2. The price of knowledge: A bilingual paired associate learning study

Age effects in experimental psychology are typically interpreted as evidence for cognitive decline. Alternatively, age-related decreases in performance on cognitive tasks could be a result of increased linguistic experience (Ramscar et al. 2014). We present the results of a paired associate learning experiment in which we tested old and young German monolinguals and Chinese-German bilinguals. Younger participants performed similarly in L1 and L2. Older participants performed better in L2 than in L1. The current findings cannot be accounted for by cognitive decline, but follow straightforwardly from basic principles of learning.