can't recall where you left your brain?

I can't vouch for the results reported about yet another brain research experiment. I'm sure this one has some faults too, but it does seem to have made some good observations about our success in trying to recall words. The report was here at Science Daily.

Basically, I think it says that you have better recall ability when the theta waves in the brain are high.

To me, this relates to SRS, because I have questioned the effectiveness of Space Repetition. Let's say you're using an SRS to try not to forget the Kanji. If you do your SRS review while the theta waves in your brain are low, your results will not be as good as if you had used the system during high theta wave activity. This will affect the SRS's ability to determine the next optimal time to show you the ones you are failing. So, say you have a bad day and get a lot of them wrong. Now there will be a day in the future where your need-to-review words will be higher.

less pain for language learning gain

Have any of you seen this article?
Less pain for learning gain: Research offers a strategy to increase learning with less effort

This is a pretty good research study because they had 4 different groups, which means they covered several variables to see how the results differ. The study measured the ability of the participants to distinguish between the pitches of different tones.

The Activities

There were 2 different types of activity used. The first type was to listen to a 1,000 Hertz tone and a slightly lower tone. Let's call that 'Activity A'. The second activity type was to listen to the 1,000 Hertz tone repeatedly. We'll call that 'Activity B'.

brain research and language learning

Can we trust what the brain researchers say about language learning? Steve Kaufmann noted there was some contradiction in the research conclusions. So I decided to create a little video in response.

language learning occurs even without intervention

I found this extremely interesting article dated December 2000. Brain Research Implications for Second Language Learning

If you don't feel like reading it or just want to know what I found interesting about it, please read the following quotes from the article.

"Language learning is a natural phenomenon; it occurs even without intervention. "


"The studies discussed below reveal the incredible neural flexibility of the developing (and aging) brain."


"it is the input that determines the function of specific areas of the brain "


"the cortical map can change even in adulthood in response to enriched environmental or learning experiences."


"Learning by the brain is about making connections within the brain and between the brain and the outside world."


"Now, there is direct evidence that when learning occurs, neuro-chemical communication between neurons is facilitated, and less input is required to activate established connections over time."


"For example, exposure to unfamiliar speech sounds is initially registered by the brain as undifferentiated neural activity. Neural activity is diffuse, because the brain has not learned the acoustic patterns that distinguish one sound from another. As exposure continues, the listener (and the brain) learns to differentiate among different sounds and even among short sequences of sounds that correspond to words or parts of words. Neural connections that reflect this learning process are formed in the auditory (temporal) cortex of the left hemisphere for most individuals. With further exposure, both the simple and complex circuits (corresponding to simple sounds and sequences of sounds) are activated at virtually the same time and more easily."


"At the same time that the auditory circuit for the word doggie is activated, the visual circuit associated with the sight of a dog is also activated. Simultaneous activation of circuits in different areas of the brain is called parallel processing.

In early stages of learning, neural circuits are activated piecemeal, incompletely, and weakly. It is like getting a glimpse of a partially exposed and very blurry photo. With more experience, practice, and exposure, the picture becomes clearer and more detailed. As exposure is repeated, less input is needed to activate the entire network. With time, activation and recognition are relatively automatic, and the learner can direct her attention to other parts of the task. This also explains why learning takes time. Time is needed to establish new neural networks and connections between networks."

we learn from successes not failures

It's in the news! Science news. An article has just come out at Science Daily that says brain cells react and learn from successes. "After a failure, there was little or no change in the brain — nor was there any improvement in behavior."

From the article, it seems the research was done on animals, such as monkeys. I wouldn't be surprised if the results were different for humans because humans have more emotional feelings.

Of course, our objective is to learn how to do something correctly, not incorrectly.

Another thing to note is that the animals only knew if they had responded correctly when they were rewarded. So in this study rewards were given. Maybe we learn better if we get rewarded, I'm not sure. But the tests were too simple. Scientists are still studying the very basics and using simple little tests. But at least they are looking at the brain and seeing what does happen. If you read the article, think about how the brain is learning naturally and on its own.

