Oh boy, do we ever have a good one for you today…
You’ve probably heard the stereotype that Asians are better at math. Turns out, it’s actually a quantifiable fact. But it isn’t necessarily because American schools are terrible or because young American kids just don’t care. No, it goes much, much deeper than that. In fact, part of the reason is the very language that you’re reading this blurb in.
Today’s episode is all about linguistic relativity — the idea that your language can not only change how you communicate, but actually how you perceive the world and interact with it.
Give it a listen.
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Show Notes:
- Big shoutout to Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers for inspiring the idea and giving us much of the content on Asian mathematics. Get Outliers on Amazon. It’s a fantastic read.
- Here also is Keith Chen’s study on how language affects savings rates and healthcare choices. And here’s the graph we were talking about as a summary:
- And finally, if you’ve somehow made it through school without reading 1984, you owe it to yourself to get caught up. Get it on Amazon here.
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