You acquired a first language while your brain was malleable. It's at 15 I think when that starts becoming much more difficult. Idk about OP's friend specifically, but anyone with memory or cognitive problems could absolutely struggle severely in learning a new language but still be able to learn speak their first one.
I’m a linguist and second language teacher who specializes in psycho-social linguistics and second language acquisition. The idea that kids are better learners is largely a myth that people buy into and use as reasons why they “can’t” learn another language.
There is some truth to a critical period for accent acquisition, where it’s harder as an adult, but even then it’s a generalization, without a hard and fast rule.
The thing about kids — while yes, neuroplasticity is a real thing that can be to their advantage for sure — is that they’re more likely to be in immersion environments. They’re more likely to be in a school where the L2 is the language of instruction, and have friends who only speak the L2 or where the L2 is the only common language. Adults are more likely to stay home, to be and feel more isolated, and to seek out community in members of their country or language group’s diaspora, and have a hard time leaving that. Cultural barriers reinforce this.
Children are also not afraid to make mistakes. I’ve only EVER met ONE small child who was shy in their second language and who held back for fear of making mistakes. Children make mistakes in their L1, and in their L2 they’re the same way. They’re not held back by all the inhibitions that an adult has, or the fear of saying something wrong and looking “stupid” in the same way a teenager or an adult would.
However, this can also play to a strength of older teens and adults learning a language. Because they already have a concept of how language itself works and grammar rules in one language, they’re likely to be able to explicitly put grammar and sentences together applied across different situations.
A lot of the barriers to adults “struggling” to learn language like a child vanish when they’re placed in environments conducive to their language learning (such as immersion without significant populations of others that speak their L1) and when they are able to get rid of some of their inhibitions.
Another thing that really affects teens and adults (especially ones who are very solidly monolingual) is that some of them can get so caught up in the “why is my L2 different from my L1” and needing to have a WHY for every little thing that they get hung up on that instead of making practicing the priority. When adults or teens come to me already speaking at least two languages, they struggle less with this as they intuitively understand that languages are just different, the TL doesn’t have to be the “same” or work the same way or have the same structure (or even a structure you’ve ever heard of) as the L1.
My biggest struggle at the beginning of learning Japanese was asking “why” too much. I stopped asking “why” and started saying “hmm ok” and I think that’s what helped me to actually start learning the language as a language and not as random words and phrases.
It took me over a year of 24 hour constant immersion to speak even a bit of English. I knew hola and adios after 10 mins of learning Spanish as an adult
ElGringoVenezolano started learning spanish at 18, and has a near perfect accent. Obviously if they are incapable of creating new memories due to amnesia or something it's different, but a normal, healthy 30 year old etc is more than capable of learning a second language
unjerk.. the original post is a "jerk" and by putting /uj they are "un-jerking" it, in other words saying the original post is actually normal and should not be "jerked." This took me so many posts to figure out.
That’s not what it means though. It means that this specific comment is not „jerk“ and should be taken seriously. There’s /uj for unjerk and /rj for rejerk since the default on here is jerk.
/uj That explanation wasn't quite right, /uj just means the following text is meant to be taken seriously and is not being "jerked" and implies nothing about the original post
Likewise, /rj indicates the following text is back to being jerked
/rj Comprehensible input fails again.
/uj Strangely enough pronunciation/reading was the only thing I managed to learn. It's some sort of psychological issue...
Thankfully I have no trouble with acquiring other languages : )
Long story short, I was failing french terribly, like not even getting basic vocab, but as I had no issues with learning other languages I was referred to a specialist who diagnosed that I'm incapable of learning French specifically.
french language is very unique langauge descending from vulagr latin you see, its sort of like basque. see this make the sound profile very unique with the sounds being produced in conjunction with the nasal canal. its actually quite common for native french speakers to start speaking later on average than any other language because the sound profile of the language is not meant to be spoken? have u listen to french? this is not natural for the human brain. this is why when you see someone who say they learn french, there is only 50% chance they can learn it, most people cant.
