Inhibitory Control in Bilinguals and Musicians: Event Related Potential (ERP) Evidence for Experience-Specific Effects

Bilinguals and musicians exhibit behavioral advantages on tasks with high demands on executive functioning, particularly inhibitory control, but the brain mechanisms supporting these differences are unclear. Of key interest is whether these forms of experience influence cognition through similar or distinct information processing mechanisms. Here, we recorded event-related potentials (ERPs) in three groups – bilinguals, musicians, and controls – who completed a visual go-nogo task that involved the withholding of key presses to rare targets. Participants in each group achieved similar accuracy rates and responses times but the analysis of cortical responses revealed significant differences in ERP waveforms. Success in withholding a prepotent response was associated with enhanced stimulus-locked N2 and P3 wave amplitude relative to go trials. For nogo trials, there were altered timing-specific ERP differences and graded amplitude differences observed in the neural responses across groups. Specifically, musicians showed an enhanced early P2 response accompanied by reduced N2 amplitude whereas bilinguals showed increased N2 amplitude coupled with an increased late positivity wave relative to controls. These findings demonstrate that bilingualism and music training have differential effects on the brain networks supporting executive control over behavior.