Bilingualism Good for Your Brain

Many scientific studies about bilingualism has found that learning a second language can
help your brain to be stronger and healthier. Neuroscientists say that a person who speaks
more than one language benefits biologically in different ways for being bilingual. These
new findings contradict the assumption that bilingualism is harmful to people because it
interfere with their cognitive skills. New research has established that being fluent in two
languages enhances a person's concentration, and this new research also suggests that it may
help against the onset of mental illnesses such as dementia and other age-related cognitive
degradation. In addition, in the latest research scientists have found that bilinguals have
denser gray mass, especially in the left brain hemisphere, which is the cerebral region where
language and communication skills are controlled (Riehl, 2006).
Another positive effect of bilingualism is in cognitive control, which is the ability of
switching flexibly between different thoughts and actions . There are a number of studies
that have demonstrated such a positive effect (Bialystok, 1999; Bialystok, 2010; Bialystok et
al., 2004; Bialystok & Shapero, 2005; Colzato et al., 2008; Costa et al., 2008; Zelazo et al.,
1996). In the process of doing that researchers employed non-linguistic demanding-tasks to
test the inhibitory ability of bilinguals against monolinguals. The results show that bilinguals
are less prone to be distracted by irrelevant information; in order words, they are better
discriminators of irrelevant information and more flexible at switching between activities.
Regardless of what scientists or anybody else say, and as a multilingual person I am
more fluent in some of them than others I always have found that learning languages to
be fun, interesting, and socially beneficial languages open 'doors' of communication to
anybody who speaks more than one language now I know that languages also have a
biological benefit to offer, according to recent studies. So, bilingualism or multilingualism is
not as bad as they make it sound, isn't it?
Below are couple of interesting links:
Bilinguals are like brain bodybuilders
Bilingualism and the brain