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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Aug 11, 2025

Examining Bilingual Language Control Using the Stroop Task

Examining Bilingual Language Control Using the Stroop Task

Published on: February 26, 2020

Language combinations of multilinguals are reflected in their first-language knowledge and processing.

Olga Kepinska^1,2,3,4, Jocelyn Caballero⁵, Myriam Oliver^5,6

¹Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Weill Institute for Neurosciences, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, 94143, USA. olga.kepinska@univie.ac.at.

Scientific Reports

|February 2, 2023

Summary

Language diversity in multilingual children impacts their vocabulary and brain activity. This study explores how the differences and similarities between languages influence cognitive development in young multilinguals.

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Last Updated: Aug 11, 2025

Examining Bilingual Language Control Using the Stroop Task

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Published on: February 26, 2020

Experimental Paradigm for Measuring the Effect of Induced Emotion on Grammar Learning

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Area of Science:

Cognitive Neuroscience
Developmental Psychology
Linguistics

Background:

Multilingualism offers cognitive benefits but can also lead to varied outcomes.
The impact of language typology on multilingual development is understudied.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate how the typological diversity of languages affects cognition and brain activity in young multilinguals.
To explore the relationship between language background and cognitive development across a multilingual continuum.

Main Methods:

Studied 162 children aged 5-6 years along a monolingual-to-quintilingual spectrum.
Assessed expressive vocabulary and brain activation patterns.
Analyzed the typological linguistic diversity of participants' language backgrounds.

Main Results:

Typological linguistic diversity correlated with expressive vocabulary in the dominant language.
Neural level findings showed altered brain activation patterns, including in the PGa area (bilateral IPL).
This brain region is linked to multilingual experience but not previously to language typology.

Conclusions:

Ecologically valid methods can describe multilingual language experience.
Cognition and brain activity in multilingual kindergartners are associated with the typological linguistic diversity of their environment.
Language typology is a significant factor in understanding multilingual development.