--- title: A Bilingual Brain Is a Smarter Brain description: Skip the sudoku, try learning French canonical: https://time.com/3581457/bilingual-brain-smart/ author: Alexandra Sifferlin article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-11-12T19:50:53.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:00:22.572Z article:section: Health og:title: A Bilingual Brain Is a Smarter Brain og:description: Skip the sudoku, try learning French og:url: https://time.com/3581457/bilingual-brain-smart/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: A Bilingual Brain Is a Smarter Brain twitter:description: Skip the sudoku, try learning French twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Speaking More Than One Language Could Sharpen Your Brain > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ## Video: Mark Zuckerberg’s Half Hour Q&A In Mandarin [Watch (HLS stream): Mark Zuckerberg’s Half Hour Q&A In Mandarin](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/KRPecAcf.m3u8) (1:33)  _Published 2014-10-27. Billionaire social media CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke to students at a Beijing university in Mandarin. Admittedly, it's an impressive feat for those of us who haven't dabbled in the tonal language._ by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Nov 12, 2014 7:50 PM UTC by [Alexandra Sifferlin](https://time.com/author/alexandra-sifferlin/) ## Alexandra Sifferlin Nov 12, 2014 7:50 PM UTC Speaking more than one language does the brain some good. A recent study [found](http://comm.soc.northwestern.edu/bilingualism-psycholinguistics/files/bilingualbrains.pdf) that bilingual speakers may actually process information more efficiently than single-language speakers. Researchers from Northwestern University, in Illinois, and the University of Houston used brain imaging to look at bilingual people’s comprehension abilities. They found that people who speak more than one language are comparatively better at filtering out unnecessary words than monolinguals, whose brains showed that they had to work harder to complete the same mental tasks. The study, published in the journal _Brain and Language_, used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to look at what’s called coactivation and inhibition in the brain. Coactivation is the ability to have both languages simultaneously active in the brain, while inhibition is that ability to select a correct language while hearing more than one at a time. The researchers studied 17 Spanish-English bilinguals and 18 monolinguals, and had them undergo tests that assessed their brains’ ability to eliminate irrelevant words. For example, in one task the participants heard the word _cloud_ and were then immediately shown four pictures. One of the photos was of a cloud, and another was a similar-sounding word like _clown_. The goal was to watch how quickly the brain could make connections to the correct word. Bilinguals were consistently better at the task. The results create a bit of a chicken-or-the-egg scenario. Is a bilingual person better at such tasks because of their expertise in both languages, or are people with greater comprehension capacity better equipped to master multiple languages? It could be a mixture of the two. The researchers of the new study believe that being bilingual is a constant brain exercise. So instead of tackling a puzzle, why not give a new language a shot, if not solely for the brain challenge. _Read next:_ [_The Secret to Learning a Foreign Language as an Adult_](http://time.com/3453841/the-secret-to-learning-a-foreign-language-as-an-adult/?xid=time%5Freadnext) ## Transcript If you haven't seen it yet, Mark Zuckerberg pulled this little stunt on Wednesday. [ FOREIGN ] [ LAUGH ] Yup, that's the billionaire social media CEO speaking to students at a Beijing university in Mandarin. Admittedly it's an impressive feat for those of us who haven't dabbled in the tonal language. And as you can imagine media outlets have been having a lot of fun with it. For some, Zuckerberg was speaking Mandarin like a boss. Others commented on his apparent mastery of the language, saying in their headlines he spoke fluently, and ABC thought Zuckerberg had put us all to shame by speaking Mandarin, adding. How do you say wow in Chinese? But for all the outlets expressing their surprise at Zuckerberg's linguistics, others remain more grounded, pointing out being bilingual is nothing to get too excited about. Two such science records and foreign policy, noting Zuckerberg's Mandarin actually wasn't spoken that well. The latter put his speaking ability at roughly someone who's studied for two years in college. And the Independent cites Internet watchers who compared his Mandarin to an articulate seven year old with a mouthful of marbles. So, the Beijing- based China Daily said his Mandarin wasn't that bad, writing Zuckerberg's Mandarin pronunciation was far from fluent, but he was able to maintain intelligible conversation and the students responded with warm cheers for his effort. In the end, we do have to give props to the tech Titan. Mandarin's a difficult language to learn, let alone using it in a [ INAUDIBLE ]. A 30 minute Q and A. As the writer over at forum policy put it, he was like a dog walking on its hind legs. 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