Do you guys think in a language? 🤔 And if you're bilingual, which language do you think and dream in?

My grandmother and her family immigrated to the U.S. when she was 14 years old. Her family spoke Germain in the home but English in public. When she was asked a question about the U.S. she said she would think in English and when she was asked about the time in Germany she would think of the answer in Germain.

had a swedish gf many years ago, after 2 years of living together she started talking in her sleep in english, i thought it was hilarious

I took German in high school and never did anything with the language afterwards. Now at 50, i just started learning it again on Duolingo and reading German articles and watching German KZfaq videos. It was about two months in while doing daily German learning exercises that I started having dreams in German. Ich habe sie jetzt ein paar pro Woche.

I know I’ve had dreams in Dutch an German. The hardest part for me is when we visit my wife’s family in Bulgaria and then come back to the states. In Bulgaria shaking your head means yes and nodding means no. It totally messes me up.

I learned a lot of Swedish swear words from my great grandfather. He would say something in a whisper and tell me to go say that to my grandmother. So I did. And she was scandalized and shocked, and my great grandfather thought that was the funniest thing ever and he would just roar with laughter. Then she would yell at us.

Feli, because of you I am on day 100 of learning German. It’s slow progress right now because I am in graduate school and working and have to focus on that more than anything but after graduation I plan to focus more on my language learning and get deeper into it! :)

Dearest Feli -- Great video, as it raises an issue that I've always been fascinated with. My late wife was Egyptian, fluent in her native Arabic but educated from an early age in English. She told me it took several years after arriving in America to begin thinking in English, which I always found amazing because the two languages are so different in terms of translation, grammar, gender variation and noun/verb placement. I studied French for four years and German for two years in college, but I never achieved what you and my wife experienced. To this day, I truly envy people who are equally fluent in several languages.

My first car was a powder blue 1968 VW Beetle. I loved that little car.

We think similarly. I usually "think in pictures." Some things pop up quickly in German with no effort, but other things I may not be 100% fluent with, I have to mentally translate. It also depends on to whom I'm talking.

I also think in concepts and not in a language but I definitely dream in English. Years ago I had a German friend over to live with me for the summer. I remember one morning (after about a month of staying with me) he looked quite perplexed. He told me that this was the first time he dreamt in English.

My friend was raised in Brazil by Americans so was completely fluent in English and Portuguese and easily switched back and forth in one conversation. She told me she thought in the language she was speaking at the time. I only recently learned that some people think in pictures or concepts, like you, rather than words, like I do. I really can't even imagine your way, but how fascinating!

This topic hits home. My parents emigrated in 1955 when I was 7 from Austria to the midwest. My Dad learned English as he would be out in the working world, it wasn't necessary for my Mom as she was a stay-at-home Mom. She wanted to learn English very much and would ask me to tell her everything I had learned that day in school my Dad wanted to practice his English so in a very short amount of time we were an English-speaking German family. I have forgotten almost all of the German I knew as a child, when I remember something from my Austria days it's in English I don't remember a time when German was my only language. Listening to you has stirred my interest in relearning my first language😊.

I have always had difficulty in attempting to learn another language. I think you just explained why. In general I describe myself as a "uni-tasker" the opposite of a multi-tasker. I can only do, think about or perform one thing at a time. When trying to learn a language I absolutely think in English and try to translate in my head before speaking. I am in complete awe of multi-lingual individuals.

Great video and great answers. I am American and only speak English fluently. I love languages and know words in several other languages, mostly Spanish. I understand a lot of what Spanish speakers are saying but can't find the words when trying to speak Spanish. I think in words and concepts, depending on the circumstance or subject. Mostly in my dreams I speak English, but I have had a dream where I understood but my dream self was speaking another language. I don't think I was really speaking another language or I wouldn't have understood, but when I woke up I remember I was surprised in the dream that I could speak another language. I know confusing and hard to explain. I have a lot of German ancestry, but also a lot of nationalities as well, a true mixed background. You've open my eyes about German culture. Thanks!

