In December, many teachers are either rejoicing or lamenting the numbers in their elective cohort. Our teaching community is incredibly generous, and I have seen many extensive lists shared, promoting the numerous positive outcomes of studying a language.
I was thus horrified to learn of the “Over-justification effect” and whilst I do not suggest you abandon your current marketing campaign, you may want to declutter it somewhat in light of the following research.
In 1973 a study was conducted by psychologist Mark Lepper that discovered that having too many incentives actually decreases the effectiveness of the original incentive and can undermine or dilute the central reason we pursue an activity. (page 39, Get it done – surprising lessons from the science of motivation” by Dr Ayelet Fishbach)
This concept was developed further by research by Maimaran and Fishbach. The 2014 project encouraged preschoolers to eat healthy foods by telling them eating such foods had benefits including making you strong or helping you learn to count. This had the surprising effect of actually reducing the children’s consumption of the healthy snacks as they assumed that a snack that served multiple purposes (such as making you strong and helping you learn) was less likely to be meet the main reason they were originally interested in the snacks – because they tasted good. This is also supported by another concept called the “Dilution principle” that suggests that the more incentives there are the more a person is distracted from their original intrinsic motivation. (page 41, Fishbach)
This gave me cause to reflect on the mixed messages I may be sending my students.
If they are naturally motivated to study Japanese because they want to communicate in that language, want to visit Japan and are interested in Japanese culture, am I really helping the cause my mentioning it will improve their literacy skills and brain function.
I then became curious and googled the question “Why should you learn a second language, art or music?”.
The gist of the quote was that music would help bring balance and harmony into my life, art could make me better at whatever I do whilst languages would help me retain lists and concentrate for longer!
If I was a kid choosing an elective, it stands to reason that the more we tell them it is “good for them” the less it will seem to be a fun option.
Despite what we are told, people don’t hate learning languages and don’t find it boring – when it is not in the school context. My own teenage son and his mates have been learning random languages based purely on interest via Duolingo. Their language choices were not based on any cultural affiliation or actual desire to study that language for gains in the future, they just thought it would be fun.
Duolingo are obviously doing something right as they are quoted as having generated $250 million in revenue in 2021, a 55% year-on-year increase with over 500 million registered users and 37 million users active each month. By contrast, the HSC enrolments in Japanese for both Beginners and Continuers hover around 1200 per course each year – we could use some Duolingo 55% year-on-year increases!
If you look at the Duolingo website the benefits they list for learning a language are all about human connection. They sight examples of how it has helped a footballer connect with his teammates, others to connect with their spouse’s family or the local community, or as a fun activity to do with a partner. This fun perspective of language learning is not crowded out by any extraneous incentives.
Perhaps it is time we also begin to focus on these original reasons why people learn a language, predominately for human connection, and just maybe then our cohorts will remember too, why they loved us in the first place.
