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This has had me curious for quite some time: when you speak a language other than your first, do you think in that language or do you think in your first language?

When I used to learn German (a bit out of practice now ) I would think in English and speak in German but is that because I was not confident enough with German to think in it? What do other people do?

Depends on the language. I can think in English at the same level than Spanish and even when talking about somethings, like miniatures, where most of my input comes in English I cannot think in Spanish in an instinctive way :O

On the other hand my Japanese and French still are at the "think first in Spanish, translate later" stage.

M.

It depends how fluent you are, and how much practice you get.

When I used to be really good at French, I thought in French when speaking in French.

When I used to be good at Japanese, I thought bits of things in Japanese, the Japanese translation of what I wanted to say would flash into my mind without thinking about it, kind of instinctive recognition of verb tenses, and the opposite would happen when listening to Japanese and understanding it in English.

Perhaps these situations are the same as instantaneous mental translation, but surely it comes to the same thing.

I never got that good at German or Latin, and I don't get enough French or Japanese practice these days, but I suppose it would come back if I lived in the country.

I once had a dream in Director scripting language and worked out a programming problem.

I've spoken English and Spanish all my life. When I'm on my own I think in English, because that's the language I've used most often (I live in England). When i'm with Spaniards I think in Spanish though.

It's both for me, actually.

When I learned English in Germany I would think about the translations in German and then speak English. When I moved to the USA I slowly switched to thinking in German but hearing and speaking English without having to translate in my head. Then at some point I realized that I started to think in English.

Now my mental language switches back and forth, depending on what's going on. I usually think in English when speaking to family, just because the majority of the times my "baseline" is still English. But when I visit Germany, and I'm surrounded by German, see German on TV and read German newspapers, it doesn't take me long to internally switch back to German. And it's the same process when switching back to thinking in English after the vacation ends and I'm back in the US. Neither switch is a conscious thing, I don't think about needing to switch or try to think in one language or the other. I just realize after the fact that the switch happened.

When I'm speaking English and in a primarily English-speaking environment, I think in English. When I'm speaking German and /or spending time in a German-speaking environment I think in German.

In general, when starting to learn a new language, beginners tend to think in their native language and try to mentally translate into the target language before speaking. For example, a beginner learning German might think internally "What is the word for dog? Oh, it's Hund." Then they'd say "Hund." But eventually (and the learner's goal should be) to stop thinking "dog=Hund" and just think "Hund."

Interestingly, my mental image of the words "dog" and "Hund" are different. When I think the word "dog" I get a mental image of a general dog. When I think "Hund" I get a mental image of a dog as well, but it's a different dog.

Basically, when I think of things in German, I tend to think of things slightly differently.

 mrhappyface wrote:
This has had me curious for quite some time: when you speak a language other than your first, do you think in that language or do you think in your first language?

When I used to learn German (a bit out of practice now ) I would think in English and speak in German but is that because I was not confident enough with German to think in it? What do other people do?

Startedwith thinking on finnish. Now think in english when english related. Startimg japanese was thinking inenglish(go figure) but again when japanese related now think in japanese.


Since languages aren't 1 on1 matchi find it easier to think in target. Especially when listening

As said, depends on how fluent you are. I think in Dutch, English and German, and am starting to do so in Portugese. In French on the other hand, and when I was still learning Portuguese I think in Dutch or English, then translate.

Lately I've caught myself counting in Thai in my head, I'm not even remotely fluent.

I'm learning German, and what I do know I think in German instead of translating in my head, but then I'll hit a wall where I don't know what's being said, and I revert to English. Its weird.

I personally have topic/theme division. This is mostly based on the language any given information has been absorbed in. For example, all 40K related thoughts and conversations are quite difficult for me to even translate fluently into Polish! (my native language). This is because above certain level of multilingual fluency mind does not even bother to translate anything, it is just bilingual. This can most easily observed in small multilingual children (raised in multilingual families): they will often change language in the middle of the sentence, depending on which semantic coverage of given word is closer to what they exactly want to express.

Same effect, combined with some personal traits, makes me sometimes "hang" in the middle of a sentence in Polish, because an English word came to my mind as an ideal for a given meaning, and I struggle to find close enough Polish equivalent. This can be even more frustrating with idioms and certain linguistic structures that have no equivalent at all.

And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

We have bred up our daughter to be bilingual in Japanese and English. She switches language instantly as needed. The two languages are completely unrelated in structure and vocabulary, but clearly she does not need to pause to mentally translate.

She also learnt Latin and German, and is reasonably fluent in French (studying International Baccalaureate level.)

I think the more languages you study and learn to speak, the better you become at learning and speaking languages.

 godardc wrote:
And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

Now that is a good question.

I would imagen that they think in images and sights that they have seen.

But what of Deaf-blind children?

I went through Arabic language training when I was in the Marine Corps. Sadly, I did not complete the course and declined to reenlist shortly later. But while I was there, I never stopped thinking in English. I did notice that once I got used to certain Arabic words written down, I'd actually read them in English. It's like they became symbols that meant an English word.

