Do bilingual people think in both languages?

[ricki]

I am taking a class in college; cultural anthropology.  I am to interview a bilingual person, but I don't know any so I decided to post an interview here and use this data for my answer.  The assignment was:

Interview someone you know who speaks more than one language (actually interview someone ? don?t just tell us what you think). In which kinds of situations does the person use language A, and in which language B? Do people also think in more than one language? What gestures, body language, or other changes accompany switches in language?

Please give serious answers; this is for class credit.  Thanks.

[camila]

Yes, they do.

[curlz]

When you know more than one language, it is always better to think in the language you are talking at the time, as the words or phrases looses their meaning when you translate them literally.

As for the body gestures, generally they could be the same, depends on how comfortable you feel with person you are talking with (this is a big factor in the body gestures and gestures).

[Jones]

I'm sure they think in the language they use most often.....at least, that's been my experience......

[Millan]

I'm bilingual in english and spanish. In fact I learned spanish first even though i was born in Georgia. I speak spanish at home because my parents are hispanic, but if i go anywhere else I speak english. Now for you question, everytime I have to think, such as "What should I do tomorrow?" or " 3 +48=?" I completely think in english. There is never a time when I actually "think" in spanish. In fact, even when i'm speaking spanish to someone I will think my thoughts in english. Weird huh? hope that helps.

[hummingbird]

Being a multilingual person myself, I think it depends on the person. The correct answer would probably be "not necessarily"
I speak four languages, and think in all four - well, I haven't been speaking Catalan for some time, so neither have I been thinking in that language.
I happen to be a bit of a "day dreamer", with a lot of imagination.  So I can momentarily forget that I am originally English-speaking.  For instance, if I am driving my car to meet with a Spanish speaking person, then I find myself thinking in Spanish.  the same with French.   But I think it is possible to be bilingual or multilingual without having that particular characteristic.
During the last 40 years I have lived either in French or in Spanish, with the exception of one year when I was living and working mostly in English.  However I find when I am counting or adding up figures in my head, if I am tired or if there is the slightest difficulty, I will be thinking of the numbers in English.  (Maths is my weak point).

[Hungry!]

I think in both languages, but just some words. at the beginning I thought iin spanish and then I translate but with practice I began to speak faster and thinking in english, at least the easy words and some vocabulary.
Everything depends of the practice and the time.

[Hawke]

Well, yes there are some cases where we have to think in both languages. For example, when I am at home I speak Spanish all the time, the same situation when I'm chatting with friends from my country etc.
On the other hand when I go to work, school or even a trip to the mall I have to think in English.
It really helps a lot to know two languages but sometimes it's kind of annoying because let's say I'm having a conversation with somebody who speaks English and I start saying words in Spanish (they look at me like I'm crazy or something lol) or when I'm having a conversation in Spanish I start mixing words with English too. So yeah we kind of have to think in both languages.
As far as body gestures go, well it's like a whole different thing because there are some signs that Spanish speaking people use to communicate that English speakers do not use.
Well I hope that helps you with your homework. Good luck.

[Melanie]

it totally depends on the situation.

If someone asks me something in Spanish, I'll switch into Spanish.  It's not like you are constantly translating words from one language to another.

(being not raised bilingual) Dreaming in the second language after being immersed in it for a while is pretty trippy.  It's like suddenly the part of your brain that used to translate just turns off (in most occasions) and you can speak, with out thinking about what you're going to say.  I think that's the best part.  Using the language becomes natural.

Gestures and body language change as you change who you're around.  If I'm around my biological parents, then i use American gestures and customs.  It's the same when I was with my host parents. i just changed depending on the environment.

[coco]

Yes, they do. It just comes naturally and it usually takes the form of whatever language the other person is speaking with. Unless of course you can't think of a certain word.

[Melanie]

I speak hindi and english...

when its a very serious matter i tend to think in Hindi...
for casual day today matters English comes to my mind and Hindi as well..

I think yes because thinking is one of the ways of improving language. when u was learning german i used to think in german as well...but limited thoughts though...

for people who are not having a very good hold at the language they tend to become uncomfortable and not very much confident...

[Millan]

Yes.

I speak fluently in 3 tongues (English, Filipino and Cebuano). I am currently learning Japanese.
I think in different languages. I sometimes jump from one language to another when i'm thinking.

I think mostly in my native tongue (Cebuano). Where the situation is about my life and family or happy thoughts and fun things.
When situation are about my work or in serious stuffs i think in english.
When situations are about my country's issues I sometimes think in Filipino which is our national language..
With japanese.. I think when i'm practising with it. I sometimes imagine talking to a Japanese.

[aero]

We think in the language we're speaking at the moment. When you switch from one language to the other you start thinking in that language automatically.

It would be impossible to master a language if you need to translate everything you want to say. That's not the way it works.

When I'm thinking about my  life in general, what I'm going to do, how I'm going to solve a problem etc, I normally think in my native language. However every now and then I have found myself thinking in my second language in those situations.
.
.

[hummingbird]

I think bilingual people think in the language they're most fluent in. I know mandarin and I've never thought in mandarin before.
But once I had a dream where everyone spoke mandarin. It was really weird.

[hummingbird]

it very much depends on the "subjects" you're looking for. Linguists differentiate between (1) The use of more than one language and (2) The ability to speak more than one language naturally & fluently in all areas of life. Very often, ppl who're in type (2) are regarded as a native speaker of both (or more) the languages they speak.. So if you ask them what their mother tongue is, they probably cannot tell.. They can only tell you which one is more "dominant".

Some cognitive studies have shown that type (1) ppl use different parts of the brain when they speak the different languages, whereas type (2) ppl may hv part of the cognitive activity overlapped - as if they treat both languages as one. But whether there is any substantial explanation to this, and whether this "difference" (if there is, at all) is substantiated is yet to be explored. I personally find it very interesting though.

About myself, I'm a Cantonese speaker who can speak English fluently. I'd regard myself as a type (1) person because I didn't "pick up" my English like some others did, but I can use it almost as naturally as the type (2) group do.. I'd say it took me a lot of hard work tho. Given my ability to speak both languages, I do think in two modes. I'm more inclined to thinking in English when i talk with english speakers.. but perhaps i use both Cantonese and English a lot that I tend to "code mix" when I speak the former.. I attribute it to the unique situation in Hong Kong, the place where I live, where ppl mix and switch between Cantonese and English a whole lot.. It's very often where the fun lies coz lots of jokes can be created out of the language mix

BTW I'm also a moderate speaker of Mandarin. I haven't really learnt to speak it till last year... but the fact this language is rather prevalent in HK, u get qt a bit of exposure it. So I could speak it fairly well b4 i began to take classes. i almost never think in Mandarin.. probably coz i dun hv any Mandarin-speaking fd.. when i speak the dialect, I sometimes need to "scour" my limited vocab bank in search for the right word and sound.

On gestures, I do switch between English & Cantonese.. But I don't switch to another mode when I speak Mandarin.. Probably it's because Mandarin & Cantonese belong to the same language family at large, and there aren't obvious differences in the gestures.. but then I won't deny it's because of my lack of exposure to Mandarin speakers.

BTW, even when i speak English, my body language would be different when I speak to a Westerner than to an Asian. With an Asian, i tend to retain my Chinese (and hence Asian) mode when doing non-verbal communications.

[TI]

it really depends who i'm talking to at the moment and what i'm talking about. i speak filipino and english and there are some words in both languages that dont directly translate into the other. it really depends on what i need. there are also times when i can't really express myself in one language because i'm thinking in the other, and thinking of a word non-existent in the former but present in the latter.

