People who speak more than one language may recover better after a stroke, a new study suggests.

According to the findings, bilingual people - those who can speak two or more languages - are twice as likely to have normal cognitive functions after a stroke than those who only speak one language.

Previous research has suggested that bilingualism can delay the onset of Alzheimer's disease. Researchers in India set out to investigate whether it had any impact when it came to stroke.

They assessed the medical records of 608 patients who had suffered a stroke between 2006 and 2013. Over half of the participants were bilingual. Other lifestyle factors were taken into account, such as smoking and diabetes, to ensure that the results were not simply due to the bilingual people in the study having a healthier lifestyle.

The researchers found that around 20% of those who spoke one language had normal cognitive functioning after a stroke. However among bilingual people, this figure jumped to 40%.

Bilingual people performed better overall on post-stroke tests which measured attention and the ability to retrieve and organise information.

It was not all bad news for people who only spoke one language. The researchers found that following a stroke, there was no difference in the likelihood of developing aphasia between those who spoke one language and those who spoke more. Aphasia is a disorder that can lead to difficulties in reading, writing and speaking after a stroke.

"The advantage of bilingualism is that it makes people switch from one language to another, so while they inhibit one language, they have to activate another to communicate," the researchers noted.

They added that their findings all suggest that any intellectually stimulating activities that are pursued over time ‘can protect you from the damage brought on by a stroke'.

Details of these findings are published in the journal, Stroke.