It used to be thought that being bilingual was a bad thing –
that it would confuse or hold people back, especially children.
Turns out, we couldn’t have been more wrong.
Learning new languages is an exercise of the mind.
It’s the mental equivalent of going to a gym every day.
all at the same time.
The continual effort of suppressing a language
when speaking another, along with the mental challenge
that comes with regularly switching between languages,
exercises our brain.
It improves our concentration, problem solving, memory,
and in turn our creativity.
It’s now widely accepted that there are huge benefits
to being bilingual.
A key breakthrough came back in 2007 in Toronto,
when Ellen Bialystok and her team made a discovery
that shook the scientific community –
and has massive real-world implications.
It was the first study which suggested
that bilingual people –
develop dementia four to four-and-a-half years later
than those who don’t.
It was a powerful confirmation of the idea of cognitive reserve.
Now, what is cognitive reserve?
Cognitive reserve is the idea that people develop
a reserve of thinking abilities, and this protects them
against losses that can occur through ageing and disease.
As well as delaying the onset of dementia, bilingual people
have been shown to recover significantly better after a stroke.
Learning anything new helps build cognitive reserve.
But there’s something special about language.
Language is particularly broad and complex.
It affects ideas and concepts, perception, different sounds.
The more complex a certain skill is, the more likely it is
to have a positive effect on cognitive reserve.
So when is the best time to learn a new language?
Well, here’s part of the answer.
The brain is a complex set of neural networks.
you’re building new networks.
But when you learn a language later in life,
you have to modify the existing networks
and make more connections.
Because learning languages later in life can be more challenging,
the benefits can also be greater.
But a 2023 study at Great Ormond Street suggests
this is just part of the story.
So we invited three groups of children
that were aged eight to 10.
We had a group of children who were monolinguals.
A group of children who had early exposure
to Greek and English from birth – they were our early bilinguals.
And finally, we had a group who had been exposed to English
between the age of two and five, and they were our later bilinguals.
is that we asked the children to lie in the scanner
while doing nothing – and just stare at a cross.
And during this, we measured their brain activity.
What we found that was really exciting for us
is that our early bilingual group
had the strongest connectivity in the network at rest.
And these group of regions are regions that light up
when we’re doing nothing and just mind-wandering.
A little bit like if you’re going to the gym every day,
your muscles might look bigger at rest.
Similarly your brain might be better connected at rest,
because you are learning a language early.
And this is something no-one had found before.
And there’s more.
One lesser-known behavioural effect
of bilingualism in both children and adults
is the ability to see the other people’s perspective,
or to understand that it is possible to have different points of view.
Recent studies have also found that people tend to react
more emotionally in their first language, and more rationally,
And the way it is usually explained is that the first language
is the one which we use to speak with family, with friends –
in informal settings.
The second language is usually learned at school,
at the university, at work.
Scientists are discovering new upsides to being bilingual
all the time.
And it’s not just our brains that benefit.
Learning new languages,
and speaking more than one language,
is very important – not only for individuals, but also for societies.
Learning new languages can open doors
to new cultural experiences, life opportunities.
Different people, different communities,
and different ways of seeing the world.
And with that, we’ll say a final…
Bye!
