"The Unique Significance of Multilingual Individuals' Native Language"

A study of polyglots who speak five or more languages has found that their brains process their native language differently, with less activity in the language network compared to non-native languages of similar proficiency. This suggests that the first language acquired is processed with minimal effort, possibly due to more experience with it. The study also revealed that the brain's language network responds more strongly to languages in which the speaker is more proficient, and that a separate network becomes activated when processing non-native languages, indicating a cognitively demanding task.