And as you point out, it's not just that people feel that a word is being misused. (Speaking Japanese). Each language comprises the ideas that have been worked out in a culture over thousands of generations, and that is an incredible amount of cultural heritage and complexity of thought that disappears whenever a language dies. We always knew that certain species of animals had abilities to orient that we thought were better than human, and we always had some biological excuse for why we couldn't do it. That hadn't started then. This is Hidden Brain. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking foreign language). VEDANTAM: If you're bilingual or you're learning a new language, you get what Jennifer experienced - the joy of discovering a phrase that helps you perfectly encapsulate a feeling or an experience. Hidden Brain Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam Subscribe Visit website Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our. Hidden Brain - You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Hidden Brain Aug 2, 2021 You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Play 51 min playlist_add Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the. FDA blocks human trials for Neuralink brain implants. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around. I think it's a really fascinating question for future research. BORODITSKY: It's certainly possible. VEDANTAM: I'm Shankar Vedantam. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. Does a speaker of a language, like Spanish, who has to assign gender to so many things, end up seeing the world as more gendered? A brief history of relationship research in social psychology, by Harry T. Reis, in Handbook of the History of Social Psychology, 2011. VEDANTAM: Languages orient us to the world. What Do You Do When Things Go Right? VEDANTAM: You make the case that concerns over the misuse of language might actually be one of the last places where people can publicly express prejudice and class differences. But what if it's not even about lust? But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? Maybe they like the same kinds of food, or enjoy the same hobbies. Hidden Brain Feb 23, 2023 Happiness 2.0: Surprising Sources of Joy Sometimes, life can feel like being stuck on a treadmill. And I was telling this person about someone I knew back in America. Are the spoken origins of language one reason that words so often seem to be on the move? How come you aren't exactly the way you were 10 years ago? Long before she began researching languages as a professor, foreign languages loomed large in her life. something, even though it shouldn't be so much of an effort. Athletic Scholarships are Negatively Associated with Intrinsic Motivation for Sports, Even Decades Later: Evidence for Long-Term Undermining, by Kennon M. Sheldon and Arlen C. Moller, Motivation Science, 2020. Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. So these speakers have internalized this idea from their language, and they believe that it's right. BORODITSKY: The way to say my name properly in Russian is (speaking foreign language), so I don't make people say that. It's as if you saw a person - I'm not going to say at 4 because then the person is growing up, and if I use that analogy then it seems like I'm saying that language grows up or it moves toward something or it develops. Listen on the Reuters app. June 20, 2020 This week on Hidden Brain, research about prejudices so deeply buried, we often doubt their existence. Special thanks to Adam Cole, who wrote and performed our rendition of "The Hokey Pokey." This week, we're going to bring you a conversation I had in front of a live audience with Richard Thaler, taped on Halloween at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in Washington, D. Richard is a professor of behavioral sciences and economics at the University of Chicago and is a well-known author. Now, in a lot of languages, you can't say that because unless you were crazy, and you went out looking to break your arm, and you succeeded - right? So there are these wonderful studies by Alexander Giora where he asked kids learning Finnish, English and Hebrew as their first languages basically, are you a boy or a girl? Course Hero is not sponsored or endorsed by any college or university. And so for me, that question was born in that conversation of are there some languages where it's easier to imagine a person without their characteristics of gender filled in? What turns out to be the case is that it's something in between - that bilinguals don't really turn off the languages they're not using when they're not using them. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? And you can just - it rolls off the tongue, and you can just throw it out. We convince a colleague to take a different tactic at work. VEDANTAM: Would it be possible to use what we have learned about how words and languages evolve to potentially write what a dictionary might look like in 50 years or a hundred years? FEB 27, 2023; Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button . UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #10: (Speaking Russian). So to go back to the example we were just talking about - people who don't use words like left and right - when I gave those picture stories to Kuuk Thaayorre speakers, who use north, south, east and west, they organized the cards from east to west. This week, a story about a con with a twist. All rights reserved. So when I ask you to, say, imagine a man walking down the street, well, in your imagery, you're going to have some details completed and some will be left out. So it's, VEDANTAM: The moment she heard it, Jennifer realized mendokusai was incredibly. I'm Shankar Vedantam. