Does Language Distance Modulate the Contribution of Bilingualism to Cognitive Reserve in Seniors? A Systematic Review.

ABSTRACT: We report a systematic review and exploratory meta-regression investigating the hypothesis that the effects of bilingualism on cognitive reserve are modulated by the distance between the pair of languages a bilingual uses. An inclusive multiple database search was performed in order to identify all relevant published research conducted in bilingual seniors. A combination of qualitative and quantitative synthesis methods were used in order to investigate our research questions. Results suggest that healthy bilingual seniors speaking more distant language pairs show improved monitoring performance on cognitive tasks. Evidence regarding a modulatory influence of language distance (LD) on the age of dementia diagnosis was inconclusive due to the small number of published studies meeting our in

SUBMITTER: Carthery-Goulart MT 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10623985 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jan-Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature