Say 'I'm angry' out loud, and your brain reacts to it, reducing the use of emotional brain regions. But this trick does not work if you say it in your second language. New study shows that it doesn't work in any language if you are a balanced bilingual. Psychologist Marc-Lluís Vives explains the surprising findings that made it into the leading journal PNAS.
Marc-Lluís Vives is more proficient in Catalan, which he spoke in his family and school, than in Spanish, which his mother speaks. Previous work indicates that labelling his sadness in Catalan would help him feel better, reducing the involvement of the amygdala. This is the brain region linked to emotional processing. Putting feelings into words is thus a well-known strategy to downregulate emotions, preventing them from taking over.
151 people in a scanner
Vives completed his PhD in Barcelona, researching judgement, decision-making and emotional processing in a foreign language. 'After our work showing that labelling emotions in a less proficient language did not help reduce the neural activity linked to emotional processing, my colleagues Tatiana Davydova and Víctor Costumero wondered: how would this work if you were equally proficient in two languages?' Vives now works in Leiden, but remained involved in the study, for which 151 people in Castelló underwent fMRI scans.
A sad woman's face
'We studied two groups of bilingual speakers: Spanish-English and Spanish-Catalan. Some were equally proficient in both languages, while others had a preferred language,' Vives explains. The participants were shown, for example, a picture of a sad woman's face. 'It is well established that you absorb some of the emotion expressed by such a face.'
Very surprised by the results
The participants had to label emotions they saw in both languages they spoke, while the scanner showed which parts of their brains were active. The main question was: what does the amygdala do? 'We were very surprised by the results. In some participants, labelling emotions did not reduce amygdala activation in any of their two languages.'
No idea why this happens
The researchers discovered a new constraint on affective labelling. Their results show that it matters whether bilinguals are genuinely equally proficient in two languages 'The amygdala only deactivated when someone labelled an emotion in their dominant, native language. But labelling failed for balanced bilinguals', Vives says. 'We have no idea why this happens,' adds Vives. 'None of the current theories would have predicted these results.'
It does no harm
The findings provide interesting material for further research. But we would like to know now: could it be harmful? Are balanced bilinguals consumed by grief, or could they become aggressive when they get angry? Fortunately, Vives does not think so. 'There are other mechanisms that can help you regulate your emotions. We studied an implicit one, but you also have reappraisal, which is to try to change the way you are constructing the situation.'
The researcher is wary of jumping to conclusions. 'So far, we have looked only at one specific task, performed by participants inside an MRI scanner. I can't wait to investigate these kinds of effects in settings such as therapy.'
