Can the language you speak change the way you plan for the future? Our new work shows it can <https://t.co/0GBN3W4r7J>.
Listen to co-author Sean Roberts and discuss it on @becauselangpod at https://t.co/9h2Auk1umS
"Low-certainty modals not future tenses cause increased psychological discounting in English relative to Dutch"
📢 New paper from: Cole Robertson (@ColebRob), Seán Roberts, Asifa Majid, Tammy Lu, Philip Wolff, & Robin Dunbar
https://t.co/4G159xI3pv
So we show differences between languages change how people plan for the future and make decisions where they must weigh present costs and future rewards.
But it's all about those modals impacting how risky and unknown the future feels.
Pleased to _finally_ get this work out into world. In it, we provide a valuable update to @MKeithChen's hypothesis that languages which oblige a future tense make people more likely to save for the future.
https://t.co/Zho9wJ1Ryw
It's not tense marking (e.g. will) but low-certainty modals (could, may, might) that make the difference.
English obliges speakers to chose a modal verb when they make a prediction about the future. This makes them construe the future as riskier and less valuable.
We show that English grammar causes speakers to value future outcome higher than Dutch speakers.
This suggests languages affect the way we make decisions about time, but undermines the mechanisms widely attributed to cause this.
https://t.co/NLSqBsnIIM
@MKeithChen ?
The claim that GPT-4 performed at the 90th percentile on the Uniform Bar Exam appears misleading according to this new preprint.
It seems more accurate to say it performs in the 63rd or 68th percentile.
We show that people who struggle with anxiety and/or depression talk about the future differently to healthy controls. They are less certain even though they talk about more proximal future dates. Why? Read the paper to find out:)
https://t.co/Xt4Njv2vaG
@KricheliKatz@MKeithChen@regev_tali Super interesting work. I just checked my data. Left is within-subject SD of temporal distance ratings. Dutch is higher across the board. Right is between-subject. Dutch has significantly higher spread from one month–one year. But is this due to differences in *tense* marking?
Are cross linguistic difference in future grammar all about time or all about probability? In contrast to conventional wisdom, we show the latter may be true. What do you think @MKeithChen?
https://t.co/sCRnwveh5c
@KricheliKatz@MKeithChen@regev_tali On reflection, I agree, too. I had been conceptualising these effects as within-subject, but either could work. I actually have some potential within-subject data that could answer this question...
@MKeithChen@KricheliKatz@regev_tali That’s right but the precision mechanism hypothesises individual weak-FTR speakers # represent future dates less precisely. Higher variance between subjects doesn’t necessarily entail this. You’d have ask individuals the same question multiple times.