Speaking More Languages Helps You Make Better Decisions
You become more rational and better at coping with traumatic memories.
Bilingual brains are fascinating.
We store different memories in different languages. Arguments I had in French are sometimes “translated” into English when I remember them, as though the rawness of rage takes me back to my mother tongue.
Our entire personalities can change depending on what language we are speaking. I am funnier in English and gentler in French.
Research also suggests that bilingual people make decisions differently depending on which language you ask the question in.
Weird, right? Psychologists think so, too.
The Foreign Language Effect
Psychologists have long suspected that different languages affect our brains. In the 1960s, Russian-American novelist Vladimir Nabokov translated his own autobiography, Speak, Memory, from English to Russian. As he did so, he was flooded with new memories from his past. He realised that changing between languages led to new details emerging from his subconscious.
This piqued the curiosity of psychologists who wondered if this was a unique case or a broader psychological phenomenon. They…
