Is Bilingualism Really an Advantage? | Hacker News Reader

Is Bilingualism Really an Advantage?

newyorker.com

49 pointssmonusbonus54 comments

Freakonomics did an interesting podcast on this:

http://freakonomics.com/2014/03/06/is-learning-a-foreign-lan...

Their conclusion was that bilingualism doesn't increase your earnings potential commensurate with all of the study required to become bilingual. (They focused on economic and not cultural value.)

The exception was English. If you don't speak English, you will make much more if you learn English.

They also discussed how supply-side is important in the market for bilinguals. In the US, learning Spanish will not increase your income by much, but learning German might.

The obvious question would be whether this works differently for languages learned as a child vs as an adult.

For me the "cost" of learning English as a second language in school was negligible (even if you factor in all the hours actually spent in class) because a lot of the learning was actually passive or even recreational (e.g. watching movies, playing games).

OTOH, learning a second (or third) language later on would have required much more investment. I actually tried several languages in university and eventually decided that I just didn't have the time or interest to learn any of them properly (i.e. the cost would have been too high and the immediate return extremely low with long-term return also being questionable).

To figure the "cost" of learning a language in school you need to count what else you could have been learning with that time.

Sure, but realistically that's not as "expensive" as it would seem. It's not like you could replace it with just about anything (it'd have to be a class that could realistically be taught instead, requiring a realistic syllabus, a sufficient availability of capable teachers and sufficient demand). And if you want to be properly realistic, you'd have to limit the alternatives to what would have been available alternatives in school if it was an elective. And if considering alternatives outside school, you also have to factor in the overhead (whereas in school you're already paying that anyway).

Besides, it's naive to treat cost as simply a measure of time. In some cases time spent in school is much more intense than outside of it. In other cases it's the opposite.

This is a good article.

It doesn't dampen my enthusiasm for learning a second language and getting immersed in a different culture. To me, it's so clearly rewarding that I don't need to worry too much about whether it benefits me.

However, now that I have kids and read the various upper middle class liberal-ish publications, I've learned so much about what my kids need to be doing. They need to

learn an instrument, learn to read music, lean not to rely too much on reading music, develop executive function through certain sports and physical activities such as dance, skateboarding, tennis, or form-based martial arts, play team sports, study math in a less abstract way, learn the abstractions of math, learn to program, learn visual arts in a tactile way, play in nature, learn to swim, engage in at least 5,000 words of abstract dialog and language, and… well crap, I forgot some I think. Oh, now I remember - my kids should also not be over scheduled. got it? good.

Something tells me that if you take, uh, a couple of these things, you're probably good. Kind of like how doing pushups also builds your triceps. You don't actually have to do 50 different exercises, one for each known muscle.

Languages? Hell yeah, languages. They're great. Go for it. You could also do some of those other things.

"However, now that I have kids and read the various upper middle class liberal-ish publications, I've learned so much about what my kids need to be doing"

I can summarize your long list to being whipped up into an anxious frenzy in a fit of Pavlovian conditioning, fall for every piece of clickbait that passes under your mouse cursor, earning a couple ad networks, and the authors, a couple pennies.

If you feel bad about not living up to an impossible ideal and feel thats the wrong way to treat people, the advertisers are thrilled because its easier to sell to freaked out people, meanwhile the feminists would like a word with you involving the strategies for mass market advertisements aimed at women.

Yup, same goes for parents. I don't feel like I have to be perfect at every parenting task. If I'm pretty good at 40% of parenting and my wife is pretty good at another 40% someone else can pick up the remaining 20%.

heck, if they are alive and the house is not on fire, you're doing pretty good :)

I don't think it's a good article at all. It refers to 'the bilingual advantage' like it's some atomic, indivisible thing. Even after spending a paragraph talking about mixed results, it still refers to it atomically.

Such a binary worldview is harmful - for example, instead of totting up the number of pro-, neutral, and anti- conference abstracts, it would have been far more useful to look at what kind of abstracts showed benefits and not. It may have been that bilingual abstracts showed a benefit for certain auditory cognitive tasks, for example. Instead 'the bilingual advantage' is treated like a sporting team with a win/loss record, hardly appropriate for a complex cognitive concept.

Not to mention that totalling studies based only on the abstract is incredibly lazy. Abstracts are free of the minutae, and that minutae can be very important when two studies differ.