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. Language is something that's spoken, and spoken language especially always keeps changing. This week on Hidden Brain, we explore how unconscious bias can infect a culture and how a police shooting may say as much about a community as it does about individuals. It's testament to the incredible ingenuity and complexity of the human mind that all of these different perspectives on the world have been invented. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "PARKS AND RECREATION"). 00:51:58 - We all have to make certain choices in life, such as where to live and how to earn a living. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. If you liked . So you can't know how the words are going to come out, but you can take good guesses. VEDANTAM: Jennifer moved to Japan for graduate school. But somehow they've managed, not just by randomly bumping into each other. It turns out, as you point out, that in common usage, literally literally means the opposite of literally. BORODITSKY: Thank you so much for having me. So you can't see time. to describe the world. The phrase brings an entire world with it - its context, its flavor, its culture. VEDANTAM: This episode of HIDDEN BRAIN was produced by Rhaina Cohen, Maggie Penman and Thomas Lu with help from Renee Klahr, Jenny Schmidt, Parth Shah and Chloe Connelly. : A Data-Driven Prescription to Redefine Professional Success, Does Legal Education Have Undermining Effects on Law Students? But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? MCWHORTER: Yes, that's exactly true. If you, grew up speaking a language other than English, you probably reach for words in your. And, I mean, just in terms of even sounds changing and the way that you put words together changing bit by bit, and there's never been a language that didn't do that. So what happens is that once literally comes to feel like it means really, people start using it in figurative constructions such as I was literally dying of thirst. Everyone wants to be loved and appreciated. And if you can enjoy it as a parade instead of wondering why people keep walking instead of just sitting on chairs and blowing on their tubas and not moving, then you have more fun. For more on decision-making, check out our episode on how to make wiser choices. One study that I love is a study that asked monolingual speakers of Italian and German and also bilingual speakers of Italian and German to give reasons for why things are the grammatical genders that they are. Purpose can also boost our health and longevity. MCWHORTER: No, because LOL was an expression; it was a piece of language, and so you knew that its meaning was going to change. VEDANTAM: Many of us have dictionaries at home or at work, John. And he started by asking Russian-speaking students to personify days of the week. So you can think about an un-gendered person in the same way that I might think about a person without a specific age or specific height or specific color shirt. . VEDANTAM: How the languages we speak shape the way we think and why the words we use are always in flux. And you've conducted experiments that explore how different conceptions of time in different languages shape the way we think about the world and shape the way we think about stories. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. Today, we explore the many facets of this idea. The fact is that language change can always go in one of many directions, there's a chance element to it. VEDANTAM: Languages seem to have different ways of communicating agency. My big fat greek wedding, an american woman of greek ancestry falls in love with a very vanilla, american man. If you still cant find the episode, try looking through our most recent shows on our homepage. They are ways of seeing the world. And why do some social movements take off and spread, while others fizzle? And we looked at every personification and allegory in Artstor and asked, does the language that you speak matter for how you paint death, depending on whether the word death is masculine or feminine in your language? And I would really guess that in a few decades men will be doing it, too. The fun example I give my students is imagine playing the hokey pokey in a language like this. I'm Shankar Vedanta. L. Gable, et. If you grew up speaking a language other than English, you probably reach for words in your native tongue without even thinking about it. I think that it's better to think of language as a parade that either you're watching, or frankly, that you're in, especially because the people are never going to stand still. And we teach them, for example, to say that bridges and apples and all kinds of other things have the same prefix as women. You would never know, for example, that - give you an example I've actually been thinking about. How does that sound now? So in English, I might say that Sam (ph) broke the flute. If you take literally in what we can think of as its earliest meaning, the earliest meaning known to us is by the letter. What Makes Lawyers Happy? Only a couple hundred languages - or if you want to be conservative about it, a hundred languages - are written in any real way and then there are 6,800 others. Parents and peers influence our major life choices. This is NPR. All sponsorship opportunities on Hidden Brain are managed by SXM Media. VEDANTAM: I understand that if you're in a picnic with someone from this community and you notice an ant climbing up someone's left leg, it wouldn't make a lot of sense to tell that person, look, there's an ant on your left leg. So I think it's something that is quite easy for humans to learn if you just have a reason to want to do it. I know-uh (ph) is there, or something along the lines of babe-uh (ph). 