How foreign language affects decisions: Rethinking the brain-drain model

Abstract

Volk, Köhler, and Pudelko (JIBS, 45, 2014, 862-885) propose that foreign language use depletes cognitive resources, thus hindering individual decision making and self-regulation. The present commentary highlights studies showing that foreign language use can also improve decision making and self-regulation. We propose that these benefits derive from two psychological factors. The first concerns the timing of cognitive depletion. Foreign language use involves an increase of memory load in the early phases of information processing, which has been shown to reduce the capture of attention by tempting stimuli. The second factor concerns the nature of human memory. Experiences and their associated emotions are coded in the language in which they occur, and thus are more accessible when the same language is used at retrieval. Therefore, certain mental constructs, such as stereotypes, which have been shaped by years of cultural learning in a native language context, may exert less influence when processing a foreign language. The present treatment indicates value in extending Volk et al.'s conceptual model, and can help develop language strategies that may ultimately improve organizational decision making.

Strategic Decision-Making in a Global Context: The Comprehension Effect of Foreign Language Use on Cooperation

“…Significance levels (two-sided): + p < 0.10, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, and ***p < 0.001 to a decision-that is, information processing and decision-making utilizing this information. This distinction, which mirrors similar distinctions in, among others, prospect theory (Kahneman and Tversky 1979), helps resolve previous debates on possibly opposing effects of foreign language use on thinking and decision-making (Hadjichristidis et al 2017;Volk et al 2014). Drawing on the role of personal characteristics in dual-process theories (Stanovich 2009) and recent research on language-related effects on decision-making (e.g., Urbig et al 2016), we also demonstrate that foreign language proficiency and individual disposition toward deliberate thinking, as individual-level variables, moderate the relationship between foreign language use, as a contextual stimulus, and comprehension and cooperation behavior, respectively, as behavioral outcomes.…”

“…If information processing and decisionmaking compete for mental resources, then cognitive load due to more deliberate information processing might lead to less cognitive capacity available for decision-making, and hence to more intuitive rather than deliberate decision-making. Our conceptual focus on comprehension, which separates information processing from decision-making, and our consideration of the specific timing of these processes (cf., Hadjichristidis et al 2017) in tandem enables us to demonstrate how foreign language use can be theorized to induce both less (e.g., Costa et al 2014a;Keysar et al 2012) and more (e.g., Takano and Noda 1993;Volk et al 2014) heuristic thinking.…”

“…Strategic Decision-Making in a Global Context: The… comprehension identifies previously hidden conceptual ambiguities with respect to different and possibly opposing mechanisms that link foreign language use with individuals' decision-making in a global context. To better understand the effect of foreign language use on decision-making, we follow previous research on decision-making (e.g., Ellsberg 1961;Kahneman and Tversky 1979) and on decision-making in foreign language research (e.g., Hadjichristidis et al 2017), explicitly distinguishing between information processing, which leads to more or less comprehension, and decision-making, which builds on the comprehended information. We emphasize that deliberate and reflective information processing, which can be activated by using a foreign language (Costa et al 2014a), is more than intuitive decision-making associated with a high cognitive load (cf., Evans and Stanovich 2013).…”

“…Strategic Decision-Making in a Global Context: The… and related outcomes, from evaluation and decision processes (Ellsberg 1961;Hadjichristidis et al 2017;Kahneman and Tversky 1979;Tversky and Kahneman 1992).…”

Language in International Business: A Review and Agenda for Future Research

“…International business settings already entail high cognitive demands due to their dynamic and complex nature (Volk et al 2014;Hadjichristidis et al 2016), but these are substantially exacerbated by the burden of foreign language processing. According to Takano and Noda (1995), activities such as conversation or negotiation require both linguistic (i.e., communication) and non-linguistic information processing (i.e., thinking and deciding).…”