I'd say learning an instrument is definitely one of those things that don't necessary have a direct impact, but can be a blessing as an adult. Basically, it avoids a common regret (I never learned an instrument, but I don't care enough to spend the time to learn it now that I'm hitting 30) and provides a way to get into music (instruments or not) with less investment. It opens possibilities for a number of hobbies.

Sports are a great way to learn social skills. In order to participate in a team sport (consistently) you need to learn how to deal with people that aren't as pre-selected to your taste as the friends you make in school. You also learn something other people may be worse at than you, which can help with confidence. Especially if the more experienced players are encouraged to train beginners.

Most other things are just examples of these or should already be (partially) covered in school, depending on your school system.

Many of these should be recreational for the kid. For example, if they hate instrument practice but can read music and understand the basics, I don't see any harm in replacing it with something else at some point.

In the end, you just have to be good enough. My childhood left me with a few issues, but most of them sorted themselves out in early adulthood. Just keep this in mind: the reason there are so many opinions on what is the "right way" to raise a child, is that every parent is afraid of doing it wrong. Most advice is anecdotal and the reason people feel strongly about it is that they don't want to have been wrong, not that "it just works".

Disclaimer: am not a parent.

Wonder if any studies controlled for income level and economic situation. Many bilingual kids might have had additional advantage such as families with parents that get jobs in other countries, or in general could move to other countries. If they learned it in school, maybe they went through a better educational system.

For me it was a combination of educational system and just being a country were multiple languages were spoken routinely.

On the the personal level. I feel that I am able to reason sometimes at a higher abstraction level because I know 3 languages. In other words many concepts are less tied to particular words in particular languages, rather they move up a level, and then there are mappings to individual languages.

This is not unlike learning multiple programming languages. If you know C# and Java, and C++ you probably have a solid understanding of OO concepts and can just map them to idiosyncrasies in those languages. If you can even move up and learn a functional languages like F# or Haskell and there is a whole new abstraction level you can reason about. But if you only and ever know Java, there is a higher chance you'd think more in Java's syntax rather than at a higher level.

I moved to US from Japan when I was 13 years old. One thing I have benefited for sure is the sheer amount of information I have access to. While there are a lot of overlaps as translated versions of the work is often available between Japanese and English pair, it is certainly easier for me; actually, this makes searching for information relatively easier. I have an option to take a jump in a language in order to narrow down the information I'm looking for.

The only thing I can think that I missed is some of the social implications (or cues, if you will) in each language. (Maybe drastically more so in English, as I haven't had chance to infuse them.) Not that I have much of problems speaking to other people, and reading documents in either language, it's just when there are hidden implications within.

I used to be billingual (french and german) as a kid. I remember literally translating passages of german books/articles a few times for school assignments. It was easy not to get caught.

I can speak in 4 languages and just about manage to converse in a fifth. There are definitely advantages to knowing more languages than one:

1. People love you if you can speak their language without forcing to search for a common language; you can build a rapport much more quickly. If you love to travel, this will definitely help!

2. Different languages force you to think in different ways. Different languages have different constructs and vocabularies/concepts not even present in English. For e.g. in Marathi/Hindi, the word "sit" can be translated in 2 different ways depending on the respect you show to the other person.

3. If you have any interest in cultural history, learning the local language will help a great deal.

Plus I think being able to think in different languages is just wonderful! I can't describe how boring it would be if I could think in only one language.

Do these translate to monetary gains? Hard to tell. Does it help me lead a more fulfilling life? Yes, I definitely think so!

Having said that, I definitely want to learn more languages. 4 is really less in India, there are plenty of people who can speak more.

The article provides a summary of research on a very complex topic and it appears as usual there's no simple "answer". It seems a pretty safe bet that bilingualism confers some advantages, though the challenge is to try to differentiate just what those are and aren't.

The researcher's problem is the enormous overlap of factors affecting cognitive function. For example, psychiatric disorders are quite common and associated with deficits in executive functioning, which we might reason affects capacity to become bilingual in the first place, thus a variable to be controlled.

However it's also been shown that biological relatives of psychiatrically disordered individuals have similar (if less severe) deficits. Dispersed into the general population, it's difficult to screen for the potential confound, injecting a subtle and essentially incomputable bias into the comparisons of bi- vs. monolingual individuals.

Similarly, the association with earlier or later onset of dementia is extremely difficult to parse. We're back to the usual pulpit re: correlation vs. causation. It could be argued that bilingualism is one indicator of advantaged systemic integrity. There are no doubt many other signals of such advantage. Dementia could be the outcome of an intrinsic lack of fitness in the Darwinian sense.

I have to say yes!