Very interesting question. I have had this experience!! I've always enjoyed speaking English. Then I was on a trip to the US for 3 weeks. In week #3 I suddenly had this moment where English didn't appear as foreign language anymore. English felt ubiquitous and completely natural. These moments like "how would I say this in English best way" was gone. in the streets English didn't feel like a foreign language anymore. And, I had two dreams in English. Though, sadyl... this fascinating "condition" was gone like a bursting balloon, after I Emailed friends at home, had a phone call to Germany and when I entered German soil. Still, it was a Wow-Moment :)

I'm a native English speaker, and I had a moment in Germany when I was trying to ask a receptionist where the closest tram was in German. She answered me in English (I assume cause I was speaking with an accent) and I kept asking her about it in German even tho she was responding in English. It took my dad to finally tell me that she was speaking English before I finally realized and started talking to her in English.

"It doesn't bother me that I dream in English, what's annoying are the German subtitles." In fact, I am thinking like you: I mostly think and dream in concepts. Only when I write do I "hear" an "inner voice".

I am a Portuguese who moved to Germany at nearly 6 years old and started learning English in 3rd/4th grade (10 yo). At home we always spoke Portuguese, my younger sister and I mostly spoke German with each other and especially after we moved back to Portugal when I was 15. We never lost the connection with the German language after we left DE, we always read books and managed to watch TV in DE. I must say that in PT you don't have any media (except for a couple radio stations) doing voice over of any international content - they use subtitles for EVERYTHING except children animation - therefore our exposure to English be it in series or movies was quite enhanced. Fast forward to today, my husband and I are living in Luxembourg and a couple weeks ago at the birth prep course with my Midwife she was surprised that we were speaking in English (as he doesn't speak German), I was using German terms in the middle of the sentences whenever I couldn't remember them in English but at the same time I was taking notes at the speed of sound... in Portuguese. I remember being a teenager and structuring a sentence in my head in German whenever I wanted to say or write it in English (once I even wrote it in German in an English test at school in PT!), but nowadays... I don't know, all 3 languages are so automatic that I don't even notice if I "pre-think" things in a different language than the one I am speaking in or not. Specially with the combinations EN-DE and PT-DE, I can be in the midst of a conversation with someone and half of it being in a language and the other half in the other, in a mix that actually makes sense!

Jetzt fühl ich mich leicht bekloppt wenn ich darüber nachdenke, das ich Sachen in meinem Kopf mit mir selbst abmache 😂 oh und ich kann mich auch an die Sprache im Traum erinnern 🤔

I am a native English speaker. My second fluency is Spanish followed closely by German. It is hilarious when I am speaking either Spanish or German and get distracted because sometimes I mix words or sentence structure from all three languages. I can really confuse people.

I lived in Central America for 4 years and am fluent in Spanish. I absolutely thought in Spanish when I was around people speaking Spanish, watching Spanish TV, or reading in Spanish. When I was alone or with English speakers, I would think in English. It just depended.

My Great Great grandmother and her family immigrated to the U.S from Bavaria to Wahalla South Carolina IN THE 1800's. Shout out to all the Germans in Up State South Carolina. Home of BMW.