When we study a language, our reward is being able to understand. But what makes a reward rewarding? Is looking up a translation in the dictionary rewarding? When excitement is created, that is rewarding. Using a dictionary is hardly exciting. But understanding on your own is exciting. It's a great reward.

Here's a link to the article: Why We Learn More From Our Successes Than Our Failures

What do you think about the article? Do you have any praises or criticisms? Is the study relevant to language learning?

sounds familiar?

As I have been saying, the language you hear and don't understand is not wasted time. Natural acquisition begins with a large amount of input that you won't be able to comprehend but still is needed to become used to the language. All the time exposed to the language is a preparatory period that is vital to later acquisition.

The Foreign Language Doctor has found this article that was published just today.

Sound patterns boost language learning - study

4:00AM Wednesday Jan 28, 2009

Exposure to the sound patterns of another language, even if it is initially meaningless, could hold the key to quickly picking up a foreign tongue, says a researcher.

Victoria University PhD graduate Paul Sulzberger made his discovery while trying to find out why many students dropped out in the early days of trying to learn a new language.

He believed his findings could revolutionise language teaching.

Listening to a language's sound patterns was critical as it set up structures in the brain required to learn the words, he found.

"Our ability to learn new words is directly related to how often we have been exposed to the particular combinations of the sounds which make up the words," he said. "Neural tissue required to learn and understand a new language will develop automatically from simple exposure to the language - which is how babies learn their first language."

He was interested in what made it so difficult to learn foreign words when we were constantly learning new ones in our native language. He found the answer in the way the brain developed neural structures when hearing new combinations of sounds.

"When we are trying to learn new foreign words we are faced with sounds for which we may have absolutely no neural representation.

"A student trying to learn a foreign language may have few pre-existing neural structures to build on in order to remember the words."

Extending exposure to foreign languages had been made easier by globalisation and new technology.

Listening to songs, movies and even foreign news reports on the internet were all easy ways to expose the brain to foreign language sounds, Dr Sulzberger said.

- NZPA

Copyright ©2009, APN Holdings NZ Limited

slow vs. fast

Is it better to go slow or fast? Is it better to acquire a language or to learn a language? Can you speed things up? Can you slow things down? If the first shall be last and the last shall be first, will the slow be fast and the fast be slow? I'd say so.

Language acquisition is a process that takes time. If you want to finish the race sooner, you have to put in more time each day. There aren't any good shortcuts. Studying and memorization seem like shortcuts but the end results only prove to slow you down.

Let's take a look at how going faster is bad and why slow and steady wins the race.

Every student of language learning would like to learn quickly. In doing so, they learn many words and grammar rules and pile on so much information that it overwhelms them. They push themselves beyond what they are ready for. They set the pace of learning but they do not get the massive amount of input and exposure to the language that is required for the brain to absorb the language. Instead, all they have is words and rules that they force themselves to think about so they can construct the language and get to the conversational level as quickly as they can.

The fast learner's model of the language in their head is incomplete. There are holes in their picture of the language which means they have holes in their head. They constantly search for the right words and ways of expressing themselves in the new language. The connections to that language in the brain are still weak because of the lack of exposure.

Whenever you learn something new, such as the name of a new person, it takes time to develop a strong connection in your brain. Whenever people can't quite remember my name, they always come up with a guess of Kevin. I think there are many more Kevins than there are Keiths. The fact that they both start with the same K sound and the same first 2 letters proves that they at least made a weak connection in their brain. If they had made a strong connection, they would have gotten my name right. If the connection was weaker, they wouldn't have even come up with the name Kevin. So there is such a thing as this connection strength.

How much more difficult it must be to make connections for a foreign language whose sounds are very different from what you are used to!

When I studied Japanese in school we used a textbook. We first learned the -masu form which is the middle of the road in terms of formality. Before I could get used to that form, then they added the dictionary form which can be used for informal situations. While I still hadn't mastered the -masu form and the dictionary form was still new to me, then the textbook added the honorific forms. Next we learned how to speak to the in-group and the out-group members which includes the humble forms of speech registers. I had so much information in my head without a chance to get used to and master any of it, is it any wonder why I couldn't speak Japanese naturally?

