Psychologyspeaking topic
Describing an event, English packs the manner of motion into the verb ('she ran in'), while Spanish packs in the path ('she entered, running'). Readers of English novels recall action scenes more vividly as a result. Does what a language points your attention at rewrite how you remember the world?
— motion event framing, satellite- vs verb-framed languages (Slobin, Talmy)
practice with this topic
Set the timer (5-30 min), take 20 seconds of prep if you like, start talking. Jot your thoughts onto the sticky-note board.
similar topics
- Without love, humanity could not exist for a day.
- Interleaving: why does mixing similar topics together teach better than studying them in tidy blocks? Can a little confusion be learning's best friend?
- Self-efficacy, Bandura: our belief that we can pull something off shapes the outcome as much as our actual ability does. Why is the conviction 'I can do this' sometimes more decisive than talent?
- Guilty pleasures, defending the stories we are embarrassed to love, and why desire does not care what our taste says.
- Sherif's norm formation experiment: in an ambiguous situation, people build a shared 'truth' out of each other's guesses. How do groups construct reality?