ReviewFrontiers in psychology2026
Bilingual effects on cognitive control: a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of 50 years of research.
Review in Frontiers in psychology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Claims of cognitive advantages associated with bilingualism have generated substantial research interest and controversy, particularly regarding influences on cognitive control. While multiple reviews have synthesized findings across previous work, their limited scope, focused exclusively on monolingual-bilingual comparisons, has precluded a more comprehensive understanding of the field as a whole. To address this, the present study provides a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of all published and unpublished original research investigating bilingual effects on cognitive control. Searches conducted in Web of Science and ProQuest Dissertations and Theses returned 8,266 documents of which 764 met eligibility criteria and were included in the analyses. Performance analysis, science mapping, and co-citation analysis were conducted using the bibliometrix package in R. Investigation of bilingual effects on cognitive control has grown steadily since the mid-2000s and is approaching saturation. Research output and influence are heavily concentrated among Western institutions, with binary monolingual-bilingual comparisons remaining the dominant methodological paradigm. Co-citation analysis identified three foundational thematic clusters reflecting an intellectual trajectory from early claims of universal bilingual advantages, through empirical reconsideration, toward more nuanced, experience-sensitive theoretical frameworks. These findings highlight persistent structural and methodological limitations in the field and underscore the need for greater global representation, improved measurement practices, and theoretically refined frameworks to advance understanding of how bilingualism shapes cognitive control.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.