This study focuses on the assessment of working memory and linguistic skills in 21 Italian-Russian speaking bilingual children who were born in Italy and inherited Russian from their parents. Their performance was compared to that of 21 monolingual Russian-speaking and 21 monolingual Italian-speaking peers. For the assessment of the two languages…

Background: Children with dyslexia often show second-language reading and writing difficulties, but the cognitive mechanisms connected to this impairment need to be clarified. Aims: The present study examined the neuropsychological mechanisms underlying learning English as a foreign language in 4th- to the 8th-grade Italian students showing…

The present study aimed at investigating whether L2 learning affects phonological short-term and working memory and first language (L1) development. The performance of a group of 31 4- to-5-year-old sequential bilinguals attending an International School on tasks assessing phonological short-term and working memory and linguistic performance in L1…

The current study investigates the relation between working memory updating and second language learning (L2) outcomes in typically-developing fourth grade children. Our primary aim was to replicate and extend previous findings on the relationship between updating and low-level reading skills, i.e. fluency. Our second objective was to examine…

This article presents a study performed to investigate the role of simulation in second language learning while using a virtual environment. Participants were asked to explore a virtual park while learning 15 new Czech verbs (action verbs that describe movements performed with either the hand or the foot, and abstract verbs). This learning…

This is the first collection of research studies to explore the potential for mixed methods to shed light on foreign or second language learning by young learners in instructed contexts. It brings together recent studies undertaken in Cameroon, China, Croatia, Ethiopia, France, Germany, Italy, Kenya, Mexico, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Tanzania and…

It has been suggested that the ability to learn a foreign language is related to working memory. However, there is no clear evidence about which component of working memory may be involved. Two experiments investigated working memory problems in groups of seventh and eighth grade Italian children with difficulties in learning English as a second…