Bilingualism and the executive function advantage in preterm-born children

Abstract Complications from premature birth puts children at risk for poorer executive function compared to their term-born peers. This study aimed to examine the effect of bilingualism on the executive function of preterm-born children, a population that is thus far rarely addressed in the bilingualism literature. Executive function skills were assessed in 35 preterm-born children ages four to seven with the Simon and the Flanker task. All children were born before 35 weeks’ gestation and were categorized as monolingual or bilingual and then matched on neonatal acuity. Bilingualism was operationalized as productive capacity in both Spanish and English and was confirmed by four triangulated measures. Results showed that the bilingual preterm-born children performed significantly better than the monolingual preterm-born children on the Flanker task. The bilingual group was also faster and more accurate on the Simon task, however group differences were not significant. Surprisingly, during the exit interview, 100 % of the bilingual group parents reported that their child’s pediatric primary care provider advised them to stop speaking Spanish at home. These preliminary findings indicate that (1) bilingualism may enhance executive function in preterm-born children and this is worth exploring further; and (2) clinical advice that parents abandon their home language and switch to English only with their preterm-born children is unwarranted.