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[What's Burning?]

While it doesn’t get much better than sex and drugs for many out there, new research has found that simply learning a new word can spark up the same reward circuits in the brain that are activated during pleasurable activities such as these. No wonder there are so many bookworms and scrabble addicts out there.

Human language is a unique phenomenon that separates us from other members of the animal kingdom. The emergence of language was a hugely important step in our evolution because it allowed humans to cooperate and share knowledge more easily. But what motivates us to acquire a new language from a very early age has been a mystery. Some hypothesized that language-learning mechanisms may have been linked to reward circuits in the brain, reinforcing the drive to learn new words. Until now, however, experimental evidence in support of this has been lacking.

For this latest study, which has been published in Current Biology, researchers from Spain and Germany looked at the brain activity of 36 adult participants using a technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Scans were taken while the participants were performing two different activities: learning the meaning of new words from context in a sentence, and a gambling task.

During both word learning and gambling, participants exhibited activity in the ventral striatum, which is a core area involved in reward and motivation. This same region is activated during a wide range of pleasurable activities, such as eating great food, having umpalumpa and taking drugs. During word learning activities, synchronization between the cortical language regions and the ventral striatum was also increased. Furthermore, those with better connections between these two circuits were found to be able to learn more words than those with weaker links.

Taken together, these results suggest that the union of these two brain circuits bestowed humans with an important advantage that ultimately resulted in the emergence of linguistic skills. “From the point of view of evolution, it is an interesting theory that this type of mechanism could have helped human language to develop,” lead author Antoni Fornells told La Vanguardia. The findings, he says, call into question whether language is solely product of the evolution of the brain cortex, and could even suggest that emotions may influence the process of language acquisition.

[racechick]

Now that's very interesting WB, but why is doing my French homework so much more of a chore than those other things on your pleasurable activity list?

[sagi58]

RC, I'm betting it's because doing something task-oriented, such as homework
isn't as pleasurable as learning a word just for the sake of learning a word!!

What I find interesting is that in English, the words are not always spelt as
they are pronounced. Just love knowing how to spell those!!

e.g. paediatrician -- and, yes, I do know it's also spelt pediatrician.

Or words that are spelt the same (in Canada and the U.S. of A.); but, which
as pronounced differently!!

e.g. lieutenant -- we are supposed to pronounce it "lef-ten-ant" in Canada;
but, that spelling throws many off, so that more and more are pronouncing
it as it's spelt.

[Jabberwocky]

Colour and tyres

[What's Burning?]

I see spelling as pedantic and not contributing to the linguistic learning experience. A rote exercise. Learning to spell a word is not the same as learning the meaning of a word in my opinion and therefore not exciting. As Mark Twain would say, never trust a man that can only spell a word one way.

[sagi58]

Spelling and the history of the word are just different aspects of linguistics.
Just as the mechanics of a car are just one aspect in its performance.

[racechick]

You know when I first read the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be about people who were addicted to logging on to their computer.

[What's Burning?]

You know when I first read the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be about people who were addicted to logging on to their computer.

But yet you became strangely aroused when you read further into it?

[racechick]

You know when I first read the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be about people who were addicted to logging on to their computer.

But yet you became strangely aroused when you read further into it?

Well you mentioned such nice things! You just missed off chocolate.

[sagi58]

You know when I first read the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be about people who were addicted to logging on to their computer.

I thought it had something to do with trees!! Well, logs, anyway!!

[racechick]

You know when I first read the title of this thread, I thought it was going to be about people who were addicted to logging on to their computer.

I thought it had something to do with trees!! Well, logs, anyway!!

addicted to chopping down trees....no I'm not going there.

Or addicted to....... no I'm not going their either

[Hammer278]

I thought its about people who have a phobia with logos.

[CookinFlat6]

I see spelling as pedantic and not contributing to the linguistic learning experience. A rote exercise. Learning to spell a word is not the same as learning the meaning of a word in my opinion and therefore not exciting. As Mark Twain would say, never trust a man that can only spell a word one way.

hear hear!! Its so true. The whole learned knowledge/rote learning and even IQ system are all part of yet another old scam, like the professional saying H20 instead of water to when water will do. The education system doesnt really want creative or independent thinkers or leaders, only compliant workers who know what they are meant to know and are dependent on what they remember and not what they can work out

Apart from lawyers never trust a man that cant understand a miss-spelt word

[Jabberwocky]

I agree with Burnie, as a dyslexic as a child I was educated in a school that still followed the grammar school method of teaching. All book work and no hands on work. The outcome was that I was left pretty much to my own devices to educate myself. The only time they took notice of me was when I showed a flair for maths and physics, paticularly electronics. For once things made sense for me

[racechick]

Don't get me started on how children learn ........ And how they are taught. Drives me mental!!