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Investigating the bilingual advantage: The impact of L2 exposure on the social and cognitive skills of monolingually-raised children in bilingual education

Chamorro, Gloria, Janke, Vikki (2020) Investigating the bilingual advantage: The impact of L2 exposure on the social and cognitive skills of monolingually-raised children in bilingual education. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, . ISSN 1367-0050. E-ISSN 1747-7522. (doi:10.1080/13670050.2020.1799323) (KAR id:82122)

Abstract

Most research reporting that bilingual children exhibit enhanced cognitive skills and social awareness relative to their monolingual peers focusses on children raised and educated bilingually, making it difficult to pinpoint the degree of second language exposure necessary for such advantages to materialise. The current study measures the social and cognitive skills of Spanish children educated bilingually yet raised monolingually to explore (a) whether bilingual education alone confers advantages, and (b) whether greater second language exposure is key to producing them. It compares three groups of monolingually-raised children in their first year of primary education (i.e. 6–7 years old): one group educated in mainstream ‘monolingual’ education, one group enrolled in English-Spanish bilingual education with a ratio of 40–60 English-Spanish exposure, and one group enrolled in English-Spanish education with a ratio of 30–70 English-Spanish exposure. After one year of primary education, children attending bilingual education scored significantly higher than monolingual children on a sub-set of cognitive (selective attention; response inhibition) and social (communication; co-operation) skills, with the higher exposure bilingual school outperforming the lower exposure bilingual school on some of these measures.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1080/13670050.2020.1799323
Uncontrolled keywords: Bilingual education, cognitive skills, social skills, L2 exposure, Spanish, English
Subjects: P Language and Literature
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Arts and Humanities > School of Culture and Languages
Depositing User: Gloria Chamorro
Date Deposited: 15 Jul 2020 12:41 UTC
Last Modified: 05 Feb 2022 00:00 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/82122 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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