How does

Bilingualism

affect our emotional experience?

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Effects of language on our experience

Language can influence how we perceive our world. For example, English speakers often see time as moving from left to right but time may be moving from right to left for speakers of languages that write from right to left.

Colors we see can be different based on how our language categorizes colors.

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Blue

Russian view of blue

goluboy

siniy

Modern rainbow

Ancient rainbow

The effects of switching languages

Language can influence results of personality survey

In a study that surveryed on personality traits of participants in English and Spanish: "participants reported significantly lower agreeableness, conscientiousness, and neuroticism in Spanish compared to English"(Gianola 2025, 366). Even though the survey questions are the same, changing the survey language created differences in the results. This study showed that the language, Spanish in this case, has more influence over other factors such as dominant/second language.

A study tested for verbal reports of pain in reaction to heat stimulation in repeated sessions using English and Spanish. The study showed differences based on the culture of the participants (American or Hispanic), and Hispanic participants reported higher intensity levels of pain than American participants. Hispanic particapnts also showed greater differences in reported intensity levels when the languages were switched (Gianola 2021, 118-120). This study shows how the influences language can have on our experiences are interconnected to culture. While the language being used can affect our perception, it only works with culture being tied to the language.

The effects of being a bilingual

There are both pros and cons to being a bilingual.

Positive effect of bilingualism

Some studies show benefits of speaking multiple languages such as better emotional processing (Sharif and Mahmood, 8). A possible explanation is that knowing vocabulary for emotions in different languages may help us better understand and control our emotions. While there are benefits to being bilingual, there may be some downsides...

Interference of bilingualism

In a study that tested emotional perception of Chinese-English bilinguals and monolingual speakers, it was seen that: "Chinese monolinguals are better at perceiving emotions in Chinese context than bilinguals, this might be caused by the frequent use of English or immersion in a non-Chinese language environment"(Ji, 275). What this means is that, knowing different languages can interfere with our emotional perception depending on the contexts that the languages are used in.

For example...

I am a bilingual in Japanese and English. While my first language is Japanese and I use it at home, I mainly use English at school. My emotional perception in a Japanese studying environment, such as reading texts in Japanese, may not be as good as monolinguals who only speak Japanese and use the language in school environmetns.

Key Takeaways

01: Language has influence on our perception of the world.

02: Language being used can have influences on our personality and experience, but it is largely tied to culture.

03: The pros and cons of being a bilingual is context dependent.

Works Cited