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| Tequila or tacos, learning Spanish is hopeless without enough motivation Photo credit: Laurence Simon licensed CC BY 2.0 |
How does this discovery affect language learners?
This new discovery will affect you more or less depending on how rewarding you find language learning already. If you are one of those lucky people who naturally feel good when studying Spanish, then you probably already find it easier than most! Spurred on by your brain’s reward mechanism, you are likely to end up progressing much quicker than your classmates, simply because you enjoy studying more than they do.
If you are amongst those that find chocolate, games, and sex more rewarding than study, then don’t despair. There are still plenty of ways that you can maximize the ‘feel good factor’ that comes from studying a new language.
The first thing that you need to ask yourself is “What am I motivated by?” You might not get a rush from study, but what about competing, risk-taking, traveling or something else? It might sound obvious, but without a reason and a motivation, your interest in study might simply peter out before you reach fluency. This is where ‘artificial’ rewards and goals come in. Santiago condenses this philosophy in a grand total of four essential building blocks of any successful language acquisition program including, of course, Spanish.
1. Make Sure To Learn New Things!
The experiment specifically showed that people feel good when they learn new words as opposed to simply studying a language. Problematically, repetition is also important as it is a crucial tool for getting words and phrases to stick in the long term memory. Unfortunately, repeating old words doesn’t feel half as interesting as discovering new ones.
To keep language learning feel fresh, make sure that your study sessions include a nice balance of reviewing the old and exploring the new. Whilst spending a long time reviewing vocabulary is great for the long term memory, spend too much time on the old and not enough on the new and there’s a danger that you might lose interest in Spanish altogether.
2. Gamble Your Way To Better Español
If you are a risk-taker, a gambler or naturally competitive, why not challenge a friend or classmate of yours to a wager? This could be related to short term goals or long term goals. The stakes can range from “I bet you one burrito that you can’t memorize all the Spanish household vocabulary words by the end of the week” to “I bet you a meal at that nice tapas place that you can’t hold a ten minute conversation in Spanish by the end of the summer.” This is clearly not a suitable strategy for everyone, but if you’re one of those people that gets a buzz from betting and overcoming challenges, then it might just work for you.
3. Make Learning Spanish Feel Like a Game
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| Learning Spanish can easily be as much fun as hitting a piñata blindfolded! Photo credit: Daniel Cortes licensed CC BY-SA 2.0 |
For those fortunate enough to have an experienced teacher, your language classes should already feel like a game. There are obstacles to overcome, rules to learn and rewards that you can unlock. If you are in a small class that emphasizes speaking rather than listening, you might already know that each lesson can be fun. If you are in a larger class that feels more like a lecture than a game, it might be time to consider taking your classes elsewhere.
Don’t believe that language learning can be an addictive game? Try telling that to the people behind Duolingo®. This one’s a language learning app that has become wildly popular in recent years with millions of learners downloading it. Part of the appeal is that the courses are structured like a game, meaning that users get to trigger that reward mechanism whilst practising their Spanish. It also strikes a good balance between reviewing the old (long term memory) and exploring the new (brain reward mechanism).
4. Learn a Language With Love
Cross-cultural romances are on the rise in countries around the world, and there’s nothing like love to motivate someone to break through the language barrier. Resist the temptation to use only one language or have one partner act as a translator all the time and instead make the most of this unique opportunity to learn another tongue.
Attending informal language learning events, such as a MeetUp® at a local restaurant or a Couchsurfing® meeting in a nearby cafe, is a good way to combine high calorie foods, potential romance and to expand your vocabulary, perhaps triggering not one but three reward mechanisms in your brain! Even if you are already spoken for, or not in the mood for romance, that doesn’t mean that you can’t have a meaningful platonic relationship with a foreign language speaker. Having someone that you want to communicate with is an excellent way to motivate your language learning and reward your brain for its hard work.
5. Reward Yourself For Learning Spanish
Despite all the reward mechanisms in our brain that can help us to learn Spanish, there’s no disguising the fact that mastering another language takes a lot of hard work and dedication too. That’s why it’s important to take the time to reward yourself for reaching certain milestones in your Spanish progress. These should range from the simple, such as time off for some Spanish music or film for doing all your homework, to the complex, such as that once in a lifetime trip to Central America that you’ve always wanted to take. Take it from me though, when you do finally get to a level of Spanish that you are pleased with, you’ll feel rewarded by the gift of a second language for the rest of your life.
Santiago is the director and founder of Spanish Tutor DC, a language school for learners of all abilities. He has been working on integrating the fields of education and mass media in Europe and Latin America for more than fifteen years.
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