00:55:27 Hidden Brain Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button I think language can certainly be a contributor into the complex system of our thinking about gender. Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. When language was like that, of course it changed a lot - fast - because once you said it, it was gone. If you're studying a new language, you might discover these phrases not in your textbooks but when you're hanging out with friends. Lera said there's still a lot of research to be done on this. And so I set myself the goal that I would learn English in a year, and I wouldn't speak Russian to anyone for that whole first year. So we did an analysis of images in Artstor. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. Those are quirks of grammar literally in stone. And they suggest that differences across languages do, in fact, predict some of these measures of gender equality across countries. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy that's all around us. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. All of the likes and, like, literallies (ph) might sometimes grate on your nerves, but John McWhorter says the problem might be with you, not with the way other people speak. But, if you dig a little deeper, you may find that they share much more: they might make the same amount of money as you, or share the, We all have to make certain choices in life, such as where to live and how to earn a living. Trusted by 5,200 companies and developers. People do need to be taught what the socially acceptable forms are. MCWHORTER: It's a matter of fashion, pure and simple. Hidden Brain: You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose on Apple Podcasts 51 min You 2.0: Cultivating Your Purpose Hidden Brain Social Sciences Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. So LOL was an internet abbreviation meaning laugh out loud or laughing out loud, but LOL in common usage today doesn't necessarily mean hysterical laughter. And you suddenly get a craving for potato chips, and you realize that you have none in the kitchen, and there's nothing else you really want to eat. And after listening to you, I realize I might have to finally give in. Evaluating Changes in Motivation, Values, and Well-being, by Kennon M. Sheldon and Lawrence S. Krieger, Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 2004. VEDANTAM: If languages are shaped by the way people see the world, but they also shape how people see the world, what does this mean for people who are bilingual? You know, we spend years teaching children about how to use language correctly. You're also not going to do algebra. What do you think the implications are - if you buy the idea that languages are a very specific and unique way of seeing the world, of perceiving reality, what are the implications of so many languages disappearing during our time? Long before she began researching languages as a professor, foreign languages loomed large in her life. MCWHORTER: Exactly. You also see huge differences in other domains like number. But it's exactly like - it was maybe about 20 years ago that somebody - a girlfriend I had told me that if I wore pants that had little vertical pleats up near the waist, then I was conveying that I was kind of past it. Toula and Ian's different backgrounds become apparent on one of their very first dates. We can't help, as literate people, thinking that the real language is something that sits still with letters written all nice and pretty on a page that can exist for hundreds of years, but that's not what language has ever been. To request permission, please send an email to [emailprotected]. And, of course, you always have to wonder, well, could it be that speakers of these different languages are actually seeing different kinds of bridges? There are different ways to be a psychologist. Many of us rush through our days, weeks, and lives, chasing goals, and just trying to get everything done. Purpose can also boost our health and longevity. It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. That's how much cultural heritage is lost. MCWHORTER: Language is a parade, and nobody sits at a parade wishing that everybody would stand still. UNIDENTIFIED MAN #1: (Speaking foreign language). Opening scene of Lady Bird Flight attendant Steven Slater slides from a plane after quitting Transcript Podcast: Subscribe to the Hidden Brain Podcast on your favorite podcast player so you never miss an episode. This week, in the second installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Todd Kashdan looks at the relationship between distress and happiness, and ho, Many of us believe that hard work and persistence are the key to achieving our goals. Whats going on here? Hidden Brain - Transcripts Hidden Brain - Transcripts Subscribe 435 episodes Share Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. For