In recent years, the need to assess multilinguals’ language proficiency and cognitive skills has rapidly grown as a result of worldwide migration. Several studies focusing on the assessment of linguistic and cognitive abilities, though, point to the paradox of evaluating multilinguals by means of monolingual tests. Assessment policies and practices based on monolingual constructs perpetuate the misleading vision of multilingual individuals as the sum of multiple monolinguals. By so doing, such policies and practices fail to do justice to the complex and multifaceted nature of the individuals’ language experience. Furthermore, they fail to reflect the individuals’ acquisition and learning process, which involves a dynamic interaction between two (or more) languages.

The goal of this Research Topic is to bring together studies focusing on the development of experiments and assessment tools, with a view to investigating multilingual communication as it unfolds in natural circumstances, and to providing ecologically valid ways to assess multilingual competence; the latter understood as a multilingual’s ability to dynamically shift between languages, codeswitch, and simultaneously use different languages for different linguistic functions. In this respect, psycholinguistic research on multilingualism has recently made some progress, as a result of its diminished reliance on monolingual norms as controls. Nevertheless, most studies continue to test multilingual individuals in a monolingual mode, using one language at a time.

Current research on linguistic assessment considers the possibility of testing in a multilingual mode: tests are designed in multiple languages (e.g., by means of translations) or, alternatively, multilinguals are allowed to answer using their full repertoire (e.g., through code-mixing or by using multiple languages). The Research Topic invites contributions discussing methodologies to assess multilingual individuals in a multilingual mode. Contributions may address the following research questions from either a psycholinguistic or educational-linguistic perspective:

• Do multilingual individuals perform better in multilingual, rather than monolingual, tests?
• Do the benefits of multilingual testing occur independently of the multilingual profile of the test taker (e.g., independently of the test taker’s having been exposed to multilingual education), or of the type of linguistic or cognitive test?
• How do multilinguals use all their language resources during multilingual testing?
• What are the main challenges of multilingual testing in schools or in the lab?

The Research Topic has important implications for language assessment among multilinguals. To begin with, it will address the shortcomings of ‘subtractive’ views of language assessment, whereby multilinguals are tested in one language at a time. Secondly, it will show the advantages of considering and including multilinguals’ whole language repertoire during assessment. Lastly, it will introduce new practices in multilingual language assessment, which have the potential to inform the design of dynamic and summative assessment instruments in language education and speech-language pathology.

We encourage the submission of original manuscripts addressing the abovementioned issues, with a clear presentation of the research questions, approach, and methodology.

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Frontiers in Communication

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