學習外語好處多：雙語讓你更敏銳

The ability to speak two languages can make bilingual people better able to pay attention than those who can only speak one language, a new study suggests.
一項新研究結果顯示，同只能講一種語言的人相比，能說兩種語言的雙語者能夠更好地集中注意力。

Scientists have long suspected that some enhanced mental abilities might be tied to structural differences in brain networks shaped by learning more than one language, just as a musician’s brain can be altered by the long hours of practice needed to master an instrument.
長期以來，科學家們一直懷疑，一些人思維能力的提升可能與學習多種語言的過程中形成的大腦網絡結構差異有關，正如音樂家們爲掌握一種樂器而進行長時間練習之後，其大腦結構會發生改變。

Now, in a study published in the Poceeding of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers at Northwestern University for the first time have documented differences in how the bilingual brain processes the sounds of speech, compared with those who speak a single language, in ways that make it better at picking out a spoken syllable, even when it is buried in a babble of voices.
如今，發表在《美國國家科學院院刊》上的一項研究結果顯示，美國西北大學(Northwestern University)的研究者首次證明了雙語者的大腦在處理語音時的不同之處。與講單一語言的人相比，雙語者更善於識別人們說出的音節，即使這些音節被淹沒在嘈雜聲音裏。

That biological difference in the auditory nervous system appears to also enhance attention and working memory among those who speak more than one language, they say.
這一聽覺神經系統上的生物學差異似乎還加強了能說多種語言的人集中注意力的能力和工作記憶。

“Because you have two languages going on in your head, you become very good at determining what is and is not relevant,” says Dr. Nina Kraus, a professor of neurobiology and physiology at Northwestern, who was part of the study team. “You are a mental juggler.”
參與了這項研究的西北大學神經生物學和生理學教授克勞斯博士說，由於你的腦子裏運行着兩種語言體系，你會變得非常善於決定哪些聲音有意義，哪些聲音沒有意義；你的思維就如同在表演雜技一般。

In the new study, Kraus and her colleagues tested the involuntary neural responses to speech sounds by comparing brain signals in 23 high school students who were fluent in English and Spanish to those of 25 teenagers who only spoke English. When it was quiet, both groups could hear the test syllable — “da” — with no trouble, but when there was background noise, the brains of the bilingual students were significantly better at detecting the fundamental frequency of speech sounds.
在這項新研究中，克勞斯和她的同事們通過對比兩組受試者的大腦信號，測試了他們對聲音的下意識神經反應。這兩組受試者中，一組是23名能講流利英語和西班牙語的高中生，另一組是25名只會講英語的十幾歲的青少年。當週圍環境安靜時，兩組受試者都能聽到測試音節“da”，而且毫不費力。但是如果背景嘈雜，講雙語的學生明顯更善於識別語音的基本頻率。

“We have determined that the nervous system of a bilingual person responds to sound in a way that is distinctive from a person who speaks only one language,” Kraus says.
克勞斯說，我們已經得出結論，雙語者的神經系統對聲音的反應方式與只能講一種語言的人明顯不同。

Through this fine-tuning of the nervous system, people who can master more than one language are building a more resilient brain, one more proficient at multitasking, setting priorities, and, perhaps, better able to withstand the ravages of age, a range of recent studies suggest.
最近的一系列研究表明，通過這種神經系統的微調，那些可掌握一種以上語言的人們將其大腦建設得更富彈性。他們的大腦在執行多重任務和決定事情的優先級別時會更爲熟練，甚至可能經得起歲月的無情摧殘。Indeed, some preliminary research suggests that people who speak a second language may have enhanced defenses against the onset of dementia and delay Alzheimer’s disease by an average of four years, as WSJ reported in 2010.
其實正如《華爾街日報》2010年所報道的，一些初步研究結果表明，會說第二外語的人可能不僅增強了對癡呆症發病的抵禦能力，還將老年癡呆症的發作平均延緩了四年。

The ability to speak more than one language also may help protect memory, researchers from the Center for Health Studies in Luxembourg reported at last year.
健康研究中心駐盧森堡的研究人員去年稱，具備說一種以上語言的能力可能還有助於人們保護記憶力。

After studying older people who spoke multiple languages, they concluded that the more languages someone could speak, the better: People who spoke three languages were three times less likely to have cognitive problems compared to bilingual people. Those who spoke four or more languages were five times less likely to develop cognitive problems.
在研究了會說多國語言的老年人後，這些研究者總結認爲，能說越多語言對人越好，因爲他們發現，說三種語言的人其產生認知問題的可能性比講兩種語言的人要小三倍，能說四種或以上語言的人出現認知問題的可能性比雙語者要小五倍。

Not so long ago, people worried that children who grew up learning two languages at once were at a developmental disadvantage compared with those who focused on only one.
不久前，人們還在擔心，相比成長過程中只專注學習一門語言的孩子，那些同時學習兩種語言的孩子會處於成長劣勢。

New research suggests that even babies have little trouble developing bilingual skills.
新研究結果表明，即使嬰兒在發展雙語技巧方面都不存在什麼困難。

Researchers at the University of British Columbia's Infant Studies Centre reported that babies being raised in a bilingual family show from birth a preference for each of the native languages they heard while still in the womb and can readily distinguish between them.
加拿大英屬哥倫比亞大學嬰兒研究中心的研究人員稱，在雙語家庭中長大的寶寶從一出生就顯示出對其在子宮中聽到的兩種母語的偏好，並且很容易就能將兩者區分開來。

Moreover, bilingual infants appear to learn the grammars of their two languages as well as babies learning a single language, even when the two languages are as different from one another as English and Japanese, or English and Punjabi.
此外，在語法學習方面，雙語嬰兒似乎能與只學習一種語言的嬰兒學得一樣好，哪怕這兩種語言就像英語和日語或者英語和旁遮普語一樣極不相同。