Native English speaker, was a German major in college where I also studied a number of other languages. When I worked in Germany (c. 1973), after a few weeks I was not only thinking in German, but as I would recall past conversations with non-German speakers they were all speaking German. Since then when thinking to myself it will be in whichever language. For many years I had the habit of muttering to myself in German since that was my only opportunity to practice it; so sad that most of my life was spent without Netflix. Translating is far too much work, so I much rather think in that language and understand what's being said, rather than have to figure out how to say it in English. Even when I'm learning a new language (eg, Italian a few years ago) I try to go straight to thinking in it, which has served me well. In college, we foreign language students had a conceit that language structures how we think; we misnamed that "psycholinguistics". What you call "thinking in concepts" I have described as "preverbal", thinking through a problem (including visualization) without using any words but still using thought structures associated with language. And of course, then you have to translate that in order to present your solution. One day in the shop, my father presented me with a carpentry problem to solve. When I present my solution to him, I stumbled over my own tongue when I started out in English but with German syntax. My personal interpretation was that I had worked through the problem with preverbal German thought structure (i.e., in "German mode") that I then had to translate into English. One day in college, a friend from Yugoslavia commented that regardless of how fluent you are in another language, you still do math in your native language. So far I've found that to be true. I've been watching Lehrerschmidt's videos to see how Germans do math. I married into a Mexican family, so my sons and their cousins grew up with both English and Spanish. We observed that young children could handle that just fine and even figured out quickly which language to use with which grandparents and even which language is spoken in which household. My older son would get mad at my father when he would use some of his Texan Spanish because he was breaking the rules by doing it in the wrong house.

Servus. Im half German half American, Born and raised in Würzburg. American educated at a military run high school. Came to the states at the age of 18, 30 years ago.I speak almost fluent German, never learned German. I picked it up at a young age spending a lot of time with my Oma and Opa. I sometime dream in German and have German thoughts, I swear in German at times too. Anyways, enjoying your videos, keep at it please. Also, I’ve met many Germans in my time here in the states, most have heavy accents. I can hear that German accent from a mile away. I would never guess that you’re German. Your American English is absolutely perfect. I’ve never met a German with your grasp of the language. I don’t know how you did it. Tschüss!

I think I hear a voice when I process my thoughts. I also had the first dream in English, and first dream in French moments when I lived in Vancouver and when I lived in Paris, respectively. I cant believe you are aware of dialogues in your dreams but not aware of the language used. Great content!

I’m a verbal thinker, and no way bilingual, but I have been studying German and other languages (took Spanish in high school, because my German immigrants mother and the German language teacher couldn’t even agree to disagree on pronunciation). When I start doing math or music, I’m in closer contact with the concepts, but I also have a separate process of “staging things to say”, different from what I am thinking in words. I’ve never dreamt in another language, but there was an incident quite some time ago, where I read a poster in a doctor’s office, and later remembered the information while being slow to recall what language it had been in. And today I was muttering to myself “Wo ist mein Handy”

I grew up bilingual in Germany and spent a lot of summers with my family in the US. So I dream both in English and in German. Depending on who I dream about or where I am in my dream. I live in the US now since 2015 so now my thoughts are more English than German. But since I have my sister here as well. I think in German when I have something to say to her and in English if saying something to everyone else. I used to work for a currency exchange company at the airport in Frankfurt and I would count the money in my head in the language the person infront of me was speaking.😂 At home (mom german/dad american) I would speak German to my mom and sister and English to my Dad. So my mom, sister and I would speak german with each other, all of us would speak English with Dad and Dad would speak English to all of us and german to everyone else.😂 The funny this is.. what you and Josh do, switching back and forth with each other, I can't do. For the life of me I can not speak English with my sister and I can't speak german with my Dad. We just started a german stammtisch last month and my Dad was sitting across from me.. I said to him he has to sit at the other end of the table because I can not speak german to him. I don't know why.. but I just can't. 😂😂

We had a professor at the University of Chicago who was Alsatian, with a German father and French mother. He was fluent in English but had quite an accent. He once told me, "I think in German...but dream in French." As for "thinking" in a language; I do think in concepts a lot, but I also have interior monologues or dialogues where, for example, I'm driving somewhere and thinking of a recent conversation with a friend and how I might formulate a reply the next time we talk. I like your comment about coming back and feeling like you want to use German sentence structures or phrases in English. A friend from Milwaukee says that there used to be a common way to joke about lingering Germanicisms among the older folk: "Ya know, where the streetcar bends the corner around." Finally--the little filler words might be the hardest ones for a non-native speaker to completely master. I think German has more than English. "So" is common to both, though the usage varies just a bit. "Genau" I hear as "Exactly.'" I know what is meant with "doch" but can't say what English word corresponds to it. "Halt" and "doch" seem like they might match some uses of "just" or "in fact" as in, "Will you just stop dilly-dallying and get here?" or "Do I like Maharaj Grill in Elmhurst? In fact, we were just there last night!"

