The amazing benefits of being bilingual

每天累了一大天，很想把自己扔上床，但是为什么非要在每晚九点，守在手机或者电脑前，跟着一万多人一起听课，记笔记，学外语呢？原因有三：

英语已经不仅仅是世界通行证，更是阶级通行证。

英语学不好不仅损失和世界沟通的机会，也损失财富自由的机会。

英语不好穷三代，为了下一代和下下一代，也要认真学起来。

和这些学好英语可能获得的收获相比，你那小小的沮丧，小小的疲惫，小小的自尊心受伤害，是不是都不算什么呢？

今天，大乐乐就和大家分享一篇关于学习英语的好处的文章，因为文章比较长，大乐乐将分为两次讲解：

7月3日将讲解第一段到第二十七段：作者通过亲身体验，告诉我们关于英语学习的秘密

7月17日 将讲解第二十八段到第四十九段：更多关于双语学习的秘密，也许读完之后，你也能成为掌握三十种语言的人。

第二十五段、二十六和二十七段小结：

这三段中提到了另一个实验：Flanker Task

如图所示，当受试者看到箭头是向左的，但是中间的箭头是向右的，他就需要回答向右。因此就需要抑制大脑的第一反应。

第二十八段

How to learn 30 languages

So-called "hyper-polyglots", like Alex Rawlings mentioned in this story, have learnt to speak at least 10 languages. They claim that anyone could learn their skills if only you take the right approach. To learn more, read our in-depth feature article here. “Learning the new language improved your performance second time around,” he explains. Relieved as I am to fit into the normal range, it’s a curious result. How can that be?（尽管我松了一口气，原来没做好flanker task是正常的，但是这个结果也挺令人惊讶的。）

金词

hyper-polyglot n. 超级多语者

if only 只要

approach  [ə'prəʊtʃ] n. 方法

second time around 再次

第二十九段

The flanker tasks were exercises in cognitive conflict resolution （认知冲突抉择）– if most of the arrows were pointing to the left, my immediate impulse（第一反应） was to push the left button, but this wasn’t the correct response if the central arrow was pointing right. I had to block out my impulse and heed the rule instead. Another example of cognitive conflict is a test in which the names of colours are written in different colours (“blue” written in red, for example). The aim is to say which colour each word is written in, but this is tricky, because we read the word much quicker than we process the colour of the letters. It requires considerable mental effort to ignore the impulse just to say the word we can’t help but read.

金词

impulse  ['ɪmpʌls] n. 冲动

block out 封闭

heed [hi:d] vt.注意；留心

语法点：

It requires considerable mental effort to ignore the impulse just to say the word we can’t help but read.

这句话真正的主语是to igonore the impulse to say the word we can't help but read

it是形式主语

谓语是requires

宾语是considerable mental effort

can't help but do sth 忍不住做某事

I can't help but notice that you are bleeding.

大脑你不得不知道的几个部分；

第三十段

The part of the brain that manages this supreme effort is known as the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC)（前扣带回）, part of the “executive system”. Located on thefrontal lobe(前额叶）, it is a toolbox of mental attention skills that enables us to concentrate on one task while blocking out competing information, and allows us to switch focus between different tasks without becoming confused. It is the executive system that tells us to go when we see a green light and stop for a red, and it is the same system that tells us to ignore the meaning of the word we read but concentrate on the colour of the letters.

金词

executive [ɪgˈzekjʊtɪv] adj.执行的

concentrate on 聚焦于

switch [swɪtʃ] vi.转换

金句

Located on the frontal lobe, it is a toolbox of mental attention skills that enables us to concentrate on one task while blocking out competing information, and allows us to switch focus between different tasks without becoming confused.

大乐乐提问时间：

这句话的主语是谁呢？句子结构又是怎样的呢？尝试翻译一下，并且在下面的评论区留言，正确答案有惊喜呢。

第三十一段

The snowflake test prepared my ACC for the second flanker task, just as speaking more than one language seems to train the executive system more generally. A steady stream of studies over the past decade has shown that bilinguals outperform(胜过) monolinguals in a range of cognitive and social tasks from [verbal and nonverbal tests to how well they can read other people. Greater empathy thought to be because bilinguals are better at blocking out their own feelings and beliefs in order to concentrate on the other person’s. “Bilinguals perform these tasks much better than monolinguals – they are faster and more accurate,” says Athanasopoulos. And that suggests their executive systems are different from monolinguals’.