As Steve Kaufmann points out in his posts, the brain learns when it is ready. Read point number 2 of the post that I linked to there.

When you take a slow approach such as the TV method, you acquire the language as you go along and when you are ready. The part of the language that you have acquired will constantly get reinforced as you keep watching and listening to the language. What happens to the rest of the language that you are hearing but don't yet understand? Does it just get wasted? Is it wasted time? The answer is: NO. It is not wasted. It gets stored and your brain tries to organize it and tie it in with what it already has. When there is a new phrase or word that you keep hearing and noticing, that is because the storage is getting stronger. You are paying more attention to this new phrase because your brain is working on it.

If words you didn't understand were just discarded by your brain then you would never have learned anything because in the beginning you didn't understand anything. When you were born all you could do was hear and feel and see. You didn't come preprogrammed for English. If every word you heard was discarded because you couldn't understand it, then every time you heard a word it would be like the first time you ever heard it and you would keep discarding it. You wouldn't get anywhere.

Memory is still not completely understood by researchers. Sometimes you can't remember something. Does that mean it's gone? No. Later on you remember it. So just the simple problem of recall does not mean the memory is not there. It just means your connection or path to that memory is a little weak. You may hear something in a language you don't understand. You have no chance of recalling what was said but does that imply that your brain threw it away? If your brain threw away everything you didn't understand then you'd have no chance of learning a foreign language. So recall and storage are not the same thing. Just because you cannot recall does not mean it is not stored. I think everything gets stored. So while you are listening to language that you do not understand, it is all being stored. The more you hear it, the more important it becomes and the more your brain will work on it.

And all the while, that language which you have already acquired will get stronger and stronger. What you want is for the language to feel natural to you. If it is foreign to you then you will not be comfortable using it. So one of the benefits of natural language acquisition is that you will feel comfortable using the language. If you are like me, your recall works better when you are comfortable.

I can't tell you the exact figure but something like 80% of the words used in a spoken language are the same set of words. Whether it is 2,000 words or 5,000 words, I don't know. If most of the time you are hearing the same set of words, you are going to acquire them pretty quickly. When you acquire words, you don't have to think about them at all. When you study words, then you are constantly thinking about those words. Even after you feel you know the words quite well, you have already created a habit of thinking about them. Habits are hard to break.

But natural acquisition frees you from those habits and allows you to pass up those people who studied the language. Acquisition allows you to relax and lets your brain work more effectively. It also gives you a broader exposure to the language. While the students are studying a limited set of words, you will have heard expressions that the students never encountered before. You will be ready for it. Once you acquire the meaning you will be way ahead of those students who will be trying to recall the meaning. While the students are trying to remember the meaning, they are missing the next sentence in the conversation. You will be hearing it. They will be frustrated. You will be relaxed and getting more input that will be easily processed.

In summary, trying to go fast and forcing a pace that is not natural and that creates bad habits of thinking will only get you so far. That is the ceiling. Going at the natural pace using a natural approach is very complimentary. It relaxes you which allows your brain to work more efficiently. You only use language that you are completely comfortable with. You are not thinking about grammar or wondering if what you say sounds natural. You know it is natural and you know the grammar is correct because you've heard it a thousand times. You don't need to think about words. The words just come to you.

Even now, I've got words that just come to me. A lot of English sentences start with "You." It is natural for us English speakers to start our thoughts with "You." "You" is rarely used in Japanese. I never use "You" in Japanese. So when the Chinese word for "You" pops into my head, which it often does now, I know that the thought I was about to think was my natural tendency to use "You" to begin a sentence and because I am watching the Chinese dramas so much, it just wants to come out in Chinese. I don't have the knowledge yet to complete my thoughts in Chinese so I have to stop and then I realize that Chinese is coming to me. I didn't choose it. I didn't make a decision. It just came.

I look forward to when I've acquired enough of the language to be able to converse in it. I think it will be pleasant and feel natural which is in contrast to how I feel about Japanese.

don't use a dictionary!

