On the overlap between bilingual language control and domain-general executive control

Abstract

We explored the overlap between bilingual language control (bLC) and domain-general executive control (EC) by focusing on inhibitory control processes. We tested 62 bilinguals in linguistic and non-linguistic switching tasks for two types of costs, such as the n − 1 shift cost and the n − 2 repetition cost. In order to explore the involvement of inhibitory control in bLC and EC, we assessed the pattern of switch costs in the two tasks and then we correlated them between tasks. Results showed reduced n − 2 repetition costs as compared to n − 1 shift costs in the linguistic task only, suggesting that small amount of inhibition were deployed when switching between languages. Importantly, neither the n − 1 shift costs nor the n − 2 repetition costs were correlated between tasks. These results, supported by additional evidence from the ex-Gaussian analysis, suggest that inhibitory control is differently involved in bLC and in EC.

This work was supported by grants from the Spanish Government (PSI2014- 54500, PSI2008-01191, PSI2011-23033, PSI2011-23340, Consolider Ingenio 2010 CSD2007-00012), the Catalan Government (Consolidat SGR 2009-1521 and SGR 2014-1210) and by one grant from the European Research Council under the European Community’s Seventh Framework (FP7/2007-2013 Cooperation grant agreement 613465-AThEME). This research received partial financial assistance as a Severo Ochoa Center of Excellence SEV-2015-0490. Francesca M. Branzi was supported by a predoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Government (FPU-2009- 2013) and by a postdoctoral fellowship from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 658341. Marco Calabria was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Spanish Government (Ramón y Cajal Fellowship).