One of the destructive byproducts of my time there was that for about two or three years I lost my ability to write complex sentences. My Arabic training was almost exclusively done with declarative sentences. When verbs were used, it was all simple subject/verb structure. After eight months of this, I found that I unwittingly retrained myself to a sixth grade writing level.

 mrhappyface wrote:

 godardc wrote:
And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

Now that is a good question.

I would imagen that they think in images and sights that they have seen.

But what of Deaf-blind children?

I am always wondering how infants think who don't have any language yet.

 d-usa wrote:

 mrhappyface wrote:

 godardc wrote:
And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

Now that is a good question.

I would imagen that they think in images and sights that they have seen.

But what of Deaf-blind children?

I am always wondering how infants think who don't have any language yet.

Probably mostly in images and feelings as opposed to internal monologue.

I use so much English I am pretty much as good at it as I am with Swedish; I use both effectively interchangeably.

My English is not flawless and many subtleties are lost on me but as a person with autism I am used to that.

Sorry ladies I only speak American. /flex

I dated a German girl for quite a few years. She had taught herself English as an adult, she was very dedicated and became truly excellent at it (which was fortunate, because my German is awful). I used to quiz her a lot about being bilingual. She absolutely thought in English, and after living in England for a few years, she found it difficult to switch back to German. Though interestingly when she did maths, she would always count in German. Another interesting thing was that if she was speaking English, and someone spoke German to her unexpectedly, she wouldn't necessarily understand what they said. It was like she had to switch something in her head first. On a couple of occasions (very rarely), she would randomly speak German to me, and when I told her she had spoken in German, she'd be really surprised because she genuinely thought she had been speaking English.

I also discovered that I don't know English nearly as well as I'd thought I did. There are a lot of words that I thought I knew the meaning of, but when asked to explain them, I discovered that I actually had no idea. An example might be something like the difference between a pond and a lake... we all think we know what a pond is, but when asked why one small body of water is a pond and another is a lake, it turns out I really have no clue what the absolute definition of either is. You might be surprised just how many words there are like that.

Over time, my German got a little bit better. I found that for phrases I used often, I wouldn't need translate them in my head, any more than an English speaker needs to translate cul-de-sac into "dead end street" in their head. A cul-de-sac is just a cul-de-sac, you know what it is. And just as cul-de-sac has been assimilated into the English language, so too are foreign words adsorbed into your mind as synonyms. I still use Fuß sometime to refer to my foot, it's just another word for the same thing, it doesn't really matter to your brain where the word came from, so long as it can find it in time to keep up with your mouth

I only speak one language but my mom is a Spanish teacher and I regularly use the word "gato" when talking to the cats, and when they're both together on the couch or the kitchen I always say "dos gatos" without thinking about it.

Never really thought about it before.

 d-usa wrote:

 mrhappyface wrote:

 godardc wrote:
And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

Now that is a good question.

I would imagen that they think in images and sights that they have seen.

But what of Deaf-blind children?

I am always wondering how infants think who don't have any language yet.

Maybe like animals ? Animals think too, without speaking ?

I think in the language that i am currently speaking/writing (Dutch, English, German, Japanese)

Is it just my imagination or is Japanese surprisingly frequent language listed here?

 godardc wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 mrhappyface wrote:

 godardc wrote:
And how do deaf people think ? I mean, deafs borned deafs

Now that is a good question.

I would imagen that they think in images and sights that they have seen.
But what of Deaf-blind children?

I am always wondering how infants think who don't have any language yet.

Maybe like animals ? Animals think too, without speaking ?

But, how do you ask them about it?

Kilkrazy wrote:
I think the more languages you study and learn to speak, the better you become at learning and speaking languages.

Very true. I don't speak Spanish but recently travelled there and in only 3 weeks was understanding what people said (only simple conversations, mind) and how things are pronounced differently between Spanish and Portugese.

If you really know a language other than yours when you talk in that language you also think in it. If you're not very fluent you still think in your own language.

 Blackie wrote:
If you really know a language other than yours when you talk in that language you also think in it. If you're not very fluent you still think in your own language.

That may be your experience but it wasn't mine. I wish it were, because I'd have done much better and might even have pursued a career related to Arabic in some way. Meh, water under the bridge.

 Blackie wrote:
If you really know a language other than yours when you talk in that language you also think in it. If you're not very fluent you still think in your own language.

That.

When I was completely fluent in Spanish, i.e. read, write, speak...I would think in Spanish when I spoke. Now, the skills are a bit rusty and I still use it on occasion, but I drift in and out of English thought and translation.

 Breotan wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
If you really know a language other than yours when you talk in that language you also think in it. If you're not very fluent you still think in your own language.

That may be your experience but it wasn't mine. I wish it were, because I'd have done much better and might even have pursued a career related to Arabic in some way. Meh, water under the bridge.

I suppose that depends on how you define fluency and knowing a language. Were you able to hold conversations with someone in the target language while thinking in English?