Transcript 585: In Defense of Ignorance Note: This American Life is produced for the ear and designed to be heard. VEDANTAM: I'm Shankar Vedantam. So they've compared gender equality, gender parity norms from the World Health Organization, which ranks countries on how equal access to education, how equal pay is, how equal representation in government is across the genders. This week, in the final installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Dacher Keltner describes what happens when we stop to sav, Sometimes, life can feel like being stuck on a treadmill. All rights reserved. Dictionaries are wonderful things, but they create an illusion that there's such thing as a language that stands still, when really it's the nature of human language to change. It's just how I feel. Follow on Apple, Google or Spotify. Welcome to HIDDEN BRAIN. So even if I'm speaking English, the distinctions that I've learned in speaking Russian, for example, are still active in my mind to some extent, but they're more active if I'm actually speaking Russian. So it's, VEDANTAM: The moment she heard it, Jennifer realized mendokusai was incredibly. Additional Resources Book: VEDANTAM: It took just one week of living in Japan for Jennifer to pick up an important new term. After claiming your Listen Notes podcast pages, you will be able to: Respond to listener comments on Listen Notes, Use speech-to-text techniques to transcribe your show and And it's not just about how we think about time. Hidden Brain. You can also connect directly with our sponsorship representative by emailing [emailprotected]. But actually, it's something that's not so hard to learn. And so what that means is if someone was sitting facing south, they would lay out the story from left to right. Personal Strivings: An Approach to Personality and Subjective Well-being, by Robert A. Emmons, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1986. And you say that dictionaries in some ways paint an unrealistic portrait of a language. You're not going to do any of the things that are seen as a foundation of our technological society. Each generation hears things and interprets things slightly differently from the previous one. Maybe it's, even less than 100 meters away, but you just can't bring yourself to even throw your, coat on over your pajamas, and put your boots on, and go outside and walk those, hundred meters because somehow it would break the coziness, and it's just too much of, an effort, and you can't be bothered to do it, even though it's such a small thing. And I don't think any of us are thinking that it's a shame that we're not using the language of Beowulf. Parents and peers influence our major life choices. It Takes Two: The Interpersonal Nature of Empathic Accuracy, What Do You Do When Things Go Right? BORODITSKY: Well, I think it's a terrible tragedy. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? And they asked me all kinds of questions about them. There's not a bigger difference you could find than 100 percent of the measurement space. Lera said there's still a lot of research to be done on this. BORODITSKY: Well, you would be at sea at first. 437 Episodes Produced by Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam Website. VEDANTAM: For more HIDDEN BRAIN, you can find us on Facebook and Twitter. VEDANTAM: John McWhorter, thank you so much for joining me on HIDDEN BRAIN today. Sociologist Lisa Wade believes the pervasive hookup culture on campuses today is different from that faced by previous generations. In the United States, we often praise people with strong convictions, and look down on those who express doubt or hesitation. If you're studying a new language, you might discover these phrases not in your textbooks but when you're hanging out with friends. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. So these speakers have internalized this idea from their language, and they believe that it's right. 4.62. And, I mean, just in terms of even sounds changing and the way that you put words together changing bit by bit, and there's never been a language that didn't do that. Lots of languages make a distinction between things that are accidents and things that are intentional actions. And if they were facing east, they would make the cards come toward them, toward the body. The best Podcast API to search all podcasts and episodes. These relationships can help you feel cared for and connected. The Effects of Conflict Types, Dimensions, and Emergent States on Group Outcomes, by Karen Jehn et. something, even though it shouldn't be so much of an effort. Goal Striving, Need Satisfaction, and Longitudinal Well-being: The Self-Concordance Model, by Kennon M. Sheldon and Andrew J. Elliot, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1999. And why do some social movements take off and spread, while others fizzle? So that, again, is a huge difference. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy thats all around us. But what if there's a whole category of people in your life whose impact is overlooked? You can support Hidden Brain indirectly by giving to your local NPR station, or you can provide direct support to Hidden Brain by making a gift on our Patreon page. Imagine this. BORODITSKY: One thing that we've noticed is this idea of time, of course, is very highly constructed by our minds and our brains. Imagine this. It is the very fabric, the very core of your experience. Special thanks to Adam Cole, who wrote and performed our rendition of "The Hokey Pokey." This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. When we come back, we dig further into the way that gender works in different languages and the pervasive effects that words can play in our lives. The authoritative record of NPRs programming is the audio record. So to go back to the example we were just talking about - people who don't use words like left and right - when I gave those picture stories to Kuuk Thaayorre speakers, who use north, south, east and west, they organized the cards from east to west. You can't smell or taste time. BORODITSKY: Well, there may not be a word for left to refer to a left leg. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. But I find that people now usually use the word to mean very soon, as in we're going to board the plane momentarily. - you would have to say something like, my arm got broken, or it so happened to me that my arm is broken. And I can't help surmising that part of it is that the educated American has been taught and often well that you're not supposed to look down on people because of gender, because of race, because of ability. Sometimes, life can feel like being stuck on a treadmill. VEDANTAM: Would it be possible to use what we have learned about how words and languages evolve to potentially write what a dictionary might look like in 50 years or a hundred years? That's how much cultural heritage is lost. MCWHORTER: Language is a parade, and nobody sits at a parade wishing that everybody would stand still. . VEDANTAM: Lera Boroditsky is a cognitive science professor at the University of California, San Diego. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #16: Not figuratively, it's literally MCWHORTER: Yeah. UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #3: (Speaking foreign language). So there are some differences that are as big as you can possibly measure. And so even though I insist that there is no scientific basis for rejecting some new word or some new meaning or some new construction, I certainly have my visceral biases. But the reason that it seems so elusive is because we don't really think about the, quote, unquote, "meaning" of things like our conversation-easing laughter. They are ways of seeing the world. You know, we spend years teaching children about how to use language correctly. They're supposed to be painting something very personal. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #11: (Speaking Russian). I'm . VEDANTAM: So this begs the question, if you were to put languages on something of a spectrum, where you have, you know, languages like Spanish or Hindi where nouns are gendered and languages like English where many nouns are not gendered but pronouns are gendered, and on the other end of the spectrum, you have languages like Finnish or Persian where you can have a conversation about someone without actually mentioning their gender, it would seem surprising if this did not translate, at some level, into the way people thought about gender in their daily activities, in terms of thinking about maybe even who can do what in the workplace. We talk with psychologist Iris Mauss, who explains why happiness Why do some companies become household names, while others flame out? Whats going on here? Today, we explore the many facets of this idea. This week on Hidden Brain, we revisit a favorite episode exploring what this culture means Jesse always wanted to fall in love. Toward Understanding Understanding:The Importance of Feeling Understood in Relationships, by Harry Reis, Edward P. Lemay Jr, and Catrin Finkenauer, Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2017. So that's an example of how languages and cultures construct how we use space to organize time, to organize this very abstract thing that's otherwise kind of hard to get our hands on and think about. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? You may also use the Hidden Brain name in invitations sent to a small group of personal contacts for such purposes as a listening club or discussion forum. Copyright Hidden Brain Media | Privacy Policy. VEDANTAM: How the languages we speak shape the way we think and why the words we use are always in flux. ROB LOWE: (As Chris Traeger) Dr. Harris, you are literally the meanest person I have ever met. There are different ways to be a psychologist. : A Data-Driven Prescription to Redefine Professional Success, by Lawrence S. Krieger and Kennon M. Sheldon, George Washington Law Review, 2015. So if the word for death was masculine in your language, you were likely to paint death as a man. And you suddenly get a craving for potato chips, and you realize that you have none in the kitchen, and there's nothing else you really want to eat. You also see huge differences in other domains like number. And if people heard the sounds a little differently and produced them a little differently, if there were new meanings of words - very quickly whatever the original meaning was wouldn't be remembered. If you are a podcaster, the best way to manage your podcasts on Listen Notes is by claiming your Listen Notes So for example, English speakers, because they're very likely to say, he did it or someone did it, they are very good at remembering who did it, even if it's an accident. But I understand that in Spanish, this would come out quite differently. There's been a little bit of research from economists actually looking at this. You-uh (ph). And I did that. BORODITSKY: I had this wonderful opportunity to work with my colleague Alice Gaby in this community called Pormpuraaw in - on Cape York. Bu So we did an analysis of images in Artstor. FEB 27, 2023; Happiness 2.0: The Reset Button . BORODITSKY: Yeah. Subscribe to the Hidden Brain Podcast on your favorite podcast player so you never miss an episode. Think back to the last time someone convinced you to do something you didn't want to do, or to spend money you didn't want to spend. ), Handbook of Closeness and Intimacy, 2004. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #7: (Speaking foreign language). It's never happened. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #5: (Speaking foreign language). Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. And he started by asking Russian-speaking students to personify days of the week. And what we find is that if you teach people that forks go with men grammatically in a language, they start to think of forks as being more masculine. Read the episode transcript. So when the perfect woman started writing him letters, it seemed too good to be true. And this is NPR. VEDANTAM: This episode of HIDDEN BRAIN was produced by Rhaina Cohen, Maggie Penman and Thomas Lu with help from Renee Klahr, Jenny Schmidt, Parth Shah and Chloe Connelly. And maybe the convenience store or the shop is really not that far away. al (Eds. Of course that's how you BORODITSKY: And so what was remarkable for me was that my brain figured out a really good solution to the problem after a week of trying, right? But if they were sitting facing north, they would lay out the story from right to left. He's a professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University and the author of the book "Words On The Move: Why English Won't - And Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally).". And a girl goes in this pile. VEDANTAM: If languages are shaped by the way people see the world, but they also shape how people see the world, what does this mean for people who are bilingual? Lera, thank you so much for joining me on HIDDEN BRAIN today. Stay with us. Language as it evolved was just talking to an extent that can be very hard for we literate people to imagine. And you suddenly get a craving for potato chips, and you, realize that you have none in the kitchen, and there's nothing else you really want to, eat. Something new will have started by then, just like if we listen to people in 1971, they sound odd in that they don't say like as much as we do. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #1: (As character) If you're so upset about it, maybe you can think of a way to help her. All sponsorship opportunities on Hidden Brain are managed by SXM Media. Toula and Ian's different backgrounds become apparent on one of their very first dates. If you're a monolingual speaker of one of these languages, you're very likely to say that the word chair is masculine because chairs are, in fact, masculine, right? We recommend movies or books to a friend. There are signs it's getting even harder. So - but if I understand correctly, I would be completely at sea if I visited this aboriginal community in Australia because I have often absolutely no idea where I am or where I'm going. Time now for "My Unsung Hero," our series from the team at Hidden Brain telling the stories of . So if you took a bunch of those tendencies, you could make up, say, the English of 50 years from now, but some of the things would just be complete chance. So for example, if Sam grabbed a hammer and struck the flute in anger, that would be one description, like, Sam broke the flute. You can run experiments in a lab or survey people on the street. So in English, I might say that Sam (ph) broke the flute. MCWHORTER: Yeah, I really do. Shankar Vedantam: This is Hidden Brain. Copyright Hidden Brain Media | Privacy Policy, Read the latest from the Hidden Brain Newsletter. What Makes Lawyers Happy? GEACONE-CRUZ: And I ended up living there for 10 years. You can find the transcript for most episodes of Hidden Brain on our website. This week, in the final . UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #1: (Speaking foreign language). And then 10 years later when they're 49, you say, well, that picture of you at 39 is what you really are and whatever's happened to you since then is some sort of disaster or something that shouldn't have happened. Hidden Brain Claim By Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam Podcasts RSS Web PODCAST SEARCH EPISODES COMMUNITY PODCASTER EDIT SHARE Listen Score LS 84 Global Rank TOP 0.01% ABOUT THIS PODCAST Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. If you can speak more than one language, does this mean that you're also simultaneously and constantly shifting in your mind between different worldviews? Many people have this intuition that, oh, I could never learn that; I could never survive in a community like this. It's not necessarily may I please have, but may I have, I'll have, but not can I get a. I find it just vulgar for reasons that as you can see I can't even do what I would call defending. Newer episodes are unlikely to have a transcript as it takes us a few weeks to process and edit each transcript. This takes kids a little while to figure out, and he had all kinds of clever ways to ask these questions. I'm Shankar Vedantam. But can you imagine someone without imagining their gender? He didn't like that people were shortening the words. Listen on the Reuters app. Yes! What do you think the implications are - if you buy the idea that languages are a very specific and unique way of seeing the world, of perceiving reality, what are the implications of so many languages disappearing during our time? And if the word bridge is masculine in your language, you're more likely to say that bridges are strong and long and towering - these kind of more stereotypically masculine words. I'm Shankar Vedantam. When we come back, we dig further into the way that gender works in different languages and the pervasive effects that words can play in our lives. Another possibility is that it's a fully integrated mind, and it just incorporates ideas and distinctions from both languages or from many languages if you speak more than two. And in fact, speakers of languages like this have been shown to orient extremely well - much better than we used to think humans could. A brief history of relationship research in social psychology, by Harry T. Reis, in Handbook of the History of Social Psychology, 2011. We always knew that certain species of animals had abilities to orient that we thought were better than human, and we always had some biological excuse for why we couldn't do it. VEDANTAM: I love this analogy you have in the book where you mention how, you know, thinking that a word has only one meaning is like looking at a snapshot taken at one point in a person's life and saying this photograph represents the entirety of what this person looks like. Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. You may link to our content and copy and paste episode descriptions and Additional Resources into your invitations. The dictionary says both uses are correct. It is a great, free way to engage the podcast community and increase the visibility of your podcasts. This week, in the second installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Todd Kashdan looks at the relationship between distress and happiness, and how to keep difficult emotions from sabotaging our wellbeing. Many of us rush through our lives, chasing goals and just trying to get everything done. How come you aren't exactly the way you were 10 years ago? Whats going on here? "Most of the laughter we produce is purely . But it turns out humans can stay oriented really, really well, provided that their language and culture requires them to keep track of this information. So what happens is that once literally comes to feel like it means really, people start using it in figurative constructions such as I was literally dying of thirst. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. And it irritates people, but there's a different way of seeing literally. It's natural to want to run away from difficult emotions such as grief, anger and fear. Shankar Vedantam, host of the popular podcast "Hidden Brain" has been reporting on human behavior for decades. So you can't know how the words are going to come out, but you can take good guesses. Interpersonal Chemistry: What Is It, How Does It Emerge, and How Does it Operate? Go behind the scenes, see what Shankar is reading and find more useful resources and links. John is a professor of English and comparative literature at Columbia University. Stay with us. So some languages don't have number words. FDA blocks human trials for Neuralink brain implants. And it ended up becoming less a direct reflection of hearty laughter than an indication of the kind of almost subconscious laughter that we do in any kind of conversation that's meant as friendly. Thank you for helping to keep the podcast database up to date. VEDANTAM: It took just one week of living in Japan for Jennifer to pick up an important, VEDANTAM: There isn't a straightforward translation of this phrase in English. Physicist Richard Feynman once said, "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool." One way we fool ourselves is by imagining we know more than we do; we think we are experts. What techniques did that person use to persuade you? If the language stayed the way it was, it would be like a pressed flower in a book or, as I say, I think it would be like some inflatable doll rather than a person. VEDANTAM: Time is another concept that is also central to the way we see and describe the world. Perceived Responses to Capitalization Attempts are Influenced by Self-Esteem and Relationship Threat, by Shannon M. Smith & Harry Reis, Personal Relationships, 2012. To request permission, please send an email to [emailprotected]. We all have to make certain choices in life, such as where to live and how to earn a living. VEDANTAM: One of the things I found really interesting is that the evolution of words and language is constant. This week, we continue our look at the science of influence with psychologist Robert Cialdini, and explore how th, We all exert pressure on each other in ways small and profound. VEDANTAM: Languages orient us to the world. Researcher Elizabeth Dunn helps us map out Having a sense of purpose can be a buffer against the challenges we all face at various stages of life. Lera is a cognitive science professor at the University of California, San Diego. It's not something that you typically go out trying to do intentionally. VEDANTAM: There are phrases in every language that are deeply evocative and often, untranslatable. When we come back, I'm going to ask you about why languages change and whether there are hidden rules that shape why some words are more likely to evolve than others. Assessing the Seeds of Relationship Decay: Using Implicit Evaluations to Detect the Early Stages of Disillusionment, by Soonhee Lee, Ronald D. Rogge, and Harry T. Reis, Psychological Science, 2010. See you next week. But that can blind us to a very simple source of joy that's all around us. And what's cool about languages, like the languages spoken in Pormpuraaw, is that they don't use words like left and right, and instead, everything is placed in cardinal directions like north, south, east and west. And you can even teach people to have a little bit of fun with the artifice. But I think that we should learn not to listen to people using natural language as committing errors because there's no such thing as making a mistake in your language if a critical mass of other people speaking your language are doing the same thing. But is that true when it comes to the pursuit of happiness? native tongue without even thinking about it. That's the way words are, too. So to give you a very quick wrap-up is that some effects are big, but even when effects aren't big, they can be interesting or important for other reasons - either because they are very broad or because they apply to things that we think are really important in our culture. Mistakes and errors are what turned Latin into French. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around. And so somebody will say, well, who was it who you thought was going to give you this present? Our team includes Laura Kwerel, Adhiti Bandlamudi and our supervising producer Tara Boyle. This is NPR. But then you start writing things down and you're in a whole new land because once things are sitting there written on that piece of paper, there's that illusion. If I give you a bunch of pictures to lay out and say this is telling you some kind of story and you - and they're disorganized, when an English speaker organizes those pictures, they'll organize them from left to right. Hidden Brain Hidden Brain, Shankar Vedantam Science 4.6 36K Ratings; Shankar Vedantam uses science and storytelling to reveal the unconscious patterns that drive human behavior, shape our choices and direct our relationships. And they suggest that differences across languages do, in fact, predict some of these measures of gender equality across countries. That kind of detail may not appear. Refusing to Apologize can have Psychological Benefits, by Tyler Okimoto, Michael Wenzel and Kyli Hedrick, European Journal of Social Psychology, 2013. This week, in the final installment of our Happiness 2.0 series, psychologist Dacher Keltner describes what happens when we stop to savor the beauty in nature, art, or simply the moral courage of those around us. Just go to the magnifying glass in the top right corner, click on it, and use the search function at the top of the page. Only a couple hundred languages - or if you want to be conservative about it, a hundred languages - are written in any real way and then there are 6,800 others. In this favorite 2021 episode, psychologistAdam Grantpushes back against the benefits of certainty, and describes the magic that unfolds when we challenge our own deeply-held beliefs. In the final episode of our Relationships 2.0 series, psychologistHarry Reis says theres another ingredient to successful relationships thats every bit as important as love. And there are consequences for how people think about events, what they notice when they see accidents. Our transcripts are provided by various partners and may contain errors or deviate slightly from the audio. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. I'm Shankar Vedantam. So I think that nobody would say that they don't think language should change. But, if you dig a little deeper, you may find that they share much more: they might make the same amount of money as you, or share the, We all have to make certain choices in life, such as where to live and how to earn a living. It seems kind of elliptical, like, would it be possible that I obtained? You can search for the episode or browse all episodes on our Archive Page. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? We use a lot of music on the show! But she told me a story about a conversation she had with a native speaker of Indonesian. VEDANTAM: You make the case that concerns over the misuse of language might actually be one of the last places where people can publicly express prejudice and class differences. VEDANTAM: So all this raises a really interesting question. We talk with psychologist Iris Mauss, who explains why happiness can seem more elusive the harder we chase it, and what we can do instead to build a lasting sense of contentment. podcast pages. But what happens when these feelings catch up with us? I had this cool experience when I was there. You can't know, but you can certainly know that if could listen to people 50 years from now, they'd sound odd. This week, we kick off a month-long series we're calling Happiness 2.0. It's how we think about anything that's abstract, that's beyond our physical senses. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR #3: (As character) I'm willing to get involved. The transcript below may be for an earlier version of this episode. No matter how hard you try to feel happier, you end up back where you started. I said, you know, this weird thing happened. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #10: (Speaking Russian). Perspectives on the Situation by Harry T. Reis, and John G. Holmes, in The Oxford Handbook of Personality and Social Psychology, 2012. So you can think about an un-gendered person in the same way that I might think about a person without a specific age or specific height or specific color shirt. This week, we're going to bring you a conversation I had in front of a live audience with Richard Thaler, taped on Halloween at the Willard Intercontinental Hotel in Washington, D. Richard is a professor of behavioral sciences and economics at the University of Chicago and is a well-known author. He's also the author of the book, "Words On The Move: Why English Won't - And Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally).". What a cynical thing to say, but that doesn't mean that it might not be true. There's a way of speaking right. In this episode, we explore how long-term relationships have changed over time and whether we might be able to improve marriage by asking less of it. And that is an example of a simple feature of language - number words - acting as a transformative stepping stone to a whole domain of knowledge. out. Copyright 2018 NPR. It's too high. And to arrive in a new place where you can't tell a joke and can't express an idea - oh, it's just really painful because you feel like your whole self is hiding inside and no one can see it. But what I am thinking is, you should realize that even if you don't like it, there's nothing wrong with it in the long run because, for example, Jonathan Swift didn't like it that people were saying kissed instead of kiss-ed (ph) and rebuked instead of rebuk-ed (ph). That is utterly arbitrary that those little slits in American society look elderly, but for various chance reasons, that's what those slits came to mean, so I started wearing flat-fronted pants. edit transcripts, Improve the presence of your podcasts, e.g., self-service, If you share your Listen Notes page and at-mention. That's because change is hard. And if it was feminine, then you're likely to paint death as a woman. No matter how hard you try to feel happier, you end up back where. So LOL was an internet abbreviation meaning laugh out loud or laughing out loud, but LOL in common usage today doesn't necessarily mean hysterical laughter. According to neuroscientists who study laughter, it turns out that chuckles and giggles often aren't a response to humorthey're a response to people.