金词：

a steady stream of 一系列不断的

outperform [aʊtpə'fɔːm] vt. 胜过

empathy  ['empəθɪ] n. 移情作用

金句：

A steady stream of studies over the past decade has shown that bilinguals outperform monolinguals in a range of cognitive and social tasks from verbal and nonverbal tests to how well they can read other people.

过去十年间一系列不断的研究表明双语者在认知及社交领域比单一语言使用者表现都更加出色，他们不仅更擅长一些语言和非语言的测试，而且还更能读懂人心。

第三十二段

Mental muscles 思维肌

In fact, says cognitive neuropsychologist Jubin Abutalebi, at the University of San Raffaele in Milan, it is possible to distinguish bilingual people from monolinguals simply by looking at scans of their brains. “Bilingual people have significantly more grey matter than monolinguals in their anterior cingulate cortex, and that is because they are using it so much more often,” he says. The ACC is like a cognitive muscle, he adds: the more you use it, the stronger, bigger and more flexible it gets.

金词：

distinguish a from b 区分a和b

scan [skæn] n.扫描

grey matter 灰质

flexible['fleksɪb(ə)l] adj.灵活的

金句：

The ACC is like a cognitive muscle, he adds: the more you use it, the stronger, bigger and more flexible it gets.

ACC就像是认知肌肉，他补充道：越是用，就越强，越大，越灵活。

第三十三段

Bilinguals, it turns out, exercise their executive control all the time because their two languages are constantly competing for attention. Brain-imaging studies show that when a bilingual person is speaking in one language, their ACC is continually suppressing the urge to use words and grammar from their other language. Not only that, but their mind is always making a judgement about when and how to use the target language. For example, bilinguals rarely get confused between languages, but they may introduce the odd word or sentence of the other language if the person they are talking to also knows it.

金词：

suppress  [sə'pres] vt.抑制

judgement ['dʒʌdʒm(ə)nt] n. 判断力

introduce [ɪntrə'djuːs] vt.采用

第三十四段

“My mother tongue is Polish but my wife is Spanish so I also speak Spanish, and we live in Edinburgh so we also speak English,” says Thomas Bak. “When I am talking to my wife in English, I will sometimes use Spanish words, but I never accidentally use Polish. And when I am speaking to my wife’s mother in Spanish, I never accidentally introduce English words because she doesn’t understand them. It’s not something I have to think about, it’s automatic, but my executive system is working very hard to inhibit the other languages.”

金词：

automatic  [ɔːtə'mætɪk] adj. 自动的

inhibit  [ɪn'hɪbɪt] vt.抑制

第三十五段

For bilinguals, with their exceptionally buff executive control, the flanker test is just a conscious version of what their brains do subconsciously all day long – it’s no wonder they are good at it.

Speaking a second language can help forestall the symptoms of dementia (Credit: Getty Images)

A superior ability to concentrate, solve problems and focus, better mental flexibility and multitasking skills are, of course, valuable in everyday life. But perhaps the most exciting benefit of bilingualism occurs in ageing, when executive function typically declines: bilingualism seems to protect against dementia.

金词：

buff = buffed 此处指的是被增强的

dementia [dɪ'menʃə] n.老年痴呆症

第三十六段

Psycholinguist Ellen Bialystok made the surprising discovery at York University in Toronto while she was comparing an ageing population of monolinguals and bilinguals.“The bilinguals showed symptoms of Alzheimer’s some four to five years after monolinguals with the same disease pathology（病理学）,” she says.

第三十七段

Being bilingual didn’t prevent people from getting dementia, but it delayed its effects, so in two people whose brains showed similar amounts of disease progression, the bilingual would show symptoms an average of five years after the monolingual. Bialystok thinks this is because bilingualism rewires the brain and improves the executive system, boosting people’s “cognitive reserve”. It means that as parts of the brain succumb to damage, bilinguals can compensate more because they have extra grey matter and alternative neural pathways.

