Remember my name? Plurilingualism is key in relating associative memory subtypes: vocabulary learning and face-name association memory

Abstract

Recent studies have suggested that language aptitude is a domain-general and flexible trait to acquire foreign languages, regarding various cognitive abilities such as memory systems as its crucial components. Despite a growing interest in working memory, however, much remains unknown about the impact of associative memory on language aptitude. The present study therefore investigated whether face-name association abilities predict vocabulary learning aptitude among 65 English-native speakers. In this study, mono- and plurilingual participants were asked to complete a face-name association test and a vocabulary learning ability task. It was found that their vocabulary learning scores were significantly predicted by their face-name association test scores among all participants. This effect was driven by the plurilinguals and not the monolinguals. In addition, plurilingual participants performed significantly better in the vocabulary learning task than monolinguals. The results suggest that plurilingual participants might possess more integrated associative memory subtypes, due to their richer linguistic knowledge. In other words, their experience of navigating multiple languages might have improved their cognitive ability to form associative memory links between different types of information.