Switching languages, switching personalities
Interesting article from Yahoo news:
Switching languages can also switch personality: study
Tue Jun 24, 11:33 AM ET
NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) - People who are bicultural and speak two languages may unconsciously change their personality when they switch languages, according to a U.S. study.
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Researchers David Luna from Baruch College and Torsten Ringberg and Laura A. Peracchio from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee studied groups of Hispanic women, all of whom were bilingual, but with varying degrees of cultural identification.
They found significant changes in self perception or “frame-shifting” in bicultural participants — women who participate in both Latino and Anglo culture.
“Language can be a cue that activates different culture-specific frames,” the researchers said in a study published in the Journal of Consumer Research.
While frame-shifting has been studied before, they said this research found that people who are bicultural switched frames more quickly and easily than people who are bilingual but living in one culture.
The researchers said the women classified themselves as more assertive when they spoke Spanish than when they spoke English.
“In the Spanish-language sessions, informants perceived females as more self-sufficient and extroverted,” they said.
In one of the studies, a group of bilingual U.S. Hispanic women viewed advertisements that featured women in different scenarios. The participants saw the ads in one language - English or Spanish - and then, six months later, they viewed the same ads in the other language.
Their perceptions of themselves and of the women in the ads shifted depending on the language.
“One respondent, for example, saw an ad’s main character as a risk-taking, independent woman in the Spanish version of the ad, but as a hopeless, lonely, confused woman in the English version,” said the researchers.
Aloha, Shalom, Bonjour, Danse, Hola, Konichiwa! Spent a portion of my childhood living on a Native American reservation in Canada because we used to man the post office there. So my culture is a mix between my own ethnic Dutch-Scottish-English-Irish-Austrian-Romanian, and Native culture. My Mom was a military brat who assimilated French, Japanese, and Hawaiian culture, so I also have those in my culture mix too. I've lived fourteen places, spread among two countries/one continent and an island. That's the short version!
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13 Comments to “Switching languages, switching personalities”
June 25th, 2008 at 9:38 am
Hmmm. I think there might be another factor in these results…
Consider also that some people are just more comfortable within a particular language. There are, for example, lots of Chinese people I know who are assertive and strong when speaking among other Chinese, but when forced to speak English will do the whole nod and smile thing. It probably also varies according to the degree of participation in both cultures, though, which they do take into account in the study above.
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June 25th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
It makes sense to me. I feel funnier and cuter when I speak Japanese, assertive and crazy when I speak English, and nostalgic when I speak French. lol
But this has nothing to do with the languages itself, but my relationship to the language.
A different language is a different vision of life. ~Federico Fellini
Learn a new language and get a new soul. ~Czech Proverb
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June 26th, 2008 at 12:18 am
Even though I agree with the conclusions to some extent, I have doubts about their methodology and also doubt the appropriateness of the sample they used to prove this point.
If your language skills are in an infantile stage, perhaps your personality in that language will come across as being more infantile for example.
Other than that the Spanish language and assertive make sense to me but the Spanish language and self-sufficient female just don’t make any sense at all.
Assertive and self-sufficient aren’t the same thing and this being used in the same sentence bothers me.
There’s also the perspective of the researchers that needs to be considered.
Good post though.
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June 26th, 2008 at 11:48 am
I agree, the methodology my be deficient, but I have been in many situations where I liked the person when they spoke one language and not when they spoke another.
Changes in self perception/characterisations based on language, makes sense when you include status and how they are perceived by the speaker and/or others in the dominant culture of whichever language being spoken. A well educated Spanish speaker in the US may be recognised as such in Spanish and therefore is treated with respect by other Spanish speakers, whereas that same person may be treated like a servant when speaking English (with or without an ‘accent’), especially to non-Spanish speakers - overtime affect this may affect how one perceives oneself in either language.
As an aside, in the black American community it’s called code-switching - although the language remains English, how it is spoken and to whom it is spoken to changes. I’ve seen behaviour and self perception change in this situation as well - not that anecdotes are by any means scientific.
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June 26th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Like Ayako said, assertive and self-sufficient probably don’t make sense together but overall I liked the article because I could personally relate.
This is an area which makes me want to do further research. I want to learn the close ties between “language” and “time” and how both affect personality.
When it comes to Japanese, I can be in the most purest form (not that I am saying I am pure but!) but when I speak Korean, I have barriers and baggage in the way I carry myself. This accounts to the *time period* when I lived in Japan and in Korea. Although many moves from a place to place made my life difficult since infancy (haha! i am not exaggerating here!), it was not until I lived in Korea during middle school that my life became substantially harder. When I speak Japanese, my persona is that kid who has not been affected by the aftermath of the negative experiences I had in middle school and the years that followed in high school. So I become a free, happy-spirited person when I speak Japanese. Whereas, Korean I associate with the past pain and relational struggles that only keep me from completely free from baggage.