[Melanie]

I am a multilingual person and I have given this problem quite a lot of attention. I speak fluently several languages (more than 5) and I do not think in any of these because, definitely, thinking in any language is a handicap for the fluency. Let's put it that way: you think in English and you speak French. It will take you time to translate the words, to find structures, to adjust for these structures, do the agreements, etc. And these languages are quite close together. What if you decide to speak Japanese instead? There are persons who do this job of translating and they soon have a time lag they have to fill. They do it with a lot of parasitic sounds and words like er, hmm, I mean, whatever, you know, repeating words or propositions, making a lot of gestures, laughing etc. which are more or less automatic activities, meanwhile allowing them to think. In my case I have noticed that I think in a way that could be described as hovering over all languages I know. The thought is done in general notions like e.g. A, B, C, action1, action2 . Each of these (A,B,C,- nouns, pronouns and actions) is a cluster comprising descriptives or cases. That allows the covering of both SOV or SVO languages. (S-subject, O-object, V-verb) An illustration of the above would be that could be turned into . I can jump from one language but not at every moment. There are some "junctions" where two or more languages intersect and where I can make the switch. When I speak a language I am perceiving not only the verbal flow but I also the body language and get additional information trying to anticipate the direction in which the conversation goes preparing alternative structures which I later fill in with words. As the saying goes in these parts "You are so many persons as the number of languages you know", switching to speaking another language is not only a matter of producing words in a certain order but also perceiving and reproducing a multitude of actions and stances. I would mention producing sounds that you never heard from your mother, add or remove tones, state your sex and/or position in group or society, assimilating new conventions of writing which could even lead to new forms of art, get cultural references (including art, history, mithology, slang) a.s.o.
I could go on like this for quite a while but I have to finish. I would say as a conclusion that the true multilingual becomes those persons I was talking about and is a mild case of multiple personality.
P.S. English is not my mother tongue, it's just one (not the best) of the languages I speak fluently, so you have here a measure to judge the extent to which I have become an English speaking person. Also, I am not earning my life in the field of humanities.
Good luck with your work!

[Jesse_J]

I grew up bilingual - German and English. But I noticed that when I was in phases of learning or getting deeper into understanding one or the other I also started to think more in that language. My problem was that we moved a couple of times back and forth after my parents separated. And then one language was monopolized - mostly just to get back into it. But It has always been easier for me to stay on track w/ the English language in Germany, because it is being taught in the schools and for business use. Now that I live here in the U.S. again I don't have that many opportunities to practice. But I try to prevent the loss by thinking German, teaching my dog German commands and talking/teaching my daughter. If you would like to know more you can either e-mail or IM me.

[Sandstorm]

My experience will carry less weight than the others because I'm not truly multilingual. I just study languages whenever I get a chance. Right now I'm working on improving my French, and Spanish, and also really getting into Greek. But every once in awhile, I occasionally forget that I'm an English speaker.

I've had a couple dreams in French when I was using the language on a more regular basis, and that was bizarre, especially since I could only understand about half of what was said in the dream.  When I'm singing along to music in Spanish, I sometimes find that the words will "reorientate" themselves in my head, without me having to consciously translate.

I'm also a writer, and I've had to laugh at myself a couple times when I realized I had sprinkled words from other languages into a piece of writing. And I can remember a time when I needed a better word for 'look', and instead, my brain just made a switch, and simply gave me the words for 'look' in Spanish and German.

If I'm speaking to someone where numbers are involved, I've had to consciously stop myself from using  the French and Greek words, and to not answer the phone, or greet somebody in Greek. I've also found myself automatically transliterating from Greek to English, and vice versa.

But in all cases, it's only ever been a phrase or two. I can't (yet) do any in-depth thinking in any other languages. Maybe that will come in time.

[Millan]

Roughly, I speak about 4 languages. I know English and Spanish quite fluently and I have a good grasp of German and Creole. But I only think in English though and I mainly talk in English also.

English is my first language and I only use the other ones when the situation calls for it so I usually am speaking in English about 90% of the time.