THE POWER OF LANGUAGE
PEOPLE who learn a second language get a significant boost to their brain function that lasts a lifetime.
Brain mapping shows that different areas of the brain are used to handle different languages — so by learning a second language you’re helping to strengthen other parts of your brain. How does this work?
BETTER CONCENTRATION.
NUMEROUS studies show that those who speak more than one language can focus not only more clearly but also have more grey matter, the central mass of cells in your brain.
Researchers at the University of Birmingham recently studied 99 volunteers; half spoke only English, while the remainder had been bilingual in English and Mandarin since childhood. The English-only speakers performed slower on two out of three tests of attention.
Scientists believe the benefits of speaking two languages are partly due to the fact the brain must actively suppress one language when speaking another.
Being able to handle the extra workload results in stronger overall control of attention. This is reflected in brain images of children and adults who speak two languages who have more grey and white matter (the network of connectors linking brain cells) than those who don’t.
IMPROVED LEARNING.
A FOUR-YEAR American study of school children in Portland, Oregon, randomly assigned some seven-year-olds to English-only classes, while the rest attended dual-language classes in Spanish, Mandarin or Japanese.
By the time they were 11, the duallanguage children were a whole year more advanced in terms of their English reading skills than their peers in the English-only group.
PROTECTION AGAINST DEMENTIA
A REMARKABLE 2007 study in Toronto showed that people who speak more than one language developed symptoms of dementia about four years later than those who spoke only one.
A recent review in the journal Current Opinion in Neurology concluded: ‘Life-long bilingualism represents a powerful cognitive reserve delaying the onset of dementia.
You may not have been lucky enough to learn another language as a child, but it’s never too late to start and reap some of the brain health benefits, too.