New research suggests that speaking multiple languages may help protect cognitive and physical health as people get older.
A surprising pattern is emerging in aging science. Groups that speak several languages seem to age more slowly than groups that speak only one. The effect shows up not only in thinking skills but also in physical function and reducing biological age.
A large European study now adds strong evidence. It found that multilingual adults showed fewer signs of accelerated aging, and the benefit grew with the number of languages spoken.
Key Takeaways
- Speaking multiple languages was linked to slower aging across cognitive and physical measures.
- The protective effect grew in a dose dependent way with two, three, or four languages.
- Bilingual benefits weakened with age, but benefits for speaking two or more foreign languages stayed strong.
- Results held even after adjusting for major lifestyle and social factors.
- Multilingual environments may help build a form of cognitive reserve that supports healthy aging.
How Multilingualism Connects To Aging
🧠 Aging researchers often focus on specific diseases, but this study used a broader measurement called a biobehavioral age gap (BAG). It compares a person’s actual age with an age predicted by a model that includes cognitive skills, physical function, and age-related conditions.
A negative BAG suggests delayed aging. A positive BAG suggests faster aging.
Across more than 86,000 adults from 27 countries, multilingual populations showed more negative BAG scores, hinting at a protective effect from using more than one language. This aligns with earlier work showing that multilingualism may help preserve attention, memory, and executive function.
The More Languages, The Stronger The Effect
🌍 The analysis included both cross-sectional snapshots and long-term tracking.
Cross-sectional findings
- Monolinguals were 2.11 times more likely to show accelerated aging.
- Speaking at least one additional language made adults 2.17 times less likely to show accelerated aging.
- Bilinguals had a modest benefit.
- Trilinguals and adults speaking four or more languages had stronger advantages.
Longitudinal findings
Following adults over time showed similar trends. Monolinguals had a 1.4 times higher risk of accelerated aging, while multilinguals showed steadily lower risks as the number of languages increased.
If two adults of the same age started the study with similar health profiles, the one who spoke three languages was more likely to maintain a slower aging trajectory.
Why Speaking More Languages Might Help
🔎 Researchers have long proposed the idea of cognitive reserve. This is the mental adaptability that helps the brain handle age-related changes. Multilingualism may boost this reserve because it requires frequent switching, inhibition, and active memory use.
Language learning also activates large neural networks. Over decades, this may help maintain cognitive efficiency and compensate for natural decline. Although this new study cannot prove cause and effect, it supports the idea that linguistic complexity might promote long-term brain resilience.
What About Lifestyle And Social Factors?
🧩 Many earlier studies did not fully adjust for confounders like education, mobility, or socioeconomic conditions. This study attempted a broader correction by using country-level data on factors like physical activity patterns, social structures, and policy environments.
Most adjustments made little difference to the observed benefits.
Two exceptions stood out:
- After adjusting for immigration, polyglot advantages weakened in cross-sectional data.
- After adjusting for gender equality, bilingual effects weakened in longitudinal data.
🌱 These results hint that stressors linked to migration or unequal environments might influence how language learning affects aging. For example, a person forced to learn a new language under pressure may not experience the same benefits as someone learning for enrichment.
A Strong Association, Not Proof Of Causality
📊 The dataset was large and diverse, but the study still cannot confirm that multilingualism causes slower aging. The authors also note that their multilingual metrics were coarse. They lacked information about how, when, and why a person learned a language.
Future studies that track language proficiency, age of learning, and patterns of use may reveal deeper details about how multilingualism affects aging trajectories.
Still, the strength of this association across 27 countries suggests that multilingualism could one day be considered a public health protective factor, similar to physical activity or social engagement.
Sources
- Amoruso, L. et al. Multilingualism protects against accelerated aging in cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses of 27 European countries.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s43587-025-01000-2 - Venugopal, A. et al. Protective effect of bilingualism on aging.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38376105/
