costs. Additionally, bilinguals who reported more positive attitudes toward their L2 showed reduced switch costs during L2 to L1 trials involving cognate transitions, although further replication is needed to test this effect among larger sample sizes and different language pairs. By combining psycholinguistic methods with a psychometrically validated sociolinguistic measure, this study illustrates how integrating cognitive and affective variables can yield more nuanced accounts of bilingual language control.

This study tests the relative amount of cognitive effort required for Spanish language processing by L1-dominant speakers (Spanish-raised bilinguals, SRBs), heritage speakers (HSs) and late second-language learners (English-raised bilinguals, ERBs). In a dual-task study, three groups of bilingual Spanish speakers were presented concurrently with a linguistic and non-linguistic task, each at three levels of difficulty. When responding to the non-linguistic task, which required concurrently processing and encoding in memory a Spanish-language phrase, SRBs were, on average, most accurate and ERBs least accurate. This suggests a three-way difference between SRBs, HSs and ERBs in the amount of cognitive resources required for language processing in the target language, highlighting HSs’ unique developmental trajectory. Results further suggest that accuracy on the non-linguistic task was reduced for all groups when the concurrent linguistic stimulus was of higher syntactic complexity, suggesting that more complex linguistic structures require more cognitive resources regardless of language background.

The present study examined how task demands modulate neural activations during the processing of emotion-label words (words describing emotional states) and emotion-laden words (words triggering emotions through connotations) in a second language (L2). To this end, we directly compared behavioral and electrophysiological responses in late Chinese-English bilinguals when the words’ affective information was task-relevant (emotional categorization task, ECT) versus task-irrelevant (emotional Stroop task, EST). Our results revealed the modulation of emotion word type and valence on L2 emotion word processing. Specifically, negative emotion-laden words exhibited slower response times, and positive emotion-label words elicited larger Late Positive Complex amplitudes. Notably, these effects were observed exclusively within the task where the emotional dimension of the stimuli was task-relevant, that is, when participants explicitly determined the word valence. Taken together, our study highlights the potential task-dependent nature of the effects of emotion word type and valence in late bilinguals’ L2, suggesting that assumptions about the universality of such effects should be evaluated in light of task demands and language context.

Current approaches to bilingualism and language learning ability obscure differences between capacity for learning (ability) and dominance (relative proficiency). Bilingual children with developmental language disorder (DLD) have persistent difficulties with complex syntax. The effects of language learning ability and relative proficiency on syntactic development in bilingual acquisition are not well described. This cross-sectional study examined the continuous effects of language ability and relative proficiency on the production of conditionals, subject/object relatives and passives in a sample of 34 five- to nine-year-old Spanish–English bilingual children, 12 of whom were identified as having DLD. Conditionals were significantly easier than other forms, and there were no differences between subject and object relatives. Higher language ability was associated with greater accuracy. Relative proficiency predicted higher English performance for balanced and English-dominant children. Further examination of language ability and relative proficiency in diverse language learners is warranted.

Language, emotion, and environment jointly shape how words are processed in real life. This study tested how valence and simulated weather influence bilingual lexical access in virtual reality (VR). Forty Spanish–English bilinguals completed a language-decision task with negative high-arousal and neutral low-arousal words under sunny and rainy conditions. Accuracy was high, with no reliable effects. Reaction times were faster for negative than for neutral words and slower under rain than sun, with no significant language effect. A Weather by Trial Order interaction reflected a practice-related speeding under sun under sunny weather. Valence and weather exerted additive influences, and weather did not modulate language or valence effects. These findings suggest that realistic perceptual load imposes general costs without altering emotional or language-related processing. The study underscores VR’s potential to integrate ecological validity into psycholinguistic paradigms, revealing how intrinsic and extrinsic factors jointly constrain bilingual emotional word processing.

The study examines the influence of bilingual experience, age and verbal working memory (WM) on the comprehension of passive voice by 116 typically developing (TD) and 65 autistic children aged 3 to 13, who were tested in their societal languages, German or French. Some children were mainly exposed to the societal language while some children were also exposed to other languages. We adopt a continuous approach to bilingual experience and operationalize it as a balance of cumulative exposure, measured through entropy scores. We found that the comprehension of passive voice improved with age in both groups, and higher verbal WM predicted better performance in autistic but not TD children. Although autistic children were less accurate than TD children, bilingual experience did not contribute to the differences between the two groups. These findings suggest that bilingualism has no detrimental effect on the comprehension of complex syntactic structures in autistic children.

The present study investigates how emotional states (positive, negative, neutral) and language-switching contexts with different switching frequencies (low: 25%, medium: 50%, high: 75%) jointly modulate executive control among unbalanced Chinese-English bilinguals. By combining a language-switching task with a Flanker task within response trials, we found that compared to low- and high-switching contexts, negative states enhanced executive control in medium switching contexts by optimizing resource allocation, as reflected by reduced N2 and increased P3 effects. In high-switching contexts, positive states facilitated proactive control, with greater P3 effects in incongruent than congruent trials. However, negative states favored reactive control, with greater P3 effects in congruent than incongruent trials. We propose the Emotion Adaptive Control (EAC) model, a framework which offers a more comprehensive perspective on how bilingual language control adapts to domain-general cognitive control under emotional states.

