CeLM Seminar

Cross-talk between language and executive control in neurodegenerative diseases

 by   Marco Calabria (Center for Brain and Cognition, Pompeu Fabra University, Spain, Barcelona)

Date                     Tues 6^th March 2018

Time                     16h15 – 17h15

Venue                  Edith Morley 124

The control mechanisms that supervise the orchestration of the linguistic processes seem to be related to the executive control system. In the context of bilingualism, the interaction between control and linguistic processes is especially apparent as bilinguals need to avoid the potential interference from the irrelevant language. Despite the research is now providing more and more evidence on the cross-talk of these two domains, it remains unclear the nature of the underlying common mechanisms. In my talk I will try to show how the research with bilingual speakers with neurodegenerative diseases may contribute to the debate on the ‘domain-specific’ vs. ‘domain-general’ nature of the control mechanisms. I will show evidence of associations vs. dissociations of deficits from single-case and group studies of bilingual patients with  Parkinson’s or Huntington’s disease to define a more comprehensive framework that includes sub-components of processes. Finally, the potential implications of the non-linguistic control will be also discussed for bilingual aphasia.