金词：

rewire  [riː'waɪə] vt.重装

boost [buːst] vt. 促进

cognitive reserve 认知储备

succumb to 屈服于

第三十八段

“Bilinguals use their frontal processors for tasks that monolinguals don’t and so these processors become reinforced and better in the frontal lobe. And this is used to compensate during degeneration of the middle parts of the brain,” Bialystok explains. However, it is no good simply to have learned a little French at school. The effect depends on how often you use your bilingual skill. “The more you use it, the better,” she says, “but there’s no breaking point, it’s a continuum.”

金词：

processor  ['prəʊsesə] n.处理器

degeneration [dɪ,dʒenə'reɪʃ(ə)n] n.退化

breaking point 突破点

continuum [kən'tɪnjʊəm] n.连续统一体

大乐乐提示：第三十九段到第四十段可以略读，主要讲双语者如果中风了会恢复得更快。但是近几年也有一些质疑的声音：有人认为双语并不能带来预期的效果。

第三十九段

Bilingualism can also offer protection after brain injury. In a recent study of 600 stroke survivors in India, Bak discovered that cognitive recovery was twice as likely for bilinguals as for monolinguals.Such results suggest bilingualism helps keep us mentally fit. It may even be an advantage that evolution has positively selected for in our brains – an idea supported by the ease with which we learn new languages and flip between them, and by the pervasiveness of bilingualism throughout world history. Just as we need to do physical exercise to maintain the health of bodies that evolved for a physically active hunter-gatherer lifestyle, perhaps we ought to start doing more cognitive exercises to maintain our mental health, especially if we only speak one language.

第四十段

In recent years, there has been a backlash（反弹） against the studies showing benefits from bilingualism. Some researchers tried and failed to replicate（复制） some of the results; others questioned the benefits of improved executive function in everyday life. Bak wrote a rejoinder *(反驳）to the published criticisms, and says there is now overwhelming evidence from psychological experiments backed by imaging studies that bilingual and monolingual brains function differently. He says the *detractors（诽谤者） have made errors in their experimental methods.

第四十一段 （重点阅读段落，看看当你的观点遭到质疑时，如何有理有据的反驳）

Bialystok agrees, adding that it is impossible to examine whether bilingualism improves a child’s school exam results because there are so many confounding factors. But, she says, “given that at the very least it makes no difference – and no study has ever shown it harms performance – considering the very many social and cultural benefits to knowing another language, bilingualism should be encouraged”. As for the financial benefits, one estimate puts the value of knowing a second language at up to $128,000 over 40 years.

金词：

confound /kənˈfaʊnd/ vt. 使困惑

语法点：

Given that at the very least it makes no difference – and no study has ever shown it harms performance – considering the very many social and cultural benefits to knowing another language, bilingualism should be encouraged.

Given that引导条件状语从句，鉴于的意思

it makes no difference 中的it指代的是bilinguilism

and no study...这句话是个插入语，it也指代bilingualism

considering引导条件状语the very many social and cultural benefits to knowing another language

这里的to是介词，而不是不定式，所以后面跟的是knowing这个动名词。

主句的主语是bilingualism。

翻译：

鉴于学双语最差也就是没啥用，而且也没有研究表明学习双语会影响孩子们的成绩，考虑到多会一门外语的社交和文化益处，双语机制还是值得鼓励的嘛。

Immersing children in a second language may help benefit their performance in all subjects (Credit: Getty Images)

第四十二段

The result of my test in Athanasopoulos’s lab suggests that just 45 minutes of trying to understand another language can improve cognitive function. His study is not yet complete, but other research has shown that these benefits of learning a language can be achieved quickly. The problem is, they disappear again unless they are used – and I am unlikely to use the made-up snowflake language ever again! Learning a new language is not the only way to improve executive function – playing video games, learning a musical instrument, even certain card games can help – but because we use language all the time, it’s probably the best executive-function exerciser there is. So how can this knowledge be applied in practice?