I was born in Portugual, so Portuguese and Spanish was all I heard growing up. But then I went into a german school and picked up German and English. Later I picked up French and finally Dutch.

My wife has a pretty similar language history so it's quite fun to speak our own version of Esperanto to our daughter and see what language she'll pick up first!

Workwise, I would be miles behind where I am right now if I hadn't picked up English at an early age. I've read somewhere that people who reason in a non-native language are able to maintain a more rational (less emotional) train of thought and that certainly seems to be the case with me, but if for no other reason, I suggest you should pick up a second language because it will increase your potential earnings! (see the economist's article below).

http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2014/03/language-stu...

My kids are both bilingual. My wife and I are both American, so it was strictly a choice that we made on the basis of having a desire to bring up children that had a less parochial look on the world. Raising children bilingual (i.e. sending them to a bilingual school) at an early age, they both became bilingual with relatively little pain.

We never viewed this as a means to increasing their earnings potential (at least not a direct consequence - it's always possible that they alleged mental benefits of bilingualism has some effect) and I have no way to make a judgement as to whether it will. They both do very well in their school work, but once again, I can't determine if bilingualism had anything to do with that.

At this point neither of them has any desire to pursue any opportunities that would use their bilingualism, but they're still both teenagers and that could change at some point.

I'd be interested to find out if having programming skills grants a similar advantage concerning dementia.

I think the advantages and disadvantages are minor compared to other influences. Many poor immigrants for example speak 2 languages. Yet rich well travelled people also speak 2 languages.

This debate is only possible in the U.S. ... the majority of the world speaks at least 2 languages.

Really, there isn't a single other country on the planet where only a minority is bilingual? This strikes me as rather unlikely.

The UK.

About half the world speaks more than one language at some unknown level of proficiency. The most popular second language worldwide is English because it is important for business. Since Americans already speak english they have less economic incentive to learn a second language.

> Bilingualism, in other words, seems to have a protective effect on cognitive decline

Do I really need to say it?... "Those whose cognition will decline slower seem to be more likely to become bilingual".

The TL;DR for this article: "Yes, there are significant cognitive benefits to being multilingual, including staving off dementia in old age, but the benefits may be sometimes overstated."

> In 1922, in “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus,” the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote, “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.

The amount of times this particular proposition has been quoted and rehashed by ignorant people in completely irrelevant contexts is staggering. (On the plus side it saved me the ~ twenty minutes that reading the rest of the article normally would have taken)

Hmm, a nice exception from Betteridge's law of headlines.

I read that as a qualified no. the advantage is neither global nor pervasive, as often reported

Learning anything generally has task specific advantages on related activities. EX: Getting good at a FPS game has carry over to other FPS games. And, Language touches a lot of bases, but there is no evidence it helps say learning to surf.

Well, the article only discusses cognitive advantages, but there is the very real advantage of being able to communicate better and with more people. They can teach me how to surf, for example. And I am able to discuss with all of you, which is nice. Learning a language can be at least as powerful as learning how to code. (Especially if you start with non-English as a first language.)

My Life Goals: 1. Learn the language of the surfers. 2. Learn to surf.

What's it with the anti-intellectualist strain in America? Learning a foreign language at any decent level means becoming acquainted with the literature written in that language and with the culture of the country where the language is spoken.

Learning that kind of stuff is good for you. Even if it doesn't translate into increased material wealth.

> Learning a foreign language at any decent level means becoming acquainted with the literature written in that language and with the culture of the country where the language is spoken.

When your first language is English, both of these things are often possible without actually knowing other languages.

How do you mean? Translated literature loses a lot of nuance. And it's hard to be immersed into a culture when you don't speak the language.

Even a very good translation is not the original. It's basically a separate work. I mean, I've heard some lovely poetic German translations of Shakespeare. But it's not Shakespeare, not really.

Funnily enough, some would argue that Shakespeare in modern English also isn't real Shakespeare!

Check out the original prenounciation: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gPlpphT7n9s

I've seen it argued (IMO pretty convincingly) that people who don't speak English get a more authentic Shakespeare experience than those of us who do. English speakers almost always get Shakespeare in the original language, which is nominally English but in reality is just on the edge of understanding. There's a strong current of "this is really different!" any time you get actual Shakespeare, and it really makes the stuff feel unnatural. Whereas people who speak, say, French get Shakespeare translated into modern, idiomatic French and it's much more natural that way.

The original isn't necessarily the best or even the most authentic.