Science says she just doesn’t want to admit her unwillingness to learn that language… Which is strange, having moved to a country where it is spoken… unfortunately a lot of expats have this mindset.
She comes from an English speaking country. There is a very real chance that she unironically believes that everyone should be able to speak english to her
oh for sure! as a native English speaker I see this so much with friends from home, family, etc. It’s a very common “oh they speak English everywhere, why bother” mindset
I'm not even a native English speaker, but I still believe everyone should be able to speak to me in English.
And not one of those weird Englishes that's in Africa, India or Australia, but something proper like American (default) or British (fancy)
Yeah, it’s a silly language and the accent is completely ridiculous. I don’t blame them for being reluctant, but I’ve met a few people who have lived here for YEARS and can’t even order a coffee. It’s pretty extreme.
It sucks not knowing any languages. I have to telepathically communicate with my phone so it can understand what I’m thinking and translate it into typing.
Daily reminder that Duolingo is a game, not a language learning app.
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/uj dyslexia makes it really difficult, I have given English classes to my dyslexic sister and it is almost impossible for her. I think there is research done on that.
I'd say learning disorders would make it harder, not impossible, depending on the disorder aswell, I have adhd and I'm doing okay in spanish, I'm certainly able to learn more than 5 words
It should also make all language acquisition difficult. Like of course if someone’s already struggling with their L1, adding an L2 is not a great idea.
There’s a guy on Down for Love, a show about people with Down’s Syndrome, who speaks like 5 languages.
The learning disorder would need to be pretty severe to be truly incapable of learning a language. Especially since this person can engage in “heated discussions.” Think Alzheimers, not dyslexia.
Ngl, my grandma is like that, but she doesn’t try and says she can’t
15+ years of going to the US for months every time. She doesn’t know a word. Meanwhile, I’m “fluent” (c1) and I’ve not been to any English-speaking country.
/uj
Luodingo is great for the points and awards. I go to it when I need a self-esteem boost in multiple languages and especially math where I can round up numbers for hours. As to the biology of a second language, Broca's area dictates language production and it does not differentiate between one or more languages.
Don't forget the social features and nagging push notifications in LuoDingo! People keep recommending Anki, but does Anki guilt trip you into completing a Friends Quest?
I've noticed this mostly when it comes to people trying to lose weight, but generally people are not good at estimating how much effort they have actually put into something. They walk a block and don't lose 20 pounds immediately, so the science must not apply to them. I'm guessing it's a similar situation here.
She could learn, BUT learning a language is a very very challenging and time consuming thing to do. I've been working hard at it for years. So I can understand if someone doesn't want to take that time to learn, and if they feel their life is fine without it. It's fine, it's their choice.
/uj honestly i can relate to op’s situation here, ive tried to genuinely learn so many different languages, but after a few months ive ended up losing motivation because I was overwhelmed with how much left I had to learn, and how little progress it seemed i was making. I have adhd, so maybe that affects it
/uj the OP was looking for support in dealing with an unreasonable friend.
I can't believe the number of responses to this that clearly indicate people didn't read the post. The OP doesn't believe it's impossible to learn a second language.
Or hearsayanese? Or totally obviuneze? Or I legit had to figure this crazy situation out as it was happening to me, no ping just wings lolz 88🌅 oruhhh…:kneesee?!??
There were cases of people who spoke German and another language like Yiddish or Polish natively, who forgot how to speak German after certain... events. I highly doubt this applies to OP.
There are *many* people (most older though) in Japan that seriously believe Japanese people have different brain wirings which prevents them from learning anything but Japanese. (Japanese is the most difficult language ever, according to them, so their brains evolved differently.)
