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What Goes on in a Bilingual Mind? The Core Cognitive Mechanisms

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Bilingualism and Cognitive Control

Part of the book series: The Bilingual Mind and Brain Book Series ((BMBBS,volume 6))

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Abstract

This chapter deals with some important mechanisms that have been influential in understanding the psychological and cognitive nature of bilingualism. Before one gets to bilingual advantage, it is necessary to know what a bilingual brain does. Theories abound with regard to modalities of processing, the age of acquisition and also mechanisms that are used in language control. It will be evident that most theories and models look at language control differently. Therefore, it has been difficult to understand the link between bilingual language use and advantage seen on non-linguistic tasks. I examine whether a particular model has been useful in predicting bilingual advantage compared with monolinguals. This is not an exhaustive review of all the models but rather their utility in undertaking the advantage question.

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Mishra, R.K. (2018). What Goes on in a Bilingual Mind? The Core Cognitive Mechanisms. In: Bilingualism and Cognitive Control. The Bilingual Mind and Brain Book Series, vol 6. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-92513-4_3

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