PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT
In the field of bilingualism there has been a recent shift towards investigating how the lifelong act of
managing two languages may benefit bilingual individuals in aging1 and in the face of clinical neuropathology.2-
4 This vein of research is motivated by the idea that managing two or more languages requires engagement of
various control processes5,6 potentially leading to more efficient execution of domain-general cognitive control,
which in turn contributes to greater cognitive reserve. Determining the factors that contribute to a behavioral
advantage for bilinguals as compared to monolinguals in the face of comparable clinical neuropathology
requires careful consideration of the constructs being examined as well as the underlying neural activation
associated with behavioral performance. Furthermore, a critical concern when examining executive functioning
in particular surrounds the ecological validity of results. Using imaging modalities that allow for completing
tasks in naturalistic environments (e.g., functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) and
electroencephalography (EEG)) as opposed to laying supine in a scanner (e.g., functional magnetic resonance
imaging (fMRI)) increases the ecological validity of results and allows for more robust interpretation and
generalizability of results.7
Therefore, the goal of this study is to examine behavioral (accuracy and reaction time measures) and
neural (fNIRS and EEG) responses across two patient (monolingual (MPWA) and bilingual (BPWA) patients
with aphasia) and two healthy control (bilingual (BHC) and monolingual (MHC)) groups on cognitive control
tasks, to disambiguate which components of executive functioning (e.g., shifting, inhibiting, and/or updating)8,9
are impacted by bilingualism and how this may translate to a cognitive reserve factor in aphasia. Aim 1:
examines group differences in behavioral performance on three non-verbal cognitive control tasks between
bilinguals and monolinguals across patient and healthy control groups. Aim 2: examines group differences in
fNIRS hemodynamic response function (HRF) during non-verbal cognitive control tasks between bilinguals and
monolinguals across patient and healthy control groups. Aim 3: examines group differences in EEG frequency
band power during non-verbal cognitive control tasks between bilinguals and monolinguals across patient and
healthy control groups. Results of this study will provide evidence of the impact of bilingualism on behavioral
and neural performance and elucidate how bilingualism serves as a cognitive reserve factor in aphasia. The
design of this study can be used as a framework for an ecologically valid investigation of the behavioral and
neural dynamics underlying performance on cognitive tasks across bilinguals and monolinguals in neurotypical
and clinical populations.