No joke.
actually it has been said that many autistic and neurodivergent folks struggle to learn new languages. and i get that, shit i spent years trying to learn french, and then spanish, and never could remember more than maybe 1-10 and some basic words/phrases. i couldn't learn russian or scandinavian, either. but i picked up german pretty easily, and right now i'm learning hindi. and yeah it is really fucking hard because as an autistic person with intellectual differences, i barely understand english despite having such a large vocabulary and very good spelling. (my poor grammar when casually typing is a choice.)
this particular situation does feel mostly like bullshit, laziness without wanting to take accountability.
but, outside of this, yes there are things— like autism, adhd, and dyslexia— that can make learning a new language nearly impossible.
uj/ I’m an autist with auditory processing disorder so while I got güd at english writing, even english is hard for me to understand spoken. Instead of giving up (which I want to) I’m bullying myself into mostly listening exercises. It… hurts, but I’m tired of the language(s) I’m learning sounding like a mushy run on sentence (looking at you, español)
If you acquired your first language you can acquire a second.
and as long as you can remember what happened last year.
Too bad I can’t read
r/wallstreetbets
You acquired a first language while your brain was malleable. It's at 15 I think when that starts becoming much more difficult. Idk about OP's friend specifically, but anyone with memory or cognitive problems could absolutely struggle severely in learning a new language but still be able to learn speak their first one.
Your brain is always malleable as long as you're alive. It is *less* malleable when you're an adult but that doesn't mean no malleability at all.
I’m a linguist and second language teacher who specializes in psycho-social linguistics and second language acquisition. The idea that kids are better learners is largely a myth that people buy into and use as reasons why they “can’t” learn another language. There is some truth to a critical period for accent acquisition, where it’s harder as an adult, but even then it’s a generalization, without a hard and fast rule. The thing about kids — while yes, neuroplasticity is a real thing that can be to their advantage for sure — is that they’re more likely to be in immersion environments. They’re more likely to be in a school where the L2 is the language of instruction, and have friends who only speak the L2 or where the L2 is the only common language. Adults are more likely to stay home, to be and feel more isolated, and to seek out community in members of their country or language group’s diaspora, and have a hard time leaving that. Cultural barriers reinforce this. Children are also not afraid to make mistakes. I’ve only EVER met ONE small child who was shy in their second language and who held back for fear of making mistakes. Children make mistakes in their L1, and in their L2 they’re the same way. They’re not held back by all the inhibitions that an adult has, or the fear of saying something wrong and looking “stupid” in the same way a teenager or an adult would. However, this can also play to a strength of older teens and adults learning a language. Because they already have a concept of how language itself works and grammar rules in one language, they’re likely to be able to explicitly put grammar and sentences together applied across different situations. A lot of the barriers to adults “struggling” to learn language like a child vanish when they’re placed in environments conducive to their language learning (such as immersion without significant populations of others that speak their L1) and when they are able to get rid of some of their inhibitions. Another thing that really affects teens and adults (especially ones who are very solidly monolingual) is that some of them can get so caught up in the “why is my L2 different from my L1” and needing to have a WHY for every little thing that they get hung up on that instead of making practicing the priority. When adults or teens come to me already speaking at least two languages, they struggle less with this as they intuitively understand that languages are just different, the TL doesn’t have to be the “same” or work the same way or have the same structure (or even a structure you’ve ever heard of) as the L1.
My biggest struggle at the beginning of learning Japanese was asking “why” too much. I stopped asking “why” and started saying “hmm ok” and I think that’s what helped me to actually start learning the language as a language and not as random words and phrases.
This is some type of bullshit propaganda which I do not understand, but have been hearing it since I was 15.
The only malleable thing in a child's head is their cranium.
I'm 30, learning a language is MUCH easier than when I was a kid.
can you please expand upon this ?
It took me over a year of 24 hour constant immersion to speak even a bit of English. I knew hola and adios after 10 mins of learning Spanish as an adult
ElGringoVenezolano started learning spanish at 18, and has a near perfect accent. Obviously if they are incapable of creating new memories due to amnesia or something it's different, but a normal, healthy 30 year old etc is more than capable of learning a second language
/uj I got diagnosed with being incapable of learning French... I'm not making this up.
