Previous work has shown that bilingualism is associated with more effective controlled processing in children; the assumption is that the constant management of 2 competing languages enhances executive functions (E. Bialystok, 2001). The present research attempted to determine whether this bilingual advantage persists for adults and whether bilingualism attenuates the negative effects of aging on cognitive control in older adults. Three studies are reported that compared the performance of monolingual and bilingual middle-aged and older adults on the Simon task. Bilingualism was associated with smaller Simon effect costs for both age groups; bilingual participants also responded more rapidly to conditions that placed greater demands on working memory. In all cases the bilingual advantage was greater for older participants. It appears, therefore, that controlled processing is carried out more effectively by bilinguals and that bilingualism helps to offset age-related losses in certain executive processes.

/pdf/bilingualism-aging-and-cognitive-control-evidence-from-the-44tz0u719r.pdf

Bilingualism, Aging, and Cognitive Control: Evidence From the Simon Task.

There is considerable concern that the majority of adolescents do not develop the competence in writing they need to be successful in school, the workplace, or their personal lives. A common explanation for why youngsters do not write well is that schools do not do a good job of teaching this complex skill. In an effort to identify effective instructional practices for teaching writing to adolescents, the authors conducted a meta-analysis of the writing intervention literature (Grades 4-12), focusing their efforts on experimental and quasi-experimental studies. They located 123 documents that yielded 154 effect sizes for quality of writing. The authors calculated an average weighted effect size (presented in parentheses) for the following 11 interventions: strategy instruction (0.82), summarization (0.82), peer assistance (0.75), setting product goals (0.70), word processing (0.55), sentence combining (0.50), inquiry (0.32), prewriting activities (0.32), process writing approach (0.32), study of models (0.25), grammar instruction (- 0.32).

/pdf/a-meta-analysis-of-writing-instruction-for-adolescent-55m4vy9ytc.pdf

A meta-analysis of writing instruction for adolescent students.

https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10587326/GIGI%20Trends.pdf?sequence=1

Bilingualism: consequences for mind and brain

A number of studies have documented the cognitive outcomes associated with bilingualism. To gain a clear understanding of the extent and diversity of these cognitive outcomes, the authors conducted a meta-analysis of studies that examined the cognitive correlates of bilingualism. Data from 63 studies (involving 6,022 participants) were extracted and analyzed following established protocols and procedures for conducting systematic reviews and guidelines for meta-analysis. Results indicate that bilingualism is reliably associated with several cognitive outcomes, including increased attentional control, working memory, metalinguistic awareness, and abstract and symbolic representation skills. Overall mean effect sizes varied from small to large, depending on the cognitive outcomes measured, and were moderated by methodological features of the studies.

/pdf/a-systematic-review-and-meta-analysis-of-the-cognitive-3ujcua28hz.pdf

A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Cognitive Correlates of Bilingualism

The present paper summarizes research showing that bilingualism affects linguistic and cognitive performance across the lifespan. The effect on linguistic performance is generally seen as a deficit in which bilingual children control a smaller vocabulary than their monolingual peers and bilingual adults perform more poorly on rapid lexical retrieval tasks. The effect on cognitive performance is to enhance executive functioning and to protect against the decline of executive control in aging. These effects interact to produce a complex pattern regarding the effect of bilingualism on memory performance. Memory tasks based primarily on verbal recall are performed more poorly by bilinguals but memory tasks based primarily on executive control are performed better by bilinguals. Speculations regarding the mechanism responsible for these effects are described.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S1366728908003477

Bilingualism: The good, the bad, and the indifferent*

Contents: Preface. Part I: Theories of Writing and Frameworks for Writing Research. J.R. Hayes, A New Framework for Understanding Cognition and Affect in Writing. J.R. Hayes, J.G. Nash, On the Nature of Planning in Writing. R.T. Kellogg, A Model of Working Memory in Writing. J. Grabowski, Writing and Speaking: Common Grounds and Differences Toward a Regulation Theory of Written Language Production. S. Ransdell, C.M. Levy, Working Memory Constraints on Writing Quality and Fluency. G. Rijlaarsdam, H. van den Bergh, The Dynamics of Composing -- An Agenda for the Research into an Interactive Compensatory Model of Writing: Many Questions, Some Answers. M. Sharples, An Account of Writing as Creative Design. Part II: Analytic Tools and Techniques. C.M. Levy, S. Ransdell, Writing Signatures. K.S. Eklundh, P. Kollberg, A Computer Tool and Framework for Analyzing Online Revisions. M. Torrance, G.V. Thomas, E.J. Robinson, Finding Something to Write About: Strategic and Automatic Processes in Idea Generation. H. van den Bergh, G. Rijlaarsdam, The Dynamics of Composing: Modeling Writing Process Data. D. Janssen, L. van Waes, H. van den Bergh, Effects of Thinking Aloud on Writing Processes. T. Sanders, C. van Wijk, Text Analysis as a Research Tool: How Hierarchical Text Structure Contributes to the Understanding of Conceptual Processes in Writing. Part III: Individual Differences and Applications. I. Levin, D.L. Share, E. Shatil, A Qualitative-Quantitative Study of Preschool Writing: Its Development and Contribution to School Literacy. R. Madigan, P. Linton, S. Johnson, The Paradox of Writing Apprehension. T. van der Geest, Studying "Real-Life" Writing Processes: A Proposal and an Example. B.K. Britton, Rewriting: The Arts and Sciences of Improving Expository Instructional Text. S. Graham, K.R. Harris, Self-Regulation and Strategy Instruction for Students Who Find Writing and Learning Challenging. J.E. Reece, G. Cumming, Evaluating Speech-Based Composition Methods: Planning, Dictation, and the Listening Word Processor.

The Science of Writing : Theories, Methods, Individual Differences and Applications

Memory in a monolingual mode: When are bilinguals at a disadvantage?

Experiment 1 assessed the time and effort allocated to writing subprocesses while generating written and verbal protocols over 10 weekly writing sessions Within a 40-min session, planning time consumed about 45% in the first 5 min, but stabilized at near 30% thereafter Generating text initially consumed 40% of the writers' time, peaked at 50% midway, and then declined to its original level The time spent revising and reviewing was negligible early in writing sessions, but increased substantially late in the sessions The highest and lowest quality documents could be differentiated on the basis of the amount of time the writers devoted to revising and to the magnitude of their RTs in a secondary interference task Writers showed consistent, distinctive patterns of transitional probabilities between writing subprocesses both within and across sessions, yielding quantitative representations of their writing styles In Experiment 2, writers overestimated the amount of time they devote to revising and overestimated the amount of effort they allocate to planning and text generation Their estimations did not improve after 10 weeks of composing A time-and-effort-based analysis of writing is proposed to account for these data

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.3758%2FBF03200928.pdf

Sarah Ellen Ransdell PhD

Papers

The Science of Writing : Theories, Methods, Individual Differences and Applications

Memory in a monolingual mode: When are bilinguals at a disadvantage?

Is writing as difficult as it seems

Working memory constraints on writing quality and fluency.

The effects of background music on word processed writing