example, when we started talking about navigation, that's an example where a 5-year-old in a culture that uses words like north, south, east and west can point southeast without hesitation. Time now for "My Unsung Hero," our series from the team at Hidden Brain telling the stories of . But I find that people now usually use the word to mean very soon, as in we're going to board the plane momentarily. And if that is true, then the educated person can look down on people who say Billy and me went to the store or who are using literally, quote, unquote, "wrong" and condemn them in the kinds of terms that once were ordinary for condemning black people or women or what have you. There's a way of speaking right. It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. Another possibility is that it's a fully integrated mind, and it just incorporates ideas and distinctions from both languages or from many languages if you speak more than two. You know, lots of people blow off steam about something they think is wrong, but very few people are willing to get involved and do something about it. If it is the first time you login, a new account will be created automatically. And then 10 years later when they're 49, you say, well, that picture of you at 39 is what you really are and whatever's happened to you since then is some sort of disaster or something that shouldn't have happened. What a cynical thing to say, but that doesn't mean that it might not be true. VEDANTAM: It took just one week of living in Japan for Jennifer to pick up an important, VEDANTAM: There isn't a straightforward translation of this phrase in English. It's exactly how old English turned into modern English. Hidden Brain explores the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior and questions that lie at the heart of our complex and changing world. So - but if I understand correctly, I would be completely at sea if I visited this aboriginal community in Australia because I have often absolutely no idea where I am or where I'm going. Lera is a cognitive science professor at the University of California, San Diego. When she was 12, her family came to the United States from the Soviet Union. Whats going on here? Cholera and malnourishment await Somalis fleeing . Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out the unexpected ways we can find joy and happiness in our everyday lives. And so somebody says something literally, somebody takes a point literally. But also, I started wondering, is it possible that my friend here was imagining a person without a gender for this whole time that we've been talking about them, right? Lots of languages make a distinction between things that are accidents and things that are intentional actions. BORODITSKY: Yeah. This week on Hidden Brain, we revisit a favorite episode exploring what this culture means Jesse always wanted to fall in love. VEDANTAM: There are phrases in every language that are deeply evocative and often, untranslatable. Transcript - How language shapes the way we think by Lera Boroditsky.docx, The Singapore Quality Award requires organisations to show outstanding results, The following lots of Commodity Z were available for sale during the year, b The authors identify 5 types of misinformation in the abstract but discuss 7, 17 Chow N Asian value and aged care Geriatr Gerontol Int 20044521 5 18 Chow NWS, Writing Results and Discussion Example.docx, A 6 month old infant weighing 15 lb is admitted with a diagnosis of dehydration, ng_Question_-_Assessment_1_-_Proposing_Evidence-Based_Change.doc, The Social Security checks the Government sends to grandmothers are considered A, 03 If a covered member participates on the clients attest engagement or is an, AURETR143 Student Assessment - Theory v1.1.docx. And if they were facing east, they would make the cards come toward them, toward the body. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. In this favorite 2021 episode, psychologistAdam Grantpushes back against the benefits of certainty, and describes the magic that unfolds when we challenge our own deeply-held beliefs. I'm . It seems kind of elliptical, like, would it be possible that I obtained? You can't know, but you can certainly know that if could listen to people 50 years from now, they'd sound odd. And very competent adults of our culture can't do that. But things can be important not just because they're big. GEACONE-CRUZ: It describes this feeling so perfectly in such a wonderfully packaged, encapsulated way, and you can just - it rolls off the tongue, and you can just throw it. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: (Speaking foreign language). It's not necessarily may I please have, but may I have, I'll have, but not can I get a. I find it just vulgar for reasons that as you can see I can't even do what I would call defending. Whereas speakers of a language like Spanish might not be quite as good at remembering who did it when it's an accident, but they're better at remembering that it was an accident. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: (Speaking foreign language). UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: (Speaking foreign language). But what we should teach is not that the good way is logical and the way that you're comfortable doing it is illogical. She once visited an aboriginal community in northern Australia and found the language they spoke forced her mind to work in new ways. The Effects of Conflict Types, Dimensions, and Emergent States on Group Outcomes, by Karen Jehn et. Each generation hears things and interprets things slightly differently from the previous one. