Purpose: The aim of this study was to compare short-term memory, reading performance and academic achievement of bilingual and early monolinguals and to provide an explanatory model in bilingual and bilingual male students.
Materials and Methods: A total of 380 fifth grade students (188 Persian-Turkish bilingual and 192 Persian monolingual) students in Bojnourd were selected as a research sample using multi-stage cluster sampling. To measure short-term memory, complex Ray and Street (ROCFT) forms were used, to measure reading performance, reading and dyslexic performance tools (Nema) and mean year-end scores of mathematics, Persian and science courses were used to measure academic achievement. Structural equation modeling method was used to analyze the data.
Findings: The results show that in both groups, the direct effect of short-term memory on academic achievement and the indirect effect of short-term memory on academic achievement through reading performance was positive and significant. In both groups, the highest path coefficient was observed between short-term memory and academic achievement and the lowest coefficient between reading performance and academic achievement. Bilinguals had scores on all components except the subscales for removing sounds and reading non-words (in the reading performance variable).
Conclusion: The result is that learning the skills of one language, such as reading and writing, helps to enrich the skills of another language and increase the sounds and meanings in memory, and the proficiency gained in one language is transferred to another language. Therefore, bilingual people have more skills compared to monolinguals due to having more knowledge, information and experience in different language fields.