• Question: How do we pick up the entire english language so easily?? :)

    Asked by madsmith98 to Anil, Blanka, Cees, Emma, Mike on 25 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Michael Cook

      Michael Cook answered on 25 Jun 2012:

      One theory is that language learning is all about statistics! In other words, we listen to lots and lots of language and over time we work out where to put words just because we know where they appear most often.

      It’s not the most popular theory out there, but the reason I know of it is because some people are using it to teach robots the English language! You can read a bit about it here if you’re interested: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/06/robot-talk/

      I don’t think anyone knows for sure how we learn language – there are lots of different theories, all of them interesting!

    • Photo: Blanka Sengerova

      Blanka Sengerova answered on 26 Jun 2012:

      Of course people in other countries learn other languages, not English. It is said that when you are very young, ie. a baby and small child, the language learning happens in a different part of the brain (that’s what learning is, forming new connections in the brain) to when you start learning a language later on. Which is why it’s easier to pick up a language when you’re young that when you have to work hard at it as an adult. It’s pretty much how I learnt German and then English, by being submerged in it when I moved to those countries as a child.

    • Photo: Emma Trantham

      Emma Trantham answered on 26 Jun 2012:

      If you can see videos this 10min video by someone who studies how we learn language as a baby is fascinating. (She talks about the statistics theory that Michael mentioned)

      She shows that babies learn languages really really quickly but as they get older this ability decreases until as adults it becomes really difficult to learn new languages.

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