New Research In
Physical Sciences
Social Sciences
Featured Portals
Articles by Topic
Biological Sciences
Featured Portals
Articles by Topic
- Agricultural Sciences
- Anthropology
- Applied Biological Sciences
- Biochemistry
- Biophysics and Computational Biology
- Cell Biology
- Developmental Biology
- Ecology
- Environmental Sciences
- Evolution
- Genetics
- Immunology and Inflammation
- Medical Sciences
- Microbiology
- Neuroscience
- Pharmacology
- Physiology
- Plant Biology
- Population Biology
- Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
- Sustainability Science
- Systems Biology
Subcortical encoding of sound is enhanced in bilinguals and relates to executive function advantages
Edited by Michael Merzenich, W. M. Keck Center for Integrative Neuroscience, San Francisco, CA, and approved March 28, 2012 (received for review February 6, 2012)

Abstract
Bilingualism profoundly affects the brain, yielding functional and structural changes in cortical regions dedicated to language processing and executive function [Crinion J, et al. (2006) Science 312:1537–1540; Kim KHS, et al. (1997) Nature 388:171–174]. Comparatively, musical training, another type of sensory enrichment, translates to expertise in cognitive processing and refined biological processing of sound in both cortical and subcortical structures. Therefore, we asked whether bilingualism can also promote experience-dependent plasticity in subcortical auditory processing. We found that adolescent bilinguals, listening to the speech syllable [da], encoded the stimulus more robustly than age-matched monolinguals. Specifically, bilinguals showed enhanced encoding of the fundamental frequency, a feature known to underlie pitch perception and grouping of auditory objects. This enhancement was associated with executive function advantages. Thus, through experience-related tuning of attention, the bilingual auditory system becomes highly efficient in automatically processing sound. This study provides biological evidence for system-wide neural plasticity in auditory experts that facilitates a tight coupling of sensory and cognitive functions.
Footnotes
- ↵1To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: nkraus{at}northwestern.edu.
Author contributions: J.K., E.S., and N.K. designed research; J.K. performed research; J.K. and A.S. analyzed data; and J.K., V.M., A.S., E.S., and N.K. wrote the paper.
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
This article is a PNAS Direct Submission.
Citation Manager Formats
More Articles of This Classification
Biological Sciences
Neuroscience
Social Sciences
Psychological and Cognitive Sciences
Related Content
- No related articles found.
Cited by...
- Involvement of the Serotonin Transporter Gene in Accurate Subcortical Speech Encoding
- Bilingual Language Control in Perception versus Action: MEG Reveals Comprehension Control Mechanisms in Anterior Cingulate Cortex and Domain-General Control of Production in Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex
- Music Enrichment Programs Improve the Neural Encoding of Speech in At-Risk Children
- The Impoverished Brain: Disparities in Maternal Education Affect the Neural Response to Sound
- Fast Modulation of Executive Function by Language Context in Bilinguals
- Aging Affects Neural Precision of Speech Encoding
- Assistive listening devices drive neuroplasticity in children with dyslexia
- A Little Goes a Long Way: How the Adult Brain Is Shaped by Musical Training in Childhood