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
78
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
A、Destiny.B、Genes.C、Personality.D、Family.B当主持人问Gaga在什么时段开始知道自己想成为一名歌手时,她回答在出生时就知道了。言外之意是Gaga认为基因造就了她将来要成为歌手,因此选择B项。
A、Hehatedgrowingup.B、Heread4bookswrittenbyHinton.C、Hehaddifficultiesinreading.D、Hedeterminedtobeawriter.C访
TypesofLanguageTestingI.Placement—sortnewstudentsinto【T1】______【T1】______—testthestudent’s【T2】______ratherthansp
...Finally,oneoftheprimarypurposesofartisto【T1】______athand.Subjectmatterdoesnotchangeallthatmuchovertime.
WritingExperimentalReportsI.Contentofanexperimentalreport,e.g.—studysubject/area—studypurpose【T1】______【T1】______
PASSAGEONEWhatdoesMrNasheedthinktobetheconditionofelectionsholding?
(1)Aswehurtletowardsmenewmillennium,whatisthebettersymboloftherelentlesspassageoftimethanmeancientsundial?
PASSAGEONEWhat’stheconclusionoftheextensiveresearchonthetestosterone/aggressionlink?
随机试题
印刷组和装订组的成员主要来自以下七名员工:F,G,H,J,K,L和M,每个组的成员必须满足下列条件:(1)每个组至少有三名员工。(2)F和K不能在同一组。(3)如果K在某个组,J也必须在这个组。(4)M至少是这两个组中的成员之一。(5)两个组至少
A.每搏输出量B.射血分数C.心指教D.射血量E.心脏做功量用于动脉血压升高,心功能评分指标降低的是()
使用切断机时,手与切刀间应保持距离大于()cm。
涉税鉴证事项符合下列()条件,税务师应当出具无保留意见的鉴证报告。
企业要想提高边际贡献总额,可采取的措施有()。
对于开朗、活泼、爱说话的孩子,教师如何处理?
环境决定论完全否定()。
根据我国继承法规定,被继承人债务的清偿原则包括()。
Clonescienceshouldbedevelopedtobenefithumanbeings______harmthem.
Youneedn’tworry______regardsthecostoftheoperation.
最新回复
(
0
)