Disentangling language status and country-of-origin explanations of the bilingual advantage in preschoolers

Isu Cho; Jewan Park; Hyun joo Song; J. Bruce Morton

doi:10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105235

Disentangling language status and country-of-origin explanations of the bilingual advantage in preschoolers

Isu Cho, Jewan Park, Hyun joo Song, J. Bruce Morton

Department of Psychology

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

4 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Bilingual preschoolers from East Asia outperform monolingual preschoolers from North America or Europe in executive functioning tasks, which has been interpreted as evidence of a bilingual advantage in executive functioning. This study tested whether these differences actually reflect country-of-origin effects given that East Asian preschoolers frequently outperform North American or European children in executive functioning tasks. Consistent with previous findings, Korean–English bilingual preschoolers made fewer errors in an age-appropriate executive functioning task than did English monolingual children in Canada. However, Korean–English bilingual preschoolers performed comparably to Korean monolingual preschoolers in Korea. Differences between Korean and Canadian children's executive functioning were not attributable to differences in parental cultural values or attitudes. The current findings suggest that differences between East Asian bilingual and North American monolingual preschoolers’ executive functioning is related to differences in country of origin rather than language status.

Original language	English
Article number	105235
Journal	Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
Volume	212
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105235
Publication status	Published - 2021 Dec

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This study was funded by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant (R3353A12) to J. Bruce Morton and by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and a National Research Foundation of Korea grant (NRF-2018S1A3A2075114) to Hyun-joo Song. We thank Stephanie Carlson for her constructive input on the project, the parents and children who participated in the research, and the research assistants who helped with data collection. This study was part of Isu Cho's Ph.D. dissertation. The study was approved by the human research ethics boards of the University of Western Ontario and Yonsei University. Regarding the first author's affiliations, some parts of this study (study design and data collection) were done at the University of Western Ontario and other parts (analyses and writing) were done at Brandeis University.

Funding Information:
This study was funded by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant (R3353A12) to J. Bruce Morton and by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and a National Research Foundation of Korea grant (NRF-2018S1A3A2075114) to Hyun-joo Song. We thank Stephanie Carlson for her constructive input on the project, the parents and children who participated in the research, and the research assistants who helped with data collection. This study was part of Isu Cho’s Ph.D. dissertation. The study was approved by the human research ethics boards of the University of Western Ontario and Yonsei University. Regarding the first author’s affiliations, some parts of this study (study design and data collection) were done at the University of Western Ontario and other parts (analyses and writing) were done at Brandeis University.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Authors

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Developmental and Educational Psychology

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10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105235

Cite this

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title = "Disentangling language status and country-of-origin explanations of the bilingual advantage in preschoolers",

abstract = "Bilingual preschoolers from East Asia outperform monolingual preschoolers from North America or Europe in executive functioning tasks, which has been interpreted as evidence of a bilingual advantage in executive functioning. This study tested whether these differences actually reflect country-of-origin effects given that East Asian preschoolers frequently outperform North American or European children in executive functioning tasks. Consistent with previous findings, Korean–English bilingual preschoolers made fewer errors in an age-appropriate executive functioning task than did English monolingual children in Canada. However, Korean–English bilingual preschoolers performed comparably to Korean monolingual preschoolers in Korea. Differences between Korean and Canadian children's executive functioning were not attributable to differences in parental cultural values or attitudes. The current findings suggest that differences between East Asian bilingual and North American monolingual preschoolers{\textquoteright} executive functioning is related to differences in country of origin rather than language status.",

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note = "Funding Information: This study was funded by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant (R3353A12) to J. Bruce Morton and by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and a National Research Foundation of Korea grant (NRF-2018S1A3A2075114) to Hyun-joo Song. We thank Stephanie Carlson for her constructive input on the project, the parents and children who participated in the research, and the research assistants who helped with data collection. This study was part of Isu Cho's Ph.D. dissertation. The study was approved by the human research ethics boards of the University of Western Ontario and Yonsei University. Regarding the first author's affiliations, some parts of this study (study design and data collection) were done at the University of Western Ontario and other parts (analyses and writing) were done at Brandeis University. Funding Information: This study was funded by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant (R3353A12) to J. Bruce Morton and by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and a National Research Foundation of Korea grant (NRF-2018S1A3A2075114) to Hyun-joo Song. We thank Stephanie Carlson for her constructive input on the project, the parents and children who participated in the research, and the research assistants who helped with data collection. This study was part of Isu Cho{\textquoteright}s Ph.D. dissertation. The study was approved by the human research ethics boards of the University of Western Ontario and Yonsei University. Regarding the first author{\textquoteright}s affiliations, some parts of this study (study design and data collection) were done at the University of Western Ontario and other parts (analyses and writing) were done at Brandeis University. Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2021 The Authors",

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Disentangling language status and country-of-origin explanations of the bilingual advantage in preschoolers

Abstract

Bibliographical note

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

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