Análise da memória de trabalho em crianças bilíngues e monolíngues

Abstract

Literacy is a milestone in school life; mastering reading, writing and expanding communication possibilities is included in the quality life improvement. It is more and more common to find bilingual people, a skilled person who communicates in two languages on different everyday situations. Studies show that bilinguals present higher cognitive development than monolingual pairs. It is possible to behold better results with the bilingual ones in working memory tasks, brief storage function for processing information. The objective of this study was to analyze the working memory of 84 students aged 6 to 7 years, from private schools in the city of João Pessoa, attending the first year of elementary school; 43 from monolingual school and 41 from bilingual school. Two instruments were used: Reading Perception Questionnaire (QPPL) and Digit Span. The collection was performed individually with the participants in an environment free from interference. Analysis were made through Statistical Program Social Sciences (SPSS) - version 21. The non-parametric (Man-Whitney) test was used in the analysis of independent samples from Digit Span, where significant differences and advantage of bilingual students were found on monolingual ones on working memory tasks; and a cross-table (chi-square test) for the QPPL in which teachers of bilingual students were more restrict to classify them as Regular, while those of the monolingual school were more malleable, classifying them as Great. With a reduced sample, it is not possible to make inferences, so more detailed studies are suggested for the future.