Many of in the language teaching profession have used this claim at some point: learning a language is good for your brain. It may protect you from dementia. It appears in course brochures, in conference talks, and in conversations with sceptical learners. Writing in The Conversation, Professor Eef Hogervorst of Loughborough University examines the evidence — and finds the story more complicated than the headlines suggest.
As we age, the connections between brain cells weaken. Illnesses such as Alzheimer’s disease and stroke speed this up, and can eventually lead to dementia: a loss of mental ability and of independence.
Scientists can now estimate a person’s brain age from a scan and compare it with their actual age. The difference is called the brain-age gap, and it helps predict who will decline faster. One study of around 39,000 people found exactly this link. Encouragingly, lifestyle changes — stopping smoking, drinking less alcohol, exercising regularly — appear to slow the process.
Recent results look impressive. Preliminary findings presented at a scientific conference suggested that people who speak more languages tend to have younger brains. Speaking two languages was associated with a six-year delay in brain ageing; speaking four, with a delay of up to thirteen years.
A separate study of more than 86,000 people across 27 European countries found that people who spoke only one language were more than twice as likely to show rapid brain ageing. Speaking two reduced that risk by around 30%.
The usual explanation is brain reserve: language learning builds extra connections between nerve cells, which help the brain cope with damage caused by ageing and disease.
When researchers combined the results of several studies, the picture changed. Speaking more than one language did not in fact lower a person’s risk of developing dementia. What it did was delay diagnosis by two to five years.
What does this mean? A larger vocabulary and stronger problem-solving skills may conceal the early signs rather than prevent the disease. The person is developing dementia at the same rate; they are simply better at compensating, so it takes longer to become visible. Supporting this, people with dementia often lose their weaker second language first, which would explain why any protective effect fades, and why diagnosis is postponed rather than avoided.
Hogervorst raises a point that most research has focused on white, middle-class people in the US and Europe — people who often grew up speaking several languages because they had a good education and supportive parents.
That same group is more likely to read for pleasure, play sport and learn musical instruments, all separately linked to lower dementia risk. Being middle class also generally means better food, better healthcare, more leisure time and less stress — each of which reduces risk on its own.
There is also a chicken-and-egg problem. People with a good memory for words and grammatical rules, and the encouragement to use them, may simply be more likely to become multilingual in the first place. The multilingualism may be a marker of an advantaged brain rather than the cause of one.
If speaking several languages were straightforwardly protective, migrants should benefit most. They usually have no choice but to learn another language. In fact, the opposite holds. Several studies have found that migrants face a higher dementia risk, not a lower one.
The reasons are complex. Poor health, social isolation and depression may all contribute, and the effect appears particularly marked among migrant women. These difficulties are sometimes connected to limited language skills arising from limited access to education in the first place.
Hogervorst draws a conclusion that reframes the debate. What may matter is not how many languages someone speaks, but whether they can communicate well enough to express their needs and obtain support.
For anyone teaching healthcare English, or working on language access for older migrants, that reframing is worth considering. It suggests the value of language provision in later life lies less in cognitive exercise than in enabling people to describe symptoms, ask questions, maintain friendships and seek help.
Perhaps the strongest test would compare older people who take up a new language with those who do not. So far that research has produced mixed results, with roughly half the studies finding no effect on thinking skills.
Hogervorst’s conclusion is measured rather than dismissive. Learning a language later in life may help the brain form new connections, and it increases blood flow — and therefore oxygen and nutrients — to the areas being used. This fits the familiar idea that the brain behaves somewhat like a muscle.
But as with most dementia research, no single habit is likely to decide whether someone develops the condition. Learning a language remains worth doing. It is not an insurance policy — and the people who might benefit most from language support are often those least likely to receive it.
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