So to speak, after all how the language affects personality may not have to do with the time period but more on the EXPERIENCE that associates with the language. My differing personality that comes with different languages happens to be apparent due to the *time periods* of my stays in the countries of residency.
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June 26th, 2008 at 4:23 pm
OK, it’s been decided that Miyon is going to do more in-depth research on this topic!
(j/k)
I think you’re right about this. It’s not too simple to dissect this, because the human brain just isn’t….well, simple!
I think you first have to evaluate the fluency the subject has in each language. If someone is a native speaker of Spanish and speaks English for example - then it’s harder to evaluate personality change without factoring in what Dan mentioned, i.e. language deficiency contributing to a forced superficial personality change.
I think it’s much easier to examine this in people who have almost equal command of 2 languages, i.e. TCKs who have two native languages (or none lol).
The important thing is that the level of command of at least 2 languages is more or less at the same level, so that variable does not come into play.
Then one can isolate things like Miyon did, i.e. Am I more negative in one language than in the other because my negative life experiences associations with that language?
Am I more at ease in a professional environment in French than in English because I’ve only ever worked in France? Does this make me more naive when I’m speaking English?
etc.
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June 26th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
I cannot say my personality changes from language to language but it sertainly does depending on what culture I am in…
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June 26th, 2008 at 9:23 pm
I think I actually do change personalities depending on which language I am using.
I seem to be more serious when I speak English since it is the language I use in college. In this environment, I tend to have more serious and academic discussions.
I think that I am a little bit more “juvenile” when I speak French because that’s the language that I used growing up (elementary and high school). Although this is changing (I think) since I am currently in France on exchange and I have been using my French in some academic discussions.
In that respect, I agree with Miyon has said. I think your life experiences, who you hung out with, where you spoke the language, the memories that you have of this place, will ultimately change your personality and even your entire world view depending on the language you are using.
My Filipino is just for casual use since I lack the technical vocabulary to properly express myself in serious or literary discussions.
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June 27th, 2008 at 3:05 am
I think ‘the nomad’ has dropped another clue here on why some TCKs might experience personality changes with languages.
It’s because with TCKs, the culture comes with the language (usually) so it’s not like a mono-cultural person who is for example speaking Japanese in Japan and translating as he/she goes from whatever language it is to Japanese in his/her brain. The TCK becomes kind of ‘Japanese’ when she or he speaks Japanese so would come across as quite different than when speaking another language.
So now we have 2 potential factors that may have an effect on the Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde language syndrome:
1. The specific different life experiences associated with the specific language
2. The culture that comes embedded in the language
*Note: You could say that #2 is included in #1 however as culture is a part of life experiences.
What do you all think?
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June 27th, 2008 at 7:49 am
Actually I though ‘the nomad’ had an interesting point too, in that the cultural context we’re in makes a difference.
Consider that all of their control groups above were probably Hispanics living in the United States. Despite varying levels of contact and interaction with the local culture, that still makes an impact on their perception of both Spanish and English within that context.
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June 28th, 2008 at 2:18 am
My personality may change when I switch languages, because I’ve only studied French in high school (haven’t lived in a Francophone nation or been in a situation where I was outnumbered by Francophones) so I don’t know slang terms and can’t really swear like I do in English. As far as Japanese, I used to speak it on the exact level as I spoke English, but since I’ve been away from Japan for some time now, my Japanese vocabulary hasn’t grown the way my English vocab has, and it’s harder for me to make complex sentences, which I can do with ease in English. Additionally, I haven’t mastered sarcasm in Japanese or French, and that’s a pretty major part of who I am. I am told though, by Japanese people that I act Japanese and by English speakers that I act American. So I guess my personality does change…
Either that or they’re just seeing the parts of me that they can identify with and ignoring the other parts.
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June 28th, 2008 at 7:19 am
For me it is not just languages, but at times accents too.
Mostly it depends on where I am, or who I am with. You notice it more with language changes, but that is mostly because the difference tends to be more stark in contrast, than an accent or a place.
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June 28th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
Hi Jackrabbit,
this is Buttercup, we chatted a while ago. I just bought “Third Culture Kids” by Ruth Reken and David Pollock. It is considered the definitive book on TCKs. I think you would greatly benefit from reading this book. I got it used on Amazon. I have only read a few chapters but already have a lump in my throat. Check it out!
buttercup
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