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. I'm Shankar Vedantam. We lobby a neighbor to vote for our favored political candidate. For example, if you take seeds and put them in the ground, that's one thing. And when I listen to people having their peeves, I don't think, stop it. VEDANTAM: Jennifer moved to Japan for graduate school. We also look at how. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. And MIT linguist Ken Hale, who's a renowned linguist, said that every time a language dies, it's the equivalent of a bomb being dropped on the Louvre. So they've compared gender equality, gender parity norms from the World Health Organization, which ranks countries on how equal access to education, how equal pay is, how equal representation in government is across the genders. See you next week. We recommend movies or books to a friend. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. Growing up, I understood this word to mean for a very short time, as in John McWhorter was momentarily surprised. Language was talk. Psychologist Ken Sheldon studies the science of figuring out what you want. And as soon as I saw that happen, I thought, oh, this makes it so much easier. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. No matter how hard you try to feel happier, you end up back where you started. Lera is a cognitive science professor at the University of California, San Diego. You may also use the Hidden Brain name in invitations sent to a small group of personal contacts for such purposes as a listening club or discussion forum. It is a great, free way to engage the podcast community and increase the visibility of your podcasts. Today in our Happiness 2.0 series, we revisit a favorite episode from 2020. Transcript Speaker 1 00:00:00 this is hidden brain. Bu How do certain memes go viral? In many languages, nouns are gendered. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #3: (Speaking foreign language). And so what that means is if someone was sitting facing south, they would lay out the story from left to right. You know, I was trying to stay oriented because people were treating me like I was pretty stupid for not being oriented, and that hurt. Transcript The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. What techniques did that person use to persuade you? They know which way is which. That is exactly why you should say fewer books instead of less books in some situations and, yes, Billy and I went to the store rather than the perfectly natural Billy and me went to the store. So some languages don't have number words. MCWHORTER: Yes, Shankar, that's exactly it. And one thing that we've noticed is that around the world, people rely on space to organize time. Copyright Hidden Brain Media | Privacy Policy. Hidden Brain. Take the word bridge - if it's feminine in your language, you're more likely to say that bridges are beautiful and elegant. And I don't think any of us are thinking that it's a shame that we're not using the language of Beowulf. Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. VEDANTAM: Time is another concept that is also central to the way we see and describe the world. And this is NPR. The categorization that language provides to you becomes real, becomes psychologically real. SHANKAR VEDANTAM, HOST:This is HIDDEN BRAIN. So earlier things are on the left. Today in our Happiness 2.0 series, we revisit a favorite episode from 2020. And nobody wishes that we hadn't developed our modern languages today from the ancient versions. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. We're speaking today with cognitive science professor Lera Boroditsky about language. In a lot of languages, there isn't. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy that's all around us. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? VEDANTAM: If you're bilingual or you're learning a new language, you get what Jennifer, experienced - the joy of discovering a phrase that helps you perfectly encapsulate a. feeling or an experience. Copyright 2018 NPR. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy that's all around us. How else would you do it? Hidden Brain Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. VEDANTAM: Still don't have a clear picture? BORODITSKY: Actually, one of the first people to notice or suggest that this might be the case was a Russian linguist, Roman Jakobson. Or feel like you and your spouse sometimes speak different languages? So when the perfect woman started writing him letters, it seemed too good to be true. So for example, for English speakers - people who read from left to right - time tends to flow from left to right. Maybe it's even less than a hundred meters away, but you just can't bring yourself to even throw your coat on over your pajamas and put your boots on and go outside and walk those hundred meters because somehow it would break the coziness. But can you imagine someone without imagining their gender? BORODITSKY: That's a wonderful question. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? Subscribe: iOS | Android | Spotify | RSS | Amazon | Stitcher Latest Episodes: Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. al, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2004. Of course, if you can't keep track of exactly seven, you can't count.