The role of the brain

[lusan]

For a while, I believed that method, persistence and dedication would be enough to learn a language. Today I found this article. I might have to reconsider this view.

It talks about the role of the brain in language learning. For example,

As a group -- and sometimes in fewer than two or three sessions -- the nine participants predicted on the basis of left HG size to be "more successful learners" achieved an average of 97 percent accuracy in identifying the pseudo words. The "less successful" participants averaged 63 percent accuracy and sometimes required as many as 18 training sessions to correctly identify the words. - See more at: http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/ ... R696X.dpuf

Disturbing?!

[Brun Ugle]

I don't find it disturbing or surprising. I always figure that with any skill, there are natural traits that can give some people an advantage in that area. However, if you spend several hours a day on something, as many of us here do, you're most likely going to get reasonably good at it eventually regardless.

Also, that study was related to words from a made-up tonal language learned in isolation. It might not have any relation to how well they might learn a non-tonal language or to any other aspects of language learning outside of learning words in isolation. That is, the people who had trouble learning the words in the manner described in the study, might very well have learned them more easily if taught in a different way. Which is why there are many different kinds of language courses and some of us prefer one kind and others prefer a different kind. There are many different learning styles. Also, they might have been better at other things, like grammar. Learning a language requires working on a lot of different skills. It might also not have much to say for long-term learning. There are always those that learn a bunch of phrases really quickly, but never seem to make much progress beyond that.

So, I'd say it is very interesting, but there needs to be a lot more research done before we can draw any major conclusions.

[Brun Ugle]

I also wonder what the HG's of people who grew up speaking a tonal language look like. Are they bigger than people who grew up speaking a non-tonal language? I imagine their environment would have an influence on their brains.

[Henkkles]

I think that the method is somewhat flawed because no real language acquisition whereby you'll be able to actively command a language is analogous to memorizing lists of words. It shows better that traditional classrooms where such lists are given will fail a good deal of their students by using methodology that does not simulate human language acquisition in any shape or form.