I probably sometimes think with a voice and sometimes without. I can totally relate to the feeling of "the brain being faster than your mouth could ever speak" although I am also often told that I speak (too) fast. When I am on my own, I can hear my thoughts with a voice (usually two levels, one louder, one behind and sometimes a third level without a voice). When I speak, there sometimes is no voice and when there is, it usually switches to the language I am speaking except for the moment in which I might not know the word I need and then I am back to German in my head in this kind of way: "verdammt, was heißt noch gleich Rauchgasentschweflungsanlage auf Englisch"? 😅 No, I never really needed that word, but e.g. trying to explain "Schützenfest" or "Schützenverein" always brings me back to German in my head. One question that I am interested in is "what cultural differences have you experienced among different states within the US" and "what cultural differences have you experienced among different states within Germany". I don't know how many places you know within both countries and if it makes sense to you. Thank you for your channel, I really enjoy your videos.

I honestly thought it would be the same for everyone and I would have guests that English is what you think and dream in after living in the US for so long. I still think and dream mainly in German! Even after living in the US for almost two years. However, when I'm with my American friends for a long time, the voice in my head actually switches to English🙂 YES! I actually do have a voice in my head 😁. Saying it out loud and realizing for the first time that is not the case for everyone makes me wonder...🤣

There was once a German heavy metal band named Accept that became well known during the 1980s, and their lead guitarist Wolf Hoffman was interviewed by the many guitar magazines of the day. One question that was asked was if he and the band wrote their songs in German and then translated them… he stated that he and his bandmates would work on the instrumental portions and discuss song themes in German, but when it came to writing the lyrics, they would think in English, due to the fact that many of their fans consumed their songs in that language.

I had a German class in college that used a textbook titled "Deutsch fur Auslander". The book had no English in it - even the foreword (vorwort) was in German. The book was written a bit like an elementary school book with pictures and words and the grammar took advantage of the similarities between English and German - underneath a red square it said "das ist rot". "Das ist..." was not explained but was obvious from the context and our knowledge of English. The professor was German and she tried very hard to make all explanations in the little bit of German we already knew. A few weeks into the course I noticed that I sometimes, on a very basic level, would begin to think, a little, in German instead of English translated to German. It was a very interesting course.

I was smiling all through this video! You made it so interesting and engaging and entertaining and amusing!

Thank you Feli for your channel, you really are a world girl. Many other people can learn from you. You really are a smart person. We travel a lot to different countries, and more Germany, our best friend's are Germany and we learn a lot from them and now your channel is a big help for us who know the facts from those who were born or lived in those countries. Thank you Feli. To learn many languages as we have done is a great advantage to all of us.

I have been learning Portuguese for awhile now and I would say I'm conversationally fluent and I feel like especially when I'm tired I tend to think in Portuguese and alot of the time simple sentences and phrases come to me in Portuguese first, even though English is my first language. I have only had 1 dream that I remember that was in Portuguese. However switching back and forth is extremely difficult to me.

I am an American. Because of the military I lived in Germany for 3.5 years as a kid (age 9 to 11) and 3.5 years as an adult (age 22 to 25). I'm not fluent but I can completely get along visiting Germany. It is like putting on a favorite sweater. I'm actually nostalgic for the Germany of the late 50s and early 60s. Germany of today is definitely different. Strangely enough, sometimes I will be communicating with someone and the German word will pop into my head and I'll have to translate it to English in order to speak with a friend. Also, I distinctly remember (I was 40 or so) the first time I dreamed (or remember dreaming) in German. It was rather bizarro. haha. I've thought about becoming fluent in German but at age 72 it would take years to memorize everything and practice. If we were drinking, you and I would easily be able to talk to one another, but my limited vocabulary would appall you with the way I was getting my point across... haha. Yes, I would buy...(the beer or whatever...).

