Abstract
In everyday conversation, bilingual individuals switch between languages
not only in reaction to monolinguals with different language profiles
but also voluntarily and naturally. However, whether and how various
switching contexts dynamically modulate the domain-general cognitive
control was still elusive. Using a cross-task paradigm which flanker
task was interleaved with language switching task trial-by-trial, the
present study manipulated forced, voluntary and natural switching
contexts. A group of unbalanced Chinese-English bilinguals performed a
flanker task in the three switching contexts. The results showed that
the cross-domain interaction on the P3 effect revealed an atypical
flanker effect in forced switching contexts only, and P3 amplitude of
incongruent trials in forced switching contexts was smaller than both
natural and voluntary switching contexts. Furthermore, the robust
brain-brain and brain-behavior relationships between language control
and domain-general control were significantly emerged in the forced
switching context only. Altogether, our findings support the dynamic
adaptation of language control to cognitive control and highlight the
importance of switching contexts.
Keywords: language switching; cross-task conflict
adaptation; language control; domain-general cognitive control.