Cambridge Extra – Katie
“A new study indicates that people who speak two languages (bilinguals) are more visually attentive than those who only speak English (monolinguals)…Adult bilingual and monolingual speakers were presented with two pictures (the original and a slightly modified version) of various scenes and required to press a key as soon as they could identify the difference. The study found that the bilingual participants were significantly faster (2.9 seconds) and 11% more accurate than monolinguals in identifying the change in the picture. Dr Filippi, director of the Multilanguage & Cognition Lab at Anglia Ruskin University, said: “Our research is examining whether learning a second or a third language provides cognitive advantages or disadvantages across someone’s life span. “Our work to date indicates that bilingual and multilingual speakers of different ages seem to have an advantage when performing non-verbal tasks requiring selective attention…It is important that the public, and in particular parents and educators, are aware of the potential importance of speaking more than one language on the development and maintenance of cognitive abilities.””(more)