For the next Ask a German video: what are some of your favorite German TV shows or movies? I know you talk a lot about How I Met Your Mother, and I've been looking for a German-dubbed version but having trouble finding it, even with my VPN 😅

I’m bilingual; English is my native language and I learned Spanish as a second language in high school/college. I think the “internal monologue” conversation is really interesting. I only recently learned that some people think in actual words with a monologue in their head, whereas others think more in concepts/ideas. I have an internal monologue and I definitely think in English, but I also live a most of my life in English. When I’ve been watching/listening to something in Spanish and I’m in “Spanish mode” I tend to think more in Spanish. I think that you definitely know when you’ve reached proficiency in a language when you stop having to translate in your head! Lastly, I think what you said about being tired is really interesting. Whenever I’m overtired (or have been drinking 😬) my brain starts using both languages at once. 😂

Really interesting. You are behaving somewhat like a large language model in which a neural network embeds language into some concepts that don't really have a language and then translates that embedding out into a language of choice!

I found this extremely interesting, how language works and how we formulate the things we speak. Keep up the great work.

Studied for one semester at University in Germany (Erlangen), living there for almost 6 months and by the end of that time would definitely dream sometimes in German...and still do occasionally, 50 years later!

I lived in Germany in the 1970s. I still occasionally count in German in my mind. I do the same thing with telling time. I still sometimes say "um die Ecke."

I usually think in abstract concepts, not words. The exception to this is if I’m thinking about actual conversation, real or imagined. Like, when so-and-so said [snarky insult], I should have replied [witty comeback]. Or even just remembering casual conversation. Or now, thinking word-for- word what I’m commenting here. That’s about the only time I think in words.

This is such a great question!

Wow, this is so cool! I can relate to the concept thinking. That’s really interesting

Great to hear you again Feli. Yes! You do speak fast, schnell, schnell.

I am from Romania, live in Germany and speak English with people at work. I would say I usually thing / dream in my native language. But sometimes I also think in English, especially at work .

Yes some people think by hearing their voice in their head speak their thoughts, while others just think of the concepts. I do it with a voice.

Ok, now you got me hooked on the thinking styles. I am a very visual thinker but I have an inner voice that kind of narrates it, in english. (native english speaker) I am not enough of an artist to draw out what I see in my head so I use lots of words to describe it. Both when I want to share my thoughts with someone else, but also just in my own head exploring ideas. I am an introvert and there is this visual to verbal translating that tends to happen before I say things out loud. In dreams though, I don't think I generally have that inner voice, words are only from someone speaking to me in a dream.

Danke/thank you for the video Feli! I never thought about that before? I don't know why?

Ich bin eine geborene Deutsche. Ich war mit meiner Familie vor über 20 Jahren auf einer Rundreise durch Australien und wir hatten da eine Nacht lang einen Farm stay, wo wir uns lange mit unseren Gastgebern auf Englisch unterhalten haben. Am nächsten Tag waren wir wieder in unserer (komplett deutschen) Reisegruppe und mir ist es ein paar Mal so gegangen, dass ich die Mitreisenden fast auf Englisch angesprochen hätte. Es fiel mir richtig schwer wieder auf Deutsch "umzuschalten". I'm a native German. I travelled more than 20 years ago with my family through Australia and there we had a one night farm stay were we talked long time with our hosts in English. The next day we were back in our (completely German) tour group and it happend to me several times, that I nearly spoke to my travel mates in English. It was really hard for me to "switch" back to German.

