Here's a really cool master's thesis I found recently:
Computer programmers and the “bilingual advantage””: Enhanced executive control in non-linguistic interference tasks. by Hannah Wright (PDF)
Quote:
Abstract
Bilingualism is associated with life-long cognitive advantages. It is well established
that bilinguals perform better at non-verbal tasks requiring enhanced executive control.
Bilinguals typically record faster response times than their monolingual peers; this is
thought to result the development of greater efficiencies in conflict monitoring network,
which develop in response to the additional demands of managing two competing
language systems. The present study investigates whether this “bilingual advantage” is
also associated with the frequent use of computer programming languages. The
performance of 10 professional computer programmers (aged 22–25) and 10 adolescent
computer programmers (aged 14–17) is compared to age-matched and IQ-matched
controls in two executive control tasks. In the Attention Networks Test, as predicted,
programmers recorded faster global reaction times than their monolingual peers; the
difference was significant. In the Stroop colour-word task, programmers recorded
slower reaction times; however, these results were not significant. Overall, the results
suggest that extensive computer programming experience may, like bilingualism, be
associated with enhanced executive control. Whatever the direction of this relationship,
it could have important implications for education; these are discussed, along with areas
for future research. |
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Some neat bits:
Quote:
It is widely hypothesized that
the bilingual advantage in these tasks arises because the bilingual brain places
additional demands on a domain-general aspect of executive control in order to
selectively attend to two competing language systems (e.g. Bialystok, Craik, Green &
Gollan, 2009; Costa, Hernandez, Costa-Faidella, & Sebastian-Galles, 2009; Hinchley &
Klein, 2011).
…
Like bilingualism, computer programming has often been argued to convey
cognitive advantages; however, the results to date are equivocal (e.g. Pea & Kurland,
1984; Palumbo, 1990; Liao & Bright, 1991). Research into the cognitive consequences
of computer programming has largely focussed on the problem-solving domain
(Ormerod, 1990); in contrast, the present paper explores computer programmers’
cognition from the perspective of language acquisition, an approach recommended by
Murnane (1993; 2006). Like bilinguals, expert computer programmers successfully
manage two or more separate lexicons, grammars and divergent concepts, avoiding
inadvertent transfer between the two. Numerous studies of novice programmers
indicate that they struggle to do achieve this division; transfer from natural language
creates bugs (e.g. Soloway and Spohrer, 1989; Witschital, 1995). The present study
therefore considers whether the “bilingual advantage” in executive control is found in
computer programmers.
…
When communicating, bilinguals must successfully manage two conflicting
languages; one must be accessed whilst the other is suppressed, in order to avoid
involuntary language switching. The cognitive demands of this task are thought to be
the origin of the bilingual advantage in executive control.
A series of studies have demonstrated that bilinguals outperform their peers on
tests of non-linguistic interference. Bilingual children, middle aged adults and older
adults consistently record faster global reaction times in the Simon task (Bialystok,
Martin and Viswanathan, 2005; Martin-Rhee and Bialystok, 2008), the spatial
Stroop/Simon arrows task (Bialystok, 2006; 2008), and flanker arrows tasks such as the
Attention Networks Task (Costa, Hernandez and Sebastian-Galles, 2008; Carlson and
Meltzoff, 2008; Emmorey et al., 2009). |
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The answer appears to be yes, programmers seem to show many of the executive control advantages as bilinguals. This does not imply that computer languages are especially like natural languages, or that high school students should be able to fulfill their foreign language requirement with a programming class. But it's pretty cool, and I'd love to see some more research.
5 persons have voted this message useful
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emk wrote:
Quote:
Abstract
... The
performance of 10 professional computer programmers (aged 22–25) and 10 adolescent
computer programmers (aged 14–17) is compared to age-matched and IQ-matched
controls in two executive control tasks. In the Attention Networks Test, as predicted,
programmers recorded faster global reaction times than their monolingual peers; the
difference was significant. In the Stroop colour-word task, programmers recorded
slower reaction times; however, these results were not significant. Overall, the results
suggest that extensive computer programming experience may, like bilingualism, be
associated with enhanced executive control. Whatever the direction of this relationship,
it could have important implications for education; these are discussed, along with areas
for future research. |
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...
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Tests run on 10 members groups and reference to IQ are both very unscientific.
"Enhanced executive control" are big words with no meaning to me - could you explane what they mean if anything ?
1 person has voted this message useful
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Michel1020 wrote:
| Tests run on 10 members groups and reference to IQ are both very unscientific. |
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It's a master's thesis, not a PhD thesis or a published paper. As a rule of thumb, that means that we can trust these results enough to say, "Hey, that's interesting and maybe somebody should take another look at this," but not enough to claim that we actually know anything. (In fact, quite a few published papers fall into this same category, and even the established scientific consensus of a field can go off track for extended periods of time.)
Michel1020 wrote:
| "Enhanced executive control" are big words with no meaning to me - could you explane what they mean if anything ? |
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Wikipedia has a pretty good overview article. For the purposes of this thesis, executive control was measured using the Attention Network Test (ANT). This requires requires responding quickly to certain visual cues while ignoring others.
The current popular hypothesis is that people who speak two languages rely on various executive control mechanisms to suppress whichever language is not currently being used.
1 person has voted this message useful
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