Can a short language game help your brain? Scientists in Canada tried one with 55 people who speak two languages. For 50 minutes, they said numbers in their two languages and switched between them. Before and after the game, they took an arrow test.

In the test, you must ignore the arrows around the middle one. After the game, people were less confused by the other arrows. But they took the same test twice, so practice may also help.

Researchers at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada tested 55 bilingual students whose strongest language was English. Their second languages were very different, with 17 languages in total. First, everyone did a flanker task. In this test you look at a row of arrows and answer only about the one in the middle.

Then they spent 50 minutes naming numbers while switching between their two languages. After that, they did the flanker task again, and the side arrows slowed them down less.

There was no group that skipped the switching task, so getting used to the test could explain part of the gain. During the switching task itself, changing languages made people slower. Switching back into English, their strongest language, took even longer.

Bilingual speakers who switch from a second language back into their first often stall for a split second, and a 2026 study in Bilingualism: Language and Cognition caught that delay again. A team at Wilfrid Laurier University asked 55 English-dominant bilinguals, whose second languages covered 17 tongues, to name numerals in both languages for 50 minutes, switching back and forth.

Switch trials were slower and less accurate than repeat trials, and the cost was larger when moving into English. That pattern fits the view that speakers hold back their dominant language while using a weaker one, so releasing it takes extra time. The bigger surprise came from a flanker task given before and after. After practice, participants were less disturbed by conflicting arrows, on a test unrelated to language.

Whether this is real transfer is another matter. The study had no comparison group, so familiarity with the test may account for some of the change. A 2019 study that did include one found that switching practice improved monitoring more than plain second-language practice did, but improved inhibition less. Counting in Japanese and English before speaking English costs nothing and works as a warm-up, whatever it does for focus.