Overview
- Speaking more languages was associated with progressively lower risk of accelerated aging, with protection increasing from bilingual to trilingual to four or more languages.
- Monolingual participants had about twice the odds of accelerated aging, while estimated risk was 23% lower for bilinguals and 49% lower for trilinguals.
- Findings draw on representative samples from 27 European countries and focus on adults aged 51 to 90.
- The associations remained after adjusting for socioeconomic status, immigration, air quality, lifestyle, and sociolinguistic factors, though the evidence is observational.
- A Spain-based follow-up is in progress, with preliminary signals that smaller linguistic distance between languages may relate to stronger protection.