The Foreign-Language Effect: Thinking in a Foreign Tongue Reduces Decision Biases

Abstract

Foreign languages influence the way people make choices and decisions. When options are presented in the native tongue, peoples choices differ from those made when the same problem is given in a foreign language. This study conducts several experiments to establish the effects of using a foreign language on decision making. The study uses decision making as the dependent variable while the language used is the independent variable. The first experiment has students from various universities in the United States as the participants. These participants speak English as their native language. Other participants in the successive trials vary in their native languages and second languages. Also, the study examines the participants’ fluency in the second language measure using a scale ranging from 0 to 1. The study also investigates loss aversion with an experiment involving betting on even odds. This critique gives a detailed summary of the research. It also focuses on the methodological weaknesses of the study in terms of reliability and validity and the shortcomings of the findings of the study.

Keywords: choices, experiments, foreign language.

The Foreign-Language Effect: Thinking in a Foreign Tongue Reduces Decision Biases

The use of a foreign language reduces bias in decision making (Keysar, Hayakawa & An, 2012). The authors of the research titled “The Foreign-Language Effect: Thinking in a Foreign Tongue Reduces Decision Biases” argued that individuals choose differently when the choices are presented in different languages. Keysar, Hayakawa, and An (2012) noted that people were risk averse for gains and risk seeking for losses when choices were presented in their native tongue and the opposite when presented in a foreign language. This paper gives a summary of the article and critiques the reliability, methodology used and the interpretation of the results in the study.

The study was an experimental study. The researchers conducted six experiments to investigate whether using a foreign language had an impact on decision making. Decision making was the dependent variable for the study while the language used presented the independent variable. According to the authors, decision making was influenced by the language used when showing the problem. The first four experiments tested the impact of a foreign language on the framing effect on risk attitudes. The other two examined the implications of using a foreign language on myopic loss aversion. The first experiment (1a) had one hundred twenty-one participants who were students from various universities in the US and spoke English as their native language. The second experiments had One hundred forty-four students from Chung Nam National University in Daejeon, Korea. They spoke English as a foreign language. Furthermore, the third experiment included one hundred three native English speakers studying in Paris, France.

The samples were given an altered version of the original “Asian disease” problem. The framing effect was replicated in the results of the first experiment with 77% of the participants preferring the sure option. The results of the first experiment were reproduced in the second and third experiment. The increased-systematicity demonstrates that using a foreign language decreases the gain-loss asymmetry in preferences associated with risk. The result is a frame-independent choice.

The fourth experiment was a control experiment. It used native English speakers as participants, but they spoke Spanish as a foreign language. However, the results of the first three experiments were replicated indicating that using a foreign language reduces the framing effect due to increased cognitive load. The fifth experiment on loss aversion reported that people anticipate that an adverse impact of a loss outweighs the positive effect. The trial found out that people took more bets in English than in Japanese showing more loss aversion in a foreign language. Thus the authors concluded that foreign languages affect decision making.

Reliability is the consistency of a measure. The study lacks test-retest reliability. If conducted at a different time, the results would be very different due to fluency in the foreign language. The case is also evident with participants omitted who use a foreign language frequently. Validity is the extent to which scores represent a variable. In this study, the researchers argue that “people are less reluctant to take a series of positive-expected-value bets when using a foreign language than when using their native language” (Keysar, Hayakawa & An, 2012). Therefore, the study lacks criterion validity since the bets using a foreign language do not perform as expected.

The authors of the article did not interpret their findings correctly. For instance, in the last experiment about Myopic Loss Aversion and Consequential Investment Behavior, the authors explained the participants’ reluctance to place more bets was because it was their money at stake. However, the reluctance could have been due to other factors such as the amount of money the participants had. Similarly, the number of bets placed could be determined by previous experience in betting. Besides, the authors of the study employ appropriate ethical safeguards. There was no confidentiality in the type of data collected from each participant. In the case of betting, the participants made their bets openly, and this could have affected the willingness of some people to participate.

The results presented by the authors are relatively weaker than their claims compared to other studies on related subjects. According to the authors, “these six experiments strongly demonstrate that people rely more on systematic processes that respect normative rules when making decisions in a foreign language than when making decisions in their native tongue” (Keysar, Hayakawa & An, 2012). However, the research findings showed high loss aversion when presented with choices involving high risk. Therefore, it is more concrete that individuals rely on normative rules rather than systematic processes when making decisions in the foreign language.

According to (Keysar, Hayakawa & An, 2012), the study had six experiments carried out to investigate the relationship between foreign language and decision making. The authors used native English speakers who spoke other languages such as Japanese and Spanish as their second languages. Similarly, the participants included people who spoke English as their second language. The respondents received several tests to show how the different languages they spoke influenced their decision making. The researchers found that the participants preferred the safe option when given choices involving risk. Also, the experiments indicated that people anticipate that an adverse effect of a loss outweighs the positive impact.

Reference

Keysar, B., Hayakawa, S. L., & An, S. G. (2012). The foreign-language effect: Thinking in a foreign tongue reduces decision biases. Psychological science, 23(6), 661-668.

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