Almost all non-native English speakers conflate language and culture to a degree that they would interpret your statement as an inherent impossibility.

For example, some notions of nationhood are described in terms like "speakers of the Japanese language".

Exactly. And it's obviously of great help when encountering people who speak said language. Communication is a wonderful thing.

I've picked up some basic Portuguese in 2014. One doesn't need to be anti-intellectual to think that my efforts might be better spent learning a new skill rather than a small variant on a skill I already have (speaking, reading and writing).

There are some benefits - Brazilian and Mozambican ladies are beautiful. But that's hardly an intellectual benefit.

So what does "good for me" mean in concrete terms? What am I missing here?

The mental exercise is definitely good. If you only knew one language knowing another will probably increase your knowledge of your native one as well.

I'm not saying it's a must but it can come handy and be a healthy exercise.

HN is severely disappointing. Here I was thinking it was different from Reddit regarding downvotes and intelligent discussion but it's not.

It's downvote on disagreement.

Please don't post comments like this. They break the guidelines ("Resist complaining about being downmodded"—https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html) and the downvote being complained about is often soon corrected by other users. That's what happened with yours.

We all know how annoying it is to have a reasonable comment downvoted, but (a) it happens to everyone, (b) sometimes it's just a misclick, and (c) changing the subject to that only lowers the signal/noise ratio.

Noted. I was negatively surprised after seeing a trend. Won't happen again.

I think most research on the topic is pretty vague, but from personal experience, after learning my 3 languages, adding more isn't much of a hassle (although, to be fair, I live in a bilingual city).

The 3rd language was Bulgarian, spoked by probably less than 10 million people worldwide, but it also helps to understand many similar Slavic languages.

I have become much more open and exposed to other cultures, feel more comfortable traveling alone off the track (I have hitchhiked in Syria before the war, amongst other places), and I can watch news or movies in a bunch of language (from those 3, I picked up basics of other languages, and from combinations, it can be enough to manage with a lot of situations).

Portuguese ladies are also quite something. I should know, I'm married to one :-)

Well, firstly, the researcher quoted extensively in this article is a Dutch-born scientist at the University of Edinburgh.

Secondly -- and from here on out I'll be derailing to rant at a more general 'you' than you specifically -- what is with you g-d global tourists and cultural dilettantes who think a cultural diet composed equally of small portions of everything is the only valid choice? And why does it always come back to Americans, specifically? (besides, you know, us all being assholes?) When you are off visiting a fishing village in Malaysia, do you tell the fishermen, "You should really visit New York sometime and try the pizza. It will really broaden your horizons!"?

There is an absurd amount of culture available, more than any one person could ever consume. Why is it so hurtful to you that someone might be content immersing themselves in their own culture, or -- worse! -- reading Proust in translation?

And why does it always come back to Americans, specifically?

It doesn't; the others just don't get read so much because they're not written in English :)

You're really arguing that learning about other cultures doesn't have a benefit? Cross cultural pollination not only contributes to a feeling of good will between counties, but it's responsible for lots of cultural and technological innovations. American culture is just a mish-mash of other cultures. Think about it. You eat spaghetti!

No, I'm saying that there are multiple ways to live your life. Cross-pollination may be a good thing, but the bees are not the flowers. Some people need to be locals, and being a local is not inferior to being a cross-pollinator.

> and from here on out I'll be derailing to rant at a more general 'you' than you specifically

At least you warned us, but how is this at all related to the comment you are nominally replying to?

What's with commenting on an interesting article with an irrelevant and baseless attack on my country?

Easy upvotes.

I find your comment to be strange; the article is not an argument against learning another language or experiencing another culture. Rather, the article is about the rather simple question: do people who are bilingual enjoy cognitive benefits over those who are not? There is no judgement attached to this question.

Learning a whole new language just to read literature or enjoy another culture is a lot of work. Lets not pretend people are doing that all across the world. If you fall in love with a particular culture go right ahead. But if you don't, what then? Learn a bunch?

I bet nearly all bilingualism is caused by immigration, cultures with historically close contact, and people learning a lingua franca.

Part of the reason the US tends to be monolingual is because we have only one native language. English is the lingua franca of North America and now the globe.

Spanish is growing because the fuzzier and fuzzier border with Mexico.

But it's kind of a waste to learn German just so that when I got a trip there once every 5 years I'll be more able to drink up the culture.

I'm acquainting myself with contemporary literature of my current country of residence; specifically the contents of newspapers. I'm a good American now? Or, is my sarcasm down-vote worthy?

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