A review by yecatherine
The Bilingual Brain: And What It Tells Us about the Science of Language by Albert Costa
4.0
I’m a bilingual. My first language is Russian, but I started learning English at 8 and by 17 I was fluent enough to study at a UK university. For the past ten years I spoke English everyday, for social and formal interactions. I also spoke Russian to my friends & family and continued reading Russian books. Some of my Russian-speaking friends have moved to the UK too, and the language we speak is a hybrid of a Russian base with English words intertwined occasionally. Sometimes we switch to English mid-sentence, and then back to Russian after another two sentences. For a Russian or English monolingual’s ear this sounds grotesque and my mother is often repulsed when she hears us.
This books was a fascinating journey into my own brain. The biggest epiphany for me was the switching cost as it explained why after a week-long stay back home or after reading a Russian book I unintentionally start speaking Russian to my British boyfriend! A few times I said “Доброе утро” right after waking up to find him looking extremely confused (I know, he really needs to learn my language too).
The switching cost is probably the reason why me and my friends often struggle to find Russian words to describe our UK lives, as bilinguals have a slower and less reliable access to the lexicon than monolinguals. I imagine it as a “language data base” in your brain, and a bilingual person simply has more data points to go through. And beyond that, sometimes there are words that cannot be translated directly. Language is one of the most complex neural structures in your brain. Languages contain collections of meanings, which create frameworks and shape perceptions. Although Costa does mention that bilingual children show better abilities in perspective taking and empathy, I felt like the theme of how languages form realities was massively underdeveloped.
Some of the benefits of bilingualism mentioned in the book were higher amount of grey matter and delay in the onset of dementia by an average of four years. This is because of the greater cognitive reserve that slows the progression of the disease.
Another fascinating theme was how speaking a foreign language can make you more utilitarian in decision-making. When people were presented the famous train dilemma, they were more likely to choose killing one person to save five when the problem was written in their second language and vice versa. The results were pretty consistent, yet scientists are yet to understand the mechanics behind this phenomena.
Overall a great book summing up the latest research on bilingualism, although I wouldn’t’ say it’s for a general reader.
This books was a fascinating journey into my own brain. The biggest epiphany for me was the switching cost as it explained why after a week-long stay back home or after reading a Russian book I unintentionally start speaking Russian to my British boyfriend! A few times I said “Доброе утро” right after waking up to find him looking extremely confused (I know, he really needs to learn my language too).
The switching cost is probably the reason why me and my friends often struggle to find Russian words to describe our UK lives, as bilinguals have a slower and less reliable access to the lexicon than monolinguals. I imagine it as a “language data base” in your brain, and a bilingual person simply has more data points to go through. And beyond that, sometimes there are words that cannot be translated directly. Language is one of the most complex neural structures in your brain. Languages contain collections of meanings, which create frameworks and shape perceptions. Although Costa does mention that bilingual children show better abilities in perspective taking and empathy, I felt like the theme of how languages form realities was massively underdeveloped.
Some of the benefits of bilingualism mentioned in the book were higher amount of grey matter and delay in the onset of dementia by an average of four years. This is because of the greater cognitive reserve that slows the progression of the disease.
Another fascinating theme was how speaking a foreign language can make you more utilitarian in decision-making. When people were presented the famous train dilemma, they were more likely to choose killing one person to save five when the problem was written in their second language and vice versa. The results were pretty consistent, yet scientists are yet to understand the mechanics behind this phenomena.
Overall a great book summing up the latest research on bilingualism, although I wouldn’t’ say it’s for a general reader.