WORD READING PROCESSING BY BILINGUAL SPEAKERS - BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE AND ENGLISH WITH AND WITHOUT ADHD

Language is related to the human communication capacity through signs, and this is how perceptions of the world are created, as well as memories and knowledge. It is through language that learning takes place, among many processes, there is the reading process, which occurs through various interfaces. One of the impairments presented by subjects with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is in the interface with working memory, impacting the speed of word recognition, due to the frequency of use of lexical items and the size of the sequence of letters or of sounds (COLTHEART et al., 2004). ADHD is associated with poor executive control (Barkley, 2006; Hervey, Epstein & Curry, 2004; King, Colla, Brass, Heuser & von Cramon, 2007; Mathers, 2006; Sonuga-Barke, Bitsakou & Thompson, 2010) in due to symptoms of inattention, impulsivity and hyperactivity. According to Albuquerque's thesis (2008) on language processing in subjects with ADHD, in one of the experiments of self-monitored reading of isolated words, whose objective was to capture the exact times of reading the target word in order to eliminate the interference of the context, and comparing them between the ADHD and control groups and also between the findings of previous experiments, we have that the results for the error rates were negligible and similar for both groups. As for the reading times of the experimental words, the results showed significant differences in almost all conditions between the groups tested, that is, the reading of the words was significantly slower in the ADHD group than in the control group with the results of the T-tests with statistically significant difference T=2.815; p<0.05/T=3.109; p=0.0023 / T=4.190; p<0.0001/ T=4.593; p<0.0001/ T=4.733; p<0.0001/ T=4.535; p<0.0001.

This research explores the relationships between bilingualism and ADHD, investigating the processing of word reading, since in the long term both groups present a reduction in linguistic vocabulary (Bialystok, Luk, Peets & Yang, 2010), but the etiology of each one of the phenomena is different. The origin of vocabulary loss for the bilingual individual is due to the “effort” in managing two or more languages, as multilingualism improves executive control, responsible for working memory, task switching, planning and problem solving (e.g., Singh, Fu, Rahman, Hameed, Sanmugam, Agarwai, Jiang, Chong, Meaney & Rifkin-Graboi 2014). Taking into account the fact that the bilingual has enhanced executive control and the deficit of ADHD, would it be beneficial for the ADHD to be bilingual? Does bilingualism favor the processing of reading isolated words compared to monolingual individuals with ADHD? Our objectives are to investigate how the processing of the reading of isolated words occurs by bilingual Brazilians, Portuguese-English, with ADHD and without ADHD, in order to find evidence that points to the existence of subclinical difficulties in some linguistic module or in the interface with the working memory and whether bilingualism exerts any compensation in word processing. As well as investigating whether the frequency of words, high or low, influences the reading time between groups. Aware of the findings and results from Albuquerque's thesis (2008) with monolinguals, we compared bilinguals with and without ADHD, intermediate and advanced through a self-monitored reading test of isolated words/pseudowords/non-words. Our hypothesis are that due to improved executive control of bilingual people, participants bilinguals with ADHD will have a better performance compared to the monolinguals and that the level of proficiency will impact the reading time for intermediate ones. The results seem to corroborate the hypothesis of the benefit of bilingualism for subjects with ADHD due to improved executive control.