经过一系列的实验，作者认为学习并经常使用一门外语是锻炼大脑的最佳方式。

第四十三段

One option is to teach children in different languages. In many parts of the world, this is already being done: many Indian children, for example, will use a different language in school from their mother or village tongue. But in English-speaking nations, it is rare. Nevertheless, there is a growing movement towards so-called immersion schooling（浸泡式教学）, in which children are taught in another language half the time. The state of Utah has been pioneering the idea, with many of its schools now offering immersion in Mandarin Chinese or Spanish.

第四十四段

“We use a half-day model, so the target language is used to teach in the morning, and then English is used in the afternoon – then this is swapped（交换） on other days as some learn better in the morning and some in the afternoon,” explains Gregg Roberts, who works with the Utah Office of State Education and has championed immersion language teaching in the state. “We have found that the kids do as well and generally better than monolingual counterparts in all subjects. They are better at concentrating, focusing and have a lot more self-esteem. Anytime you understand another language, you understand your language and culture better. It is economically and socially beneficial. We need to get over our affliction with monolingualism.”

第四十五段

The immersion approach is being trialled in the UK now, too. At Bohunt secondary school in Liphook, Hampshire, head teacher Neil Strowger has introduced Chinese-language immersion for a few lessons.

Immersing yourself in a new language and culture may open your mind to new ways of thinking (Credit: Getty Images)

I sit in on an art class with 12-year-olds being taught by two teachers: one speaking English, the other Chinese. The children are engaged but quiet, concentrating on the task of learning multiple ideas. When they speak it is often in Chinese – and there is something rather surreal（超现实的） about watching young people in the UK discussing British graffiti artist Banksy in Mandarin. The children say they chose to learn in Chinese because they thought it would be “fun” and “interesting” and “useful” – a far cry from the dreary French lessons I endured at school.

金词：

a far cry from sth 远非

第四十六段

The majority of the art class will take their Chinese GCSE exams several years early but Strowger tells me the programme has had many benefits in addition to their grades, including improving students’ engagement and enjoyment, increasing their awareness of other cultures so that they are equipped as global citizens, widening their horizons, and improving their job prospects.

金句：

The programme has had many benefits in addition to their grades, including improving students’ engagement and enjoyment, increasing their awareness of other cultures so that they are equipped as global citizens, widening their horizons, and improving their job prospects.

除了分数之外，（双语）计划给小朋友们带来了无穷好处，比如提升学生的参与度与愉悦感，提升他们作为世界公民的意识，开阔眼界，以及增强就业竞争力。

第四十七段

What about those of us who have left school? In order to maintain the benefits of bilingualism, you need to use your languages and that can be tricky, especially for older people who may not have many opportunities to practise. Perhaps we need language clubs, where people can meet to speak other languages. Bak has done a small pilot study with elderly people learning Gaelic in Scotland and seen significant benefits after just one week. Now he aims to carry out a much larger trial.

成年人学习外语的关键就是用。不管是口语俱乐部，还是每天保持阅读习惯，定量练习是学好外语的不二法门。

第四十八段(重点阅读段落)

It is never too late to learn another tongue, and it can be very rewarding. Alex Rawlings is a British professional polyglot who speaks 15 languages: “Each language gives you a whole new lifestyle, a whole new shade of meaning,” he says. “It’s addictive!” “People say it’s too hard as an adult. But I would say it’s much easier after the age of eight. It takes three years for a baby to learn a language, but just months for an adult.”

每多学一门语言，就多一种新的生活方式，多一种新的理解方式。学语言是让人上瘾的。有人会说成年之后学语言很难，但是我却认为八岁之后学外语容易多啦。小孩子学外语需要三年，成年人则只需要几个月。

第四十九段

As the recent research shows, that’s a worthwhile investment of time. Being bilingual could keep our minds working longer and better into old age, which could have a massive impact on how we school our children and treat older people. In the meantime, it makes sense to talk, hablar, parler, sprechen, beszel, berbicara in as many languages as you can.

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