學(xué)同語系外語的體驗(yàn)

附：外語讓人更明智？

相比母語，我們?cè)谥v外語時(shí)會(huì)更加明智嗎？芝加哥大學(xué)的研究發(fā)現(xiàn)，用外語思考時(shí)，人們往往會(huì)做出更加冷靜、客觀的決定；而母語使用者則更多依靠直覺。為什么會(huì)這樣？

Do we make better decisions in a foreign language?（757 words）

By Michael Skapinker

Financial Times

An American friend recently told me of a reunion with the son of the German family whose home he had lived in for a year as an exchange student. My friend had spent the year acquiring fluent German, which he spoke to the family.

The reunion, several decades later, took place among a crowd who were speaking English. Afterwards, the German son said to my friend: “I never realised you were witty.” Because in German, he never was. It was too hard to joke in a foreign tongue.

witty：using words in a clever and funny way 風(fēng)趣的，詼諧的

Anyone who has learnt another language will be familiar with this. We are more ponderous in our acquired language. We are slower on the uptake, having to construct each riposte in advance.

ponderous /'p?nd?r?s/

1）slow and awkward because of being very heavy or large （因重或大而）行動(dòng)遲緩的，笨拙的

2）If a book, speech, or style of writing or speaking is ponderous, it is boring because it is too slow, long, or serious. （書、講話或?qū)懽黠L(fēng)格）嚴(yán)肅而乏味的，呆板的，生硬的

be quick/slow on the uptake：If someone is quick/slow on the uptake, they understand things easily/with difficulty. 領(lǐng)悟得快／慢

riposte /r?'p?st/

a quick and clever remark, often made in answer to a criticism 機(jī)敏的回答；巧妙的應(yīng)對(duì)

She made a sharp/witty/neat riposte.

她尖刻／機(jī)智／巧妙地反唇相譏。

But is it also possible that we make more dispassionate decisions when thinking in a foreign language?

dispassionate：able to think clearly or make good decisions because of not being influenced by emotions 冷靜的，鎮(zhèn)靜的，沉著的

Academics at the University of Chicago think we do.

Writing in the journal Cognition, they describe a well-known moral dilemma. You are watching a runaway carriage hurtling down a railway. In its path you see five people tied to the track. On your left is a large man. If you push him into the carriage's path, you will kill him but save the five. Do you do it?

推下一人救活五個(gè)人？

你會(huì)怎么選擇？

dilemma：a situation in which a difficult choice has to be made between two different things you could do 左右為難，兩難境地

The Chicago academics put the dilemma to a group of 800 native German speakers. About half considered the dilemma in German and half in English. Those answering in their second language were more likely to favour pushing the man on to the track.

To the Chicago faculty, this was no surprise. There have been several experiments, with similar results, about the effect of language on the track dilemma, with native speakers of English, Korean, Spanish, French, Hebrew, German and Italian.

The question the Chicago team tried to answer in the Cognition study was why the change happens when people decide in another language.

Their hypothesis was that we visualise people and objects more sharplyin our native tongue and this affects our decision-making. In particular, when thinking in our own language, we can clearly picture the large man and are reluctant to [不情愿/不愿意] push him to his death.

To test this, the 800 German speakers were asked to rate the vividness of their images of the large man and the five people on the tracks. Those doing the experiment in German reported having a clearer picture of the man than those doing it in English. There was no difference between the vividness of the images of the five other people on the track.

Why should this be? The Chicago study argues that the images we form in our minds are based on the memories we have of people and objects. Because we have more experience of people in our native language, we find it easier to picture them.

The authors concede that “other potential explanations are possible”. However, they did argue in an earlier paper that “a foreign language provides a distancing mechanism that moves people from the immediate intuitive system to a more deliberate mode of thinking”.

concede：to admit, often unwillingly, that something is true （常指不情愿地）承認(rèn)

How seriously should we take this? An increasing number of people are now working in organisations that operate in English, mixing native and second-language speakers. It is certainly worth thinking about whether people seem more considered, and make more dispassionate decisions, in English than the native speakers do. The non-native speakers may seem less witty, but pay more attention to their opinions.