Keeping up with the bilinguals - can monolinguals perform executive functioning tasks just as well after some practice?

The focus of the talk will be on a Simon Task experiment, a paradigm used to test executive functioning. Participants are asked to associate two squares of different colours with two keys, one on the left and one on the right. The squares can appear on the left or right of the screen, creating a congruent (location of key and square match) and incongruent condition (location of key and square do not match). Bilinguals were consistently found to have fewer issues with the incongruent condition. While this has recently been challenged, the present study will be presented along a meta-analysis supporting the notion of a bilingual advantage, although it is small.
The Simon study includes an unusually high number of trials (200, across 2 blocks), allowing to analyse trial bins and establish if monolinguals can “catch up” after some training. Testing is still ongoing and expected to finish in June.