A Bilingual Advantage in Task Switching - Free Essay Sample

Introduction

The research was oriented towards determining the advantage of bilinguals in the task-switching paradigm. The task switching cost after a comparison between bilinguals and monolinguals showed that bilinguals had reduced costs in the model. Through this, it suggested that switching between different languages led to and contributed mainly to the capability to shift between mental sets with ease and flexibly. The study compared the performance of fluent bilingual and monolingual individuals in a task-switching. From the research, a conclusion based on the switching costs in the paradigm was analyzed and compared to establish how it affected the ability to shift between mental sets. The results obtained represent the executive function of bilinguals. The paper focuses on the bilingual advantage in the task-switching paradigm.

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Methods

The study entailed a total of 44 individuals as participants. Out of the 44 participants, 36 of them were females, while the remaining percentage were males. Most of the participants were friends to the researchers. The participants were not chosen; instead, they volunteered to partake in the study since it was part of their Unit requirement. The standard deviation of the age of all the participants was +- 12 years. The average age of the individuals in the study was 34. The participants were separated into two; monolinguals and multilingual. In the two groups, there consisted of participants who disclosed that they spoke one language and others who spoke more languages. Then, a one-way ANOVA was carried out to determine how the difference between the switching costs occurred.

Results

The study was conducted in t-tests examining the connection between language group and the mixing cost. There was no mixing cost difference among the monolinguals (M = 1147.796, SD = 320.8835), but that of bilinguals was (M = 1566.576, SD = 400.8284). In the next t-test, there still was no difference in mixing cost oriented to monolinguals. However, the bilingual’s mixing cost changed to (M = 490.2143, SD = 380.8341) when N = 15.

There did not exist any assumption on equal variances. Mixing cost is the dissimilarity of RT for pure trials and RT for mixed trials. The average switching cost of mixing for the monolinguals was 381.831 when the participant's total was 29, and the Standard deviation was 272.0169. The sum of the participants was 29 monolinguals and 15 multilingual. The average of bilinguals in the language category before six was 490.2143. When there was no switching cost involved, the average was 6.022727 and a standard deviation of 9.574041 for monolinguals. The opposite occurred to be 10.05682 and a Standard deviation of 13.35439.

Conclusion

To determine the bilingual advantage in task switching, the response latencies occurred to be as follows. The switching cost for monolinguals was 381.831, with a standard deviation of 272.0169. The total participants were 29. On the other hand, the switching cost for bilinguals was 490.2143 having a standard deviation of 380.8341 and a total of 15. The errors for switching costs for the 29 monolinguals were 3.534483, with a standard deviation of SD = 4.887906. The bilingual switching errors for the 15 participants were 5, having a standard deviation of 8.711651.