If you are learning a language, you should not use a dictionary to learn words. It is a colossal waste of time. You look up a word and then proceed to forget what it means and so you have to look it up again. This process repeats itself over and over again. What does it mean when you have to re-look up a word? Well, it means you didn't learn anything the first time, doesn't it. It also means you wasted your time.

Instead of using the dictionary, let yourself wonder what the word means. Let your brain try to figure it out. Give it some time. This is what you did when you were 2 years old. It must be the natural way.

There was a study done on memory that is known as the "Zeigarnik effect." A quote from the article where I discovered this:

it was shown that tasks that are interrupted are remembered by adults approximately 90% better than those that are fully completed, and that children, in general, remember only interrupted tasks.

You see, when you look up a word in the dictionary, the task is completed. That is why you don't remember the meaning. Your brain is spending no more time thinking about the word or trying to figure it out. You're satisfied, it's over, done, and forgotten about.

Let's look for some other ways in language acquisition that we can apply what Zeigarnik discovered. Perhaps, if you read a story in your target language and never find out how it ends, you will be able to remember the details of the story better. You might recall certain phrases or words that were used in the story. If you are really curious about how it ends, you might end up dreaming about it which means that your brain is processing that story.

Does anyone have any other ideas or comments on the Zeigarnik effect?

the brain will learn on its own

Steve Kaufmann has just posted a summary of a book about the brain and learning by somebody named Manfred Spitzer. Who is he? I don't know. The book is in German so I guess I won't be reading it, but here is what I found to be interesting from the summary.

Under point 2, The brain controls what it is going learn, it says this:

The brain does most of its learning on its own. With the right input, the brain is quite capable of creating the necessary labels and rules required to organize the information it has received and stored. It is not always necessary, and is sometimes counterproductive, to teach rules explicitly. It is often more effective to let the brain develop its own rules, from the observation of the information received. We all learn to speak our own language and yet most of us are unable to provide rules to explain how the language works. We just know how to speak our language.

This basically means that we need not try to teach ourselves anything. Our brain will just learn! If we sit in front of the Chinese TV all the time, we'll learn Chinese! Sure it takes lots of input. A huge variety of input is best, I believe. You must also have patience, which is what most people don't have.

Just stating that last sentence reminds me of those contests where the person who holds out the longest wins a big prize. Sometimes they are roller coaster rides, sometimes they are just sitting in a lounge chair, and sometimes they have to keep a hand on a vehicle. They begin with a dozen or more people and soon, participants start dropping out. Probably after about a day there are only 3 or 4 people left. Out of those, only 2 will be so patient and willing to continue the wait for days and days on end. Unfortunately, those endurance contests sometimes end tragically.

But for language acquisition, you can go at your own pace. You can go to the bathroom whenever you want! You can take breaks and eat or sleep. Just have patience and don't give up. Get the language input and be patient.

Trying to memorize words is a bad way to go. Here's what you do when you try to memorize words: You look at the foreign word and then to check if you know it, you think of the meaning in your own language. You look at the word in your language and then try to remember the word in the foreign language. That's the only way you can check yourself. But this kind of connection is what slows us down. It becomes a habit. If we get enough input, I believe we overcome this habit one by one, for each word. But some habits, like incorrect grammar, are much harder to break. Speaking slowly is also hard to overcome for myself.

But I think this can all be fixed through exposure. However, it is much harder to fix what's broken than to build something correctly the first time.

And if the brain will learn on its own, then why should we get in the way of that?

your brain predicts words

Your brain is doing a lot of work without you telling it to do so. So why do we think we must tell it what to do for a second language? Your brain can do so much at lightening speed, so why would you want to get in the way of that? Trying to learn a language is like getting in the way. There is an article which tells us this:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 15, 2008) — Scientists at the University of Rochester have shown for the first time that our brains automatically consider many possible words and their meanings before we've even heard the final sound of the word.

Without the proper amount of exposure to a new language, your brain will not have enough data to do this processing. I think the article shows us how much it is that our brain will do. We don't need to force it. Just give yourself the exposure and let your new language build up inside of your brain.