ERP and Behavioural Correlates of Prospective Memory in Bilinguals during L1 and L2 Processing

López-Rojas, Cristina; Csilinkó, Anikó; Bajo, Mª Teresa; Marful, Alejandra · 2023 · Crossref

DOI: 10.3390/brainsci13020365

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Summary

This study investigates the neural and behavioral correlates of prospective memory (PM) in bilinguals, specifically examining how processing in a first language (L1) versus a second language (L2) modulates performance. Prospective memory involves recalling future intentions, such as attending an appointment, often while engaged in an ongoing task. While previous research has established that bilingualism influences cognitive processes like attention and long-term memory, few studies have explored its impact on PM, particularly regarding the neural mechanisms involved during L1 and L2 processing. The authors aimed to fill this gap by analyzing both behavioral outcomes and event-related potentials (ERPs) to understand how language context affects the monitoring and retrieval processes essential for PM. The experiment employed a 2 (language: L1 Spanish, L2 English) × 2 (focality: focal, non-focal) within-subject design with 31 Spanish-English bilingual university students. Participants performed a PM task where they completed an ongoing animal-naming task while monitoring for specific cues to execute a prospective intention. Focal cues were semantically related to the ongoing task (e.g., the word "ball"), whereas non-focal cues were unrelated (e.g., specific screen border colors), thereby varying the monitoring demands. Brain activity was recorded using EEG to analyze the P3b component, associated with monitoring and context updating, and the N300 component, linked to cue detection. Behavioral data included accuracy and response times, while ERP data focused on amplitude differences between PM and ongoing trials. Results indicated that performing the PM task in L2 imposed a cognitive cost compared to L1. Behaviorally, participants showed lower accuracy rates in the ongoing task when processing in L2. Electrophysiologically, the study found smaller amplitude differences between focal and non-focal conditions in the P3b component during L2 processing. This reduction suggests that bilinguals had a diminished capacity to adjust their monitoring strategies to the increased demands of non-focal cues when operating in their less dominant language. The findings support the hypothesis that L2 processing consumes additional cognitive resources, leading to impaired prospective processing and a reduced ability to flexibly engage monitoring mechanisms required for detecting non-focal cues. The significance of these findings lies in providing the first electrophysiological evidence of how bilingual language processing modulates prospective memory. The study demonstrates that the cognitive load associated with L2 processing interferes with the adaptive monitoring strategies typically employed in PM tasks. This supports the broader view that bilingualism shapes cognitive control mechanisms, but also highlights that working in a less dominant language can impair performance in complex, real-world tasks requiring future intention recall. These results contribute to the psycholinguistic field by linking bilingual experience to specific neural correlates of memory and attention, suggesting that language context is a critical factor in understanding cognitive efficiency in bilingual populations.

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• prospective memory interruptions