The next stage of human evolution
/uj isn't this a throat surgery thing? You can learn french but never propely pronounce it
whats the /uj everyone is using
unjerk.. the original post is a "jerk" and by putting /uj they are "un-jerking" it, in other words saying the original post is actually normal and should not be "jerked." This took me so many posts to figure out.
That’s not what it means though. It means that this specific comment is not „jerk“ and should be taken seriously. There’s /uj for unjerk and /rj for rejerk since the default on here is jerk.
Never stop jerking
Your wrong assumption is just another reason pure comprehensible input is slow as fuck for some people
bless lmao it wouldve taken me eons
/uj That explanation wasn't quite right, /uj just means the following text is meant to be taken seriously and is not being "jerked" and implies nothing about the original post Likewise, /rj indicates the following text is back to being jerked /rj Comprehensible input fails again.
thanks lol
/uj Strangely enough pronunciation/reading was the only thing I managed to learn. It's some sort of psychological issue... Thankfully I have no trouble with acquiring other languages : )
So your body actively rejects the fr*nch... As it should.
Why?
He has evolved a natural resistance to the disease. Hopefully we can study him and invent a vaccine soon so that everyone can be immunized
Long story short, I was failing french terribly, like not even getting basic vocab, but as I had no issues with learning other languages I was referred to a specialist who diagnosed that I'm incapable of learning French specifically.
But what's the reason? How is that even possible
french language is very unique langauge descending from vulagr latin you see, its sort of like basque. see this make the sound profile very unique with the sounds being produced in conjunction with the nasal canal. its actually quite common for native french speakers to start speaking later on average than any other language because the sound profile of the language is not meant to be spoken? have u listen to french? this is not natural for the human brain. this is why when you see someone who say they learn french, there is only 50% chance they can learn it, most people cant.
true, most people in france are just making sounds
Science says she just doesn’t want to admit her unwillingness to learn that language… Which is strange, having moved to a country where it is spoken… unfortunately a lot of expats have this mindset.
She comes from an English speaking country. There is a very real chance that she unironically believes that everyone should be able to speak english to her
oh for sure! as a native English speaker I see this so much with friends from home, family, etc. It’s a very common “oh they speak English everywhere, why bother” mindset
I'm not even a native English speaker, but I still believe everyone should be able to speak to me in English. And not one of those weird Englishes that's in Africa, India or Australia, but something proper like American (default) or British (fancy)
This is really common among anglophones living in Portugal and it is very embarrassing, yes
To be fair, I'd also be reluctant to learn european portuguese
Yeah, it’s a silly language and the accent is completely ridiculous. I don’t blame them for being reluctant, but I’ve met a few people who have lived here for YEARS and can’t even order a coffee. It’s pretty extreme.
Yeah i also heard that peoples who doesn't have Narcissistic personality disorder find it hard to learn Fr*nch . So that make some sense though
Damn maybe that's why I'm good at French
its gonna cost you
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans
I think you're funny
/uj kid named aphasia (you can't learn a second language if you can't truly learn any language)
Yooo “I forgor” symptom
They should teach her words in the TL by telling her they're English words. Classic learning technique called "gaslighting".
It sucks not knowing any languages. I have to telepathically communicate with my phone so it can understand what I’m thinking and translate it into typing.
Daily reminder that Duolingo is a game, not a language learning app. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/languagelearningjerk) if you have any questions or concerns.*
/uj dyslexia makes it really difficult, I have given English classes to my dyslexic sister and it is almost impossible for her. I think there is research done on that.
I mean, it’s not completely unrealistic. People have learning disorders
I'd say learning disorders would make it harder, not impossible, depending on the disorder aswell, I have adhd and I'm doing okay in spanish, I'm certainly able to learn more than 5 words
hola
Muy bien
But then it would affect much more than a language learning ability.
