title: Feature binding and the processing of global-local shapes in bilingual and monolingual children.
abstract: In the present study, we examined the effects of bilingualism and age on a color-shape binding task (assessing visual working memory) and a global-local task (assessing inhibitory processes) in a sample of 55 bilingual and 49 monolingual children 8 and 10 years old. In the color-shape binding task, corrected recognition scores increased in older children; bilingual children performed better than monolinguals in the shape-only condition, but the two groups were equally accurate in the color-only and combination conditions. In the global-local task, accuracy was higher in bilingual than in monolingual children, particularly on incongruent trials; monolingual children showed a strong global precedence effect (higher accuracy in the global than in the local conditions and greater global-to-local interference), whereas bilingual children exhibited a small, but significant, local precedence effect (higher accuracy in the local than in the global conditions and greater local-to-global interference). These findings confirm and extend previous evidence indicating that the bilingualism advantage is more pronounced in working memory tasks involving inhibitory processes.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Education, Free University of Bolzano, Bressanone, Italy.
authors.forename: Milvia
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cottini
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pieroni
authors.forename: Pietro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Spataro
authors.forename: Antonella
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Devescovi
authors.forename: Emiddia
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Longobardi
authors.forename: Clelia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rossi-Arnaud
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology*; D003118:Color Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology*; D019303:Multilingualism