Know any of the above words from ubongo to brein? If so, you can (surprisingly to you of course) say BRAIN in Hawaiian, Swahili, Spanish, Italian, French, or Dutch. And if you can (read this and) fluently speak at least one of these languages, or another not shown, you are multilingual (again, SO surprisingly to you…) – and may consequently reap some benefits from this status!

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, at least 13% of Americans are bilingual. They speak a language other than English at home and can speak English “well” or “very well.” Henceforth, studies on bilingualism are relevant and many have actually demonstrated differences between monolinguals and bilinguals.

Despite political adversity, educational neuroscientists have advocated the study of second languages in school and the use of a second language at home, especially before age five or six. According to a briefing from the Society for Neuroscience website, monolingual and bilingual children have been found to reach the language milestones at the same time and the latter are not “language confused” as some adversaries and earlier theories would suggest.

Several studies have demonstrated that bilinguals perform better than monolinguals on many executive control tasks, including attention, control, concentration, inhibition, and prioritizing. In the Los Angeles Times, Ellen Bialystok from York University in Toronto who has studied bilingualism for nearly 40 years discussed a study in which she found that bilinguals “manifested a cognitive system with the ability to attend to important information and ignore the less important.” Compared to monolingual children, bilingual children would pick out silly sentences like “apples grow on noses” but also note that they are still grammatically correct.

Additionally, bilingual people were found to “multitask better, pick out key information faster and more effectively ignore surrounding distractions.” In the Stroop test, where one must say the color of the letters rather than the word made up from the letters (e.g. the word blue written in red), bilingual people had faster reaction times than monolingual people – 160 milliseconds compared to 240 milliseconds.

Another study by Krizman et al. in 2011 noted that bilinguals showed “enhanced discrimination of simple, non-linguistic sounds as assessed by a measure of temporal resolution (backward masking) and a measure of frequency discrimination.” Supposedly, bilingual brains can better process “specific sound elements that relate to auditory perception and cognitive abilities.”

Such enhancement of cognitive abilities has been suggested to protect bilingual people from the symptoms of dementia and Alzheimer Disease. According to the Society for Neuroscience website, some theories suggest that “speaking two languages may increase blood and oxygen flow to the brain and keep nerve connections healthy—factors thought to help ward off dementia.”

Another study by Bialystok from 2004 showed that bilingual people had enhanced cognitive function compared to monolingual people. Later studies looking at the medical records of around 400 patients demonstrated that bilinguals also showed Alzheimer Disease symptoms five or six years later than monolinguals.

While learning a language could protect us from showing symptoms of Alzheimer disease, performing any kind of engaging task that requires more than one sensory modality can help. In doing so, the brain strengthens neural networks and could rewire in some areas. According to Bialystok, bilingualism does rewire the brain. Neural connections are different between monolinguals and bilinguals. Neuroimaging demonstrates that, when solving a problem or performing a task, different systems are being used by the two groups. Additionally, another study showed that the inferior parietal cortices of bilinguals have greater gray-matter density in the language-dominant left hemisphere, especially in those who were proficient early on in life. Not only that, but the dorso-lateral prefrontal cortex of the right hemisphere is more active when bilinguals are “toggling” between languages, or in “bilingual mode.” This area has been known to take part in attention and control, and its activity acts as a neural signature of bilingualism.

While more studies are needed to challenge theories, many have persuasively shown that there is a difference between bilinguals and monolinguals, and this difference provides bilinguals an advantage in executive control and prevention of cognitive decline.

What language will you try to pick up?

Sources:

Brain Briefings – Bilingual Brain, Society for Neuroscience

Bilingualism good for the brain, researchers say - Amina Khan, Los Angeles Times

J.L. Krizman Presentation Abstract

The Bilingual Advantage – Claudia Dreifus, The New York Times

If I told you that a theater company and a medical school collaborated to produce one of the best plays of the year, would you believe me?

Probably not, because this is not the case. However, this unlikely partnership of industries did produce a substantial therapeutic program for people who are currently suffering the cognitive deficits associated with dementia.

Based on the theory of cognitive reserve - or the brain’s resilience to neuropathological damage – it is widely hypothesized that creative and interactive activities, such as painting, singing, and acting, would help patients maintain their cognitive functions for as long as possible.

With this hypothesis and the guidance of the Lookingglass Theater Company, the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University formed the first-ever “Memory Ensemble.” The cast included six elderly patients suffering from early stages of memory loss, a common symptom attributable to various types of dementia.

Quoted as “one of the first-of-its-kind,” the directors of this production sought to design a program that would improve the quality of life for these patients by setting up a safe and supportive environment. With the serene scene set, patients were encouraged to express every emotion and/or words associated with their neurological deficits to help them alleviate any pains or questions of uncertainty accompanied by these disorders.

As a part of a seven week pilot study, the ensemble would meet and participate in various cognitive activities, including an impromptu-style of acting that actively engaged the patients both physically and mentally. As a baseline measure, metaphor-based warm-up exercises prompted the patients to choose a color that symbolizes their current emotional state. Prior to their regularly scheduled regime, the patient’s reports ranged from a happy sunny yellow to a melancholy blue. Nevertheless, after a stretching routine, body-sculpting exercises portraying various feelings, and an active discussion of the hardships involved with their disorders, all of the patients were quick to describe their emotional state at the end of the workshop as a happy yellow.

Although these patients verbally reported an improvement in their quality of life within the given time period, it was noted that this qualitative research study could not quantitatively provide evidence in support of their hypothesis. Thus, a lack of evidence from this study could be detrimental to implementing this therapeutic program in hospitals across the US simply because of the lack of funding.

Though not discussed in this article, pre- and post-study fMRI scans and intermittent neuropsychological tests could provide quantitative insight on whether or not such a therapeutic program significantly contributes to the patient’s cognitive reserve. Pre- and post-study fMRI scans of the patients performing these neuropsychological tests can be compared to control subjects, as well as across-patients and within-patients, in order to identify the statistical differences between the patterns of activity associated with each task. Other measures, such as reaction time, can also be recorded to correlate with the patients behavioral performance to provide more information and insight on whether or not this is an effective prevention program.

Despite this predicament, I must say that I am very impressed and optimistic about this new style of therapy because it helps the patient positively cope with such a disastrous and unfortunate mental disorder. In the future, I hope that quantitative measures, as discussed before, will be implemented to help facilitate and disambiguate the uncertainty pertaining to dementia-related research.

Trying Improv as Therapy for Those with Memory Loss – Chicago News Cooperative - NYTimes.com

Cognitive Reserve – Dr. Yaakov  Stern (2009) - Neuropsychologia (PDF)