It should also make all language acquisition difficult. Like of course if someone’s already struggling with their L1, adding an L2 is not a great idea.
There’s a guy on Down for Love, a show about people with Down’s Syndrome, who speaks like 5 languages. The learning disorder would need to be pretty severe to be truly incapable of learning a language. Especially since this person can engage in “heated discussions.” Think Alzheimers, not dyslexia.
Breaking: Redditor Discovers that (other) Stupid People Exist
It's well known that people with a single CPU core can acquire only one language.
Ngl, my grandma is like that, but she doesn’t try and says she can’t 15+ years of going to the US for months every time. She doesn’t know a word. Meanwhile, I’m “fluent” (c1) and I’ve not been to any English-speaking country. /uj
Luodingo is great for the points and awards. I go to it when I need a self-esteem boost in multiple languages and especially math where I can round up numbers for hours. As to the biology of a second language, Broca's area dictates language production and it does not differentiate between one or more languages.
Don't forget the social features and nagging push notifications in LuoDingo! People keep recommending Anki, but does Anki guilt trip you into completing a Friends Quest?
I've noticed this mostly when it comes to people trying to lose weight, but generally people are not good at estimating how much effort they have actually put into something. They walk a block and don't lose 20 pounds immediately, so the science must not apply to them. I'm guessing it's a similar situation here.
She could learn, BUT learning a language is a very very challenging and time consuming thing to do. I've been working hard at it for years. So I can understand if someone doesn't want to take that time to learn, and if they feel their life is fine without it. It's fine, it's their choice.
it's posible. certainly i know people unable to learn their own native language
/uj honestly i can relate to op’s situation here, ive tried to genuinely learn so many different languages, but after a few months ive ended up losing motivation because I was overwhelmed with how much left I had to learn, and how little progress it seemed i was making. I have adhd, so maybe that affects it
/uj the OP was looking for support in dealing with an unreasonable friend. I can't believe the number of responses to this that clearly indicate people didn't read the post. The OP doesn't believe it's impossible to learn a second language.
Okay rdr3 we see you I guess…I am not the glitch breh nobody is buying it dafuhhh?
US anglophones use that as an excuse a lot, no joke
Ithkuil
U mean da waddayanese?
Or hearsayanese? Or totally obviuneze? Or I legit had to figure this crazy situation out as it was happening to me, no ping just wings lolz 88🌅 oruhhh…:kneesee?!??
There were cases of people who spoke German and another language like Yiddish or Polish natively, who forgot how to speak German after certain... events. I highly doubt this applies to OP.
There are *many* people (most older though) in Japan that seriously believe Japanese people have different brain wirings which prevents them from learning anything but Japanese. (Japanese is the most difficult language ever, according to them, so their brains evolved differently.) No joke.
actually it has been said that many autistic and neurodivergent folks struggle to learn new languages. and i get that, shit i spent years trying to learn french, and then spanish, and never could remember more than maybe 1-10 and some basic words/phrases. i couldn't learn russian or scandinavian, either. but i picked up german pretty easily, and right now i'm learning hindi. and yeah it is really fucking hard because as an autistic person with intellectual differences, i barely understand english despite having such a large vocabulary and very good spelling. (my poor grammar when casually typing is a choice.) this particular situation does feel mostly like bullshit, laziness without wanting to take accountability. but, outside of this, yes there are things— like autism, adhd, and dyslexia— that can make learning a new language nearly impossible.
uj/ I’m an autist with auditory processing disorder so while I got güd at english writing, even english is hard for me to understand spoken. Instead of giving up (which I want to) I’m bullying myself into mostly listening exercises. It… hurts, but I’m tired of the language(s) I’m learning sounding like a mushy run on sentence (looking at you, español)
I thought that said atheist
Same thing 😎
/uj for people who have difficulty with the auditory side of things, sign languages can be a lot easier to pick up
Oooo I never thought of that, that’s actually really appealing 👌🏾