首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
Passage Four Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world.
Passage Four Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world.
admin
2022-09-27
59
问题
Passage Four
Speaking two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world. But in recent years, scientists have begun to show that the advantages of bilingualism are even more fundamental than being able to converse with a wider range of people. Being bilingual, it turned out, makes you smarter. It can have a profound effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language and even shielding against dementia (痴呆) in old age.
This view of bilingualism is remarkably different from the understanding of bilingualism through much of the 20th century. Researchers, educators and policy makers long considered a second language to be an interference, cognitively speaking, that hindered a child’s academic and intellectual development.
They were not wrong about the interference: there is ample evidence that in a bilingual’s brain both language systems are active even when he is using only one language, thus creating situations in which one system obstructs the other. But this interference, researchers are finding out, isn’t so much a handicap as a blessing in disguise. It forces the brain to resolve internal conflict, giving the mind a workout that strengthens its cognitive muscles.
The collective evidence from a number of such studies suggests that the bilingual experience improves the brain’s so-called executive function—a command system that directs the attention processes that we use for planning, solving problems and performing various other mentally demanding tasks. These processes include ignoring distractions to stay focused, switching attention willfully from one thing to another and holding information in mind—like remembering a sequence of directions while driving.
Why does the tussle between two simultaneously active language systems improve these aspects of cognition? Until recently, researchers thought the bilingual advantage stemmed primarily from an ability for inhibition that was honed by the exercise of suppressing one language system: this suppression, it was thought, would help train the bilingual mind to ignore distractions in other contexts. But that explanation increasingly appears to be inadequate, since studies have shown that bilinguals perform better than monolinguals even at tasks that do not require inhibition, like threading a line through an ascending series of numbers scattered randomly on a page.
The key difference between bilinguals and monolinguals may be more basic: a heightened ability to monitor the environment. "Bilinguals have to switch languages quite often—you may talk to your father in one language and to your mother in another language," says Albert Costa, a researcher at the University of Pompea Fabra in Spain. "It requires keeping track of changes around you in the same way that we monitor our surroundings when driving. " In a study comparing German-Italian bilinguals with Italian monolinguals in completing monitoring tasks, Mr. Costa and his colleagues found that the bilingual subjects not only performed better, but also did so with less activity in parts of the brain involved in monitoring, indicating that they were efficient at it.
The bilingual experience appears to influence the brain from infancy to old age, and there is reason to believe that it may also apply to those who learn a second language later in life.
According to the passage, the more recent and old views of hi lingua I ism differ mainly in________.
选项
A、its practical advantages
B、perceived language fluency
C、its role in cognition
D、its role in medicine
答案
C
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/6FBK777K
0
专业英语八级
相关试题推荐
Whatdoyouneedtodoinordertounderstandthelecture?NowtherearefourthingsthatI’mgoingtotalkabout.Thefirstthi
Whatdoyouneedtodoinordertounderstandthelecture?NowtherearefourthingsthatI’mgoingtotalkabout.Thefirstthi
SomeTheoriesofHistoryI.TheproblemsofunderstandinghistoryHistorywithwrittenrecords:therecordsmaybe【T1】______
A、Hehatedgrowingup.B、Heread4bookswrittenbyHinton.C、Hehaddifficultiesinreading.D、Hedeterminedtobeawriter.C访
...Finally,oneoftheprimarypurposesofartisto【T1】______athand.Subjectmatterdoesnotchangeallthatmuchovertime.
...Finally,oneoftheprimarypurposesofartisto【T1】______athand.Subjectmatterdoesnotchangeallthatmuchovertime.
(1)Aswehurtletowardsmenewmillennium,whatisthebettersymboloftherelentlesspassageoftimethanmeancientsundial?
PASSAGETWOWhatdoes"odious"inthelastparagraphmean?
PASSAGETWOWhatwasStephen’sfeelingstowardsMaggie?
随机试题
A.漏出液B.浆液性渗出液C.血性渗出液D.乳糜性渗出液E.脓性渗出液结核性腹膜炎腹水为
情志之间相互制约,恐胜
SMA混合料摊铺前必须洒一层粘层油,粘层油可使用改性沥青(丁苯胶乳改性沥青或其他),用量为()kg/m2。
根据《建筑安装工程费用项目的组成》(建标[2003]206号),折旧费、安拆费及场外运费属于建筑安装工程费用中的()。
受理公司清算时,清算组应当自成立之日起()日内通知债权人,并于()日内在报纸上公告。
去年某公司支付每股股息为l元,预计在未来的日子里该公司股票的股息按每年5%的速率增长,该公司股票当前的内在价值和市场价格分别为19元和25元,那么,该公司股票的内部收益率介于10.00%至10.50%之间。()
下列社会保险中,资金来源不仅包括用人单位缴纳,也包括个人缴纳的有()。
(2006年真题)期刊更改(),须按创办期刊的规定办理审批、登记手续。
银行资本的需要量与哪些因素相关?怎样测定最佳资本规模?
论述我国从建国到党的八大期间社会主要矛盾的演化及党所采取的措施。
最新回复
(
0
)