The linguistic, cognitive, and emotional consequences of minority language bilingualism

This chapter explores the possible linguistic, cognitive, and emotional advantages of speaking a minority language (in this case Welsh or Irish) alongside a more dominant community language - English. Various groups of Welsh-English and Irish-English bilingual children (compared to control groups of English monolinguals) were given a series of tasks, comprising (i) receptive vocabulary and reading tests in English, as measures of linguistic abilities; (ii) a cognitive test battery (including measures of Executive Functioning) as a measure of non-linguistic cognitive abilities; and (iii) standardised measures of self-esteem and coping strategies, as extra-linguistic measures of the emotional evaluation of one’s worth.

Results revealed the following patterns of differential performance in favour of bilingualism: First, no child from an English-speaking home attending minority language education was at a disadvantage in their English vocabulary or reading, regardless of the language of instruction at school; second, the additional knowledge of a second language led to some advanced performance on certain types of cognitive tasks, but not exclusively so; and third, secondary school-aged children attending Welsh medium schools in Wales seemed to have higher self-esteem than age matched children attending English-medium schools. These findings are discussed within the context of bilingual education and bilingualism in minority language situations.