This study evaluated English and Spanish language proficiency, and balance among these proficiencies, in relation to reading achievement in a sample of 161 middle school current and former English learners known to be struggling readers. Students were administered English and Spanish language assessments and also reported on their language usage; English reading outcomes (word reading, reading fluency, reading comprehension) were also assessed. Findings support the role of English proficiency in all three reading outcomes in this population. However, Spanish language skills, or indices that reflected the relative balance of these proficiencies, were not uniquely predictive. The present study adds nuance to the current literature and offers considerations for future work.

This study examines how emotional states interact with bilingual language control across different switching contexts. Chinese–English bilinguals performed cued and voluntary switching tasks under neutral, negative and positive emotional states. Behaviorally, negative states did not affect performance. Event-related potentials (ERPs) results revealed that in voluntary switching, negative state increased cue-locked late positive component (LPC) on switch trials, indicating greater reactive control during the late stage of language schemas competition phase. In cued switching, negative state enhanced cue- and stimulus-locked N2 and reduced stimulus-locked LPC on L1 trials, reflecting enhanced proactive control during the early stage of language schemas competition and throughout the lexical selection phase. As proactive control is more cognitively demanding than reactive control, these findings suggest that the compensatory mechanism is more strongly activated in cued switching across both language control phases. Our findings extend the adaptive control hypothesis by showing how bilinguals flexibly adjust control in emotional contexts.

We investigated how bilingual adults lexicalized novel words (bloksom) derived from existing English words (blossom), over a 24-h interval that included sleep, as a function of word-related factors (lexical frequency), task-related factors (inferencing during encoding), and individual differences in compartmentalized versus integrated bilingual use (language entropy). In Experiment 1, 48 bilingual adults explicitly learned novel word–picture pairings. In Experiment 2, 50 bilingual adults implicitly learned the same pairings. Both experiments manipulated task conditions to require an inference (Inference +) versus absence of inference (Inference −). Participant performance was responsive to word-related factors (word frequency). However, participants who use multiple languages in a low-entropy, compartmentalized manner were most responsive to explicitly tuned task factors. In contrast, participants who use their languages in a high entropy, integrated manner were most responsive to implicitly tuned task factors. These data suggest that bilingual experience modulates preferred novel word learning styles in adult bilinguals.

It remains unclear how language and cognitive control networks interact to support second language (L2) proficiency in the bilingual brain. Our study used gradient network and dynamic causal modelling (DCM) to investigate the brain activity flow in these two brain networks underlying L2 proficiency with sixty-one Chinese-English bilinguals. We found that the gradient values of the right calcarine gyrus and the left supramarginal gyrus were positively correlated with L2 proficiency. However, multivariate pattern and region-of-interest analyses suggested that L2 proficiency may not significantly modulate the brain activity flow of these two networks in global network gradients. Meanwhile, DCM findings demonstrated that L2 proficiency development increased inhibitory effects from the language network to the cognitive control network, indicating that L2 learning would modulate the cognitive control system. In summary, our study provides further insights into how language and cognitive control networks interact to establish a smooth bilingual system underlying L2 proficiency.

The present study aimed to investigate the impact of cultural exposure conditions (i.e., Chinese culture, American culture, dual cultures and control condition) on the bilingual language switch costs during the process of language comprehension. Sixty unbalanced Chinese–English bilinguals performed a modified animacy judgment task across four cultural exposure conditions, judging whether Chinese or English words referred to a living or nonliving objects. Reaction times and accuracy rates were analyzed using repeated-measures ANOVA. The results showed smaller switch costs in dual-cultural exposure than in the control condition. Furthermore, switch costs under different cultural exposures varied only for the second language (L2), with no significant differences for the first language (L1). Moreover, in the Chinese cultural exposure and control conditions, the switch costs for L2 were found to be larger than those for L1. Conversely, in the American and dual-cultural exposure conditions, the switch costs for L2 were smaller than those for L1.

Examining 62 college students who are bilingual in Spanish and English, this study assessed key predictors of irregular English word spelling accuracy, including cognates and non-cognates. Explanatory item response models tested the contributions of word-level (e.g., orthographic similarity [OS] and phonemic similarity [PS] between English and Spanish word forms) and person-level predictors (e.g., literacy skills in English and Spanish) to item-level spelling accuracy. In line with prior investigations of cognate spelling in English, spelling accuracy was predicted by generally stronger English decoding skill and higher OS, with no significant influence of Spanish abilities. However, OS effects diminished after removing identical cognates from the outcome variable. An exploratory analysis revealed similar effects of English and Spanish decoding fluency on the likelihood of non-cognate spelling accuracy. These results have implications for understanding how orthographic representations of cognates are stored and accessed in the bilingual lexicon, particularly in alphabetic orthographies.

Research on the non-linguistic cognitive consequences of bilingualism remains inconclusive, with ongoing debate over which characteristics of bilinguals drive potential effects and which cognitive abilities may be involved. The impact of bilingualism and trilingualism on attentional performance was studied using a computerized Attentional Network Test. It was administered to 97 adults, assuming progressive improvement with increasing language experience. Reaction times and errors were examined across global and specific attentional network measures (alerting, orienting and executive control). Results indicated that the locus of improvement between bilinguals and trilinguals relative to monolinguals emerged primarily in global reaction times and errors, with no specific effects in any attentional network. Although differences between bilinguals and trilinguals showed only a non-significant trend, regression analyses revealed a significant logarithmic relationship whereby speaking more languages predicted faster global reaction times. The observed processing-speed improvement is discussed in relation to ongoing hypotheses proposing an adaptive response in multilinguals.