The Impact of Bilingual Experience on Healthy Age-Related Changes in Reading

老年人(65岁以上)是新不伦瑞克、加拿大和世界人口中不断增长的一部分。老龄化过程可能会影响基本的生活技能，如阅读，从而限制老年人的社交、工作表现、独立性和生活质量。然而，很少有科学研究调查老年人的阅读情况。到目前为止，几乎所有的研究都集中在单语老年人(只懂一种语言的人)上，而对双语老年人(懂两种语言的人)的阅读理解很少。考虑到双语者与单语者在质量和数量上都有不同的语言体验，这可能会影响阅读中涉及的大脑行为动力学，因此涉及单语者的研究可能不会推广到双语者。随着加拿大新不伦瑞克和世界上越来越多的人开始使用双语，更好地理解老龄化和双语对阅读的影响是至关重要的。为了解决科学文献中的这一关键差距，拟议的研究将调查单语者和双语者在成年后的自然阅读表现。它将决定双语(相对于单一语言)是改善还是阻碍老年人的自然阅读能力。一系列研究将使用眼球跟踪方法来调查一生中使用一种语言和两种语言对以下方面的影响：(1)自然阅读的局部(单词层面)方面，特别关注词汇特性；(2)自然阅读的全局(句子层面)方面，特别关注视觉注意的作用；(3)自然阅读的全局(文本层面)方面，特别关注走神的作用。它还将调查词汇知识和执行控制方面的分级差异的贡献。综上所述，这项拟议的研究将阐明健康老龄化如何影响研究不足的人群：双语者的阅读。它将有助于更全面、更全面地描述语言、认知和大脑。从这项工作中收集的见解将有助于更好地理解与年龄相关的健康认知变化(特别是在不同语言背景的人中)，并将为健康老龄化计划，特别是那些旨在保持老年人功能独立的计划提供参考。通过纳入一支相当大的本科生和研究生受训团队，拟议的研究还将有助于初级科学家的教育和培训。

Older adults (65+) represent an ever-increasing segment of the New Brunswick, Canadian, and world population. The aging process can impact essential life skills, such as reading, in ways that limit older adults' social interaction, job performance, independence, and quality of life. However, little scientific research has investigated reading in older adults. To date, nearly all studies have focused on monolingual older adults (individuals who know one language only), leaving reading in bilingual older adults (individuals who know two languages) poorly understood. Given that bilinguals have both qualitatively and quantitatively different language experiences from their monolingual peers, which likely influence the brain-behaviour dynamics involved in reading, the research involving monolinguals likely does not generalize to bilinguals. With more and more people becoming bilingual in New Brunswick, Canada, and the world, it is crucial to develop a better understanding of how aging and bilingualism jointly influence reading. To address this critical gap in the scientific literature, the proposed research will investigate naturalistic reading performance in both monolinguals and bilinguals across the adult lifespan. It will determine whether bilingualism (as opposed to monolingualism) improves or hinders naturalistic reading performance among the elderly. A collection of studies will employ eye-tracking methods to investigate how a lifetime of using one vs. two languages influences: (1) local (word-level) aspects of naturalistic reading, with a specific focus on lexical properties; (2) global (sentence-level) aspects of naturalistic reading, with a specific focus on the role of visual attention; and (3) global (text-level) aspects of naturalistic reading, with a specific focus on the role of mind wandering. It will also investigate the contribution of graded differences in lexical knowledge and executive control. Taken together, the proposed research will clarify how healthy aging impacts reading in an under-studied population: bilinguals. It will contribute to a more comprehensive and inclusive account of language, cognition, and the brain. Insights gathered from this work will lead to a better understanding of healthy age-related changes in cognition (especially among people with different language backgrounds) and will inform healthy aging programs, especially those aimed at maintaining older adults' functional independence. By including a sizable team of undergraduate and graduate trainees, the proposed research will also contribute to the education and training of junior scientists.