I spent 9 years in NYC in the early 2000s. Once I moved back to Germany I realized that the english expressions or words always came to me first and i had to look for the german translation really hard. It felt so pretentious, look at me, i am fluent in english, I am so cool - but it wasn't like that, it just would not come to me while english was always present. 15 years later it's still the case. English is so much more straight forward, i like it so much better. I still live, breathe, dream, think in english. I had a cat in New York that moved back with me to germany. I spoke english to him (yes I know it's 'it' but he is a he). I am on my second dog past him now and I still speak english to my dog, both learned all commands in english cause it just felt right. It just comes naturally. I just love the english language. Even my boyfriend now picks up on it and uses the words I use in lack of remembering the german vocabulary .-). can't watch german tv any longer, HAVE to watch US movies and series in english, sooo much better!

American here, English speaker. I've always found languages fascinating, and while I don't speak German (it's on my to-do list), I know some Spanish. The phrasing, filler words, or when a word for word translation doesn't work, happens for me as well but in English-Spanish. I think in English, and do primarily have an inner monologue going. I do remember a time when I dreamt in Spanish, or it was more that Spanish was being spoken, and I simply understood it. It was a very cool experience.

Your English is quite remarkable. I really don't hear any particular accent. It's very clear and articulate, but it's also very central.

The first few years, and probably because I'm horrible with languages, I distinctly remember actively translating from English into German. When I was speaking with someone who didn't get, that I wasn't entirely fluent, so was speaking in Swiss-German, I even had to first translate into High German and then into English. Inmy third or fourth year here, I was jumped by my trumpet professor, an American living at the time in Basel, who spoke REALLY good German and wrote articles and books in German, to translate from German into English for a Swedish visiting professor. At one point I was just so tired from translating as best I could in both directions, that a participant asked a question in Badisch and I turned to the Swedish prof and translated it into my Swiss Hochdeutsch. He took it in his dry humor and said "Very interesting, But now could you translate that into English?" I hadn't even noticed that I'd simply oral translated it into Swiss Hochdeutsch. But that was maybe 40 years ago. I now don't really know if I'm thinking in German or as you do simply speak in my own way. My wife and I speak Swiss Hochdeutsch with each other. When the grandkids are here, I speak Swiss Hochdeutsch, but they reply in Lupsingerdüütsch and my wife speaks to them in Bärndüütsch. but switched immediately to Swiss Hoch if she has anything to say to me. It's a whirling linguistic derby. The only time I actively stop and think about the languge is when I suddenly hit a wall of a word or phrase that escapes me or I just don't know, because then I have to stop, think about what I want to say and they find an alternative way to explain ti without that specific word. After 45 years this very rarely happens in German. But, and here's the weird thing. It does ALSO very rarely happen in English, where I stop and think "I used to know that word in English....". There is also one scenario that's happened to me a couple of times in the US. For example, I went through a phase here, where I was intensely interested in stereos and equipement. I built my own DIY speakers. But I learned everything about stereo stuff in German from German texts, magazines, etc. So I was in the US and had some spare time and found myself in a Radio Shack. I was standing in front of a wall of exhibited stereo parts and the salesperson asked me: "Hello, can I help you?" So I answered "Thanks. I was just looking at these .... uh .... er...." I was looking at various "parts" and didn't know the terminology in English. I knew what they were called in German: "Frequenzweichen", but had no clue what they were called in English and they only had price tags, no other identifiers stuck on or near them. EMBARESSING. But it was a sure sign of getting comfortable enough with a "foreign" language to learned something that I'd never had contact with in English.

Though I only speak American English, I find I only think about the words I'm speaking when I'm searching or trying to be precise in what I'm saying... like answering a technical question where words, word placement, or even pronunciation and syllable emphasis may become important. Other times I think about it is when I'm trying to be absolutely honest with someone I care for, and I make sure I'm clear enough they won't misunderstand.

