Are you an EPFL student looking for a semester project?
Work with us on data science and visualisation projects, and deploy your project as an app on top of Graph Search.
Concept
Simultaneous bilingualism
Summary
Simultaneous bilingualism is a form of bilingualism that takes place when a child becomes bilingual by learning two languages from birth. According to Annick De Houwer, in an article in The Handbook of Child Language, simultaneous bilingualism takes place in "children who are regularly addressed in two spoken languages from before the age of two and who continue to be regularly addressed in those languages up until the final stages" of language development. Both languages are acquired as first languages. This is in contrast to sequential bilingualism, in which the second language is learned not as a native language but a foreign language.
It is estimated that half of the world is functionally bilingual, and the majority of those bilinguals are 'native speakers' of their two languages. Wölck has pointed out that there are many "native bilingual communities", typically in South America, Africa, and Asia, where "monolingual norms may be unavailable or nonexistent".
Some popular misconceptions about bilingualism include the ideas that bilingual children will not reach proficiency in either language and that they will be cognitively disadvantaged. Many studies in the early 20th century found evidence of a "language handicap" in simultaneously bilingual children, linking bilingualism with a lower intelligence. However, many of these studies had serious methodological flaws. For example, several studies relating bilingualism and intelligence did not account for socioeconomic differences among well-educated, upper class monolingual children and less-educated (often immigrant) bilingual children.
Recent research has found evidence that simultaneous bilinguals have a cognitive advantage over their monolingual counterparts, particularly in the areas of cognitive flexibility, analytical skill, and metalinguistic awareness. However, most studies agree that simultaneous bilinguals do not have any definitive cognitive advantage over monolinguals.
Despite these findings, many therapists and other professionals maintain that simultaneous bilingualism can be harmful for a child's cognitive development.
Official source
About this result
This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.