"I don't think in any language." I have a lot of friends with that problem. Kidding, I'm kidding, don't hit me! ;-) Always love the videos. This is definitely a very meta question because you have to think about thinking, which gets trippy if you do it for too long. Have a great week, Feli! I look forward to the new series!

On a similar topic: I am Mex-Amer and I have noticed that people that are speaking Spanglish (a mix of Spanish and English at the same time) are thinking in both languages at the same time. The reason I know that is that non-Spanglish speakers (people that didn't learn both languages as a child) have a hard time keeping up and they hate Spanglish. I'm talking about people that grew up with one language (either Spanish or English) and then learned the opposing language as an adult, are translating in their brain and that is why they can't keep up with Spanglish. Half of the Spanglish is instantly understood, but the other half (the language they learned later in life) has a delay while it goes through the translator in their brains. That is what brought me to the conclusion that Spanglish speakers are thinking in two languages at the same time. Spanglish speakers listening to Spanglish are having zero delay time for translations in the brain. The funny thing about Spanglish speakers is that English and Spanish have a completely opposite syntax each. It's like running both Windows and Mac at the same time and making both work. Spanglish speakers can tell when someone is faking Spanglish (like in the movies or in ads). Spanglish, even with the differing syntax for each core language, still has it's own very defined language rules (like Spanish verbs and English nouns). Advertising agencies mistakenly hire people that grew up with either English or Spanish and then they later in life learned the opposing second language. They didn't grow up with Spanglish and make MANY mistakes trying to fake their way through it.Those mistakes come over very harshly to the ears of true Spanglish speakers and they are turned off to the product that is badly using fake Spanglish. Taco Bell is the worst offender, but Chevy and some others are also guilty. The offense they most often commit is using English verbs with Spanish nouns. A HUGE no-no in Spanglish (because momma taught them most of the verbs while school taught them most of the nouns).

I read last year for the first time that some people don't have an inner monologue. Fascinating!

Ich habe im gymnasium für drei jahren deutsch gelernt. Depois disso aprendi falar portuguese para poder servir o povo do Brazil como missionário. После нескольких лет примерок я могу произнести несколько фраз по-русски. So I both understand that sometimes the right word to describe the thought/feeling you're trying to convey isn't one of the words you know in the language of the conversation you're having and I understand how using the appropriate word to convey the thought out of linguistic/cultural context can be off putting to some. I also understand that those who are open to new experiences can often find it intriguing and enlightening as well as educational in both directions because often times both parties learn a new word or phrase in the process. 😅 The bottom line is that you produce enlightening and engaging content while simultaneously living your life as you see fit. Wie Frau Mattern, das mir deutsch gelernt hat, ich gebe dir "eine ausgezeichnet". Keep up the good work and never be ashamed of expressing your multilinguicity ( I don't care if it's not a real word).

As a Norwegian I mostly thinks in Norwegian, but since I read and write English quite a lot, I also thinks in English at times. Especially if the context is in English.

Growing up in a German-American community, I knew of older people who spoke in English but still used German sentence structure... because of the war so much of German culture had been supressed, but things like this still stood out.

Many (too many) years ago when I was studying French in high school and college, as long as I knew the correct word, I could carry on a conversation with my instructor without giving a second thought to which language we were using at the time. I wasn't translating as we went along; we were simply talking in whatever language we were using at the time.

I do both, thinking in concepts and thinking in a voice. Concepts is the more all-the-time and subconscious version, when I'm actively thinking I put things into words. It's basically my thoughts' version of speaking out loud, I know what I'm "gonna think" before I put it into words. But I can't actively think without putting it into words or I'll get a headache.

Sometimes I think in English, sometimes in Spanish, and sometimes in diagrams or graphs. It depends on what I'm thinking about. Years ago I went to Brazil for two weeks and then talked about the trip in church, where everyone speaks Spanish. Spanish, French, and Italian all use a descendant of Latin "dōāna" or of the Arabic word it was borrowed from. Portuguese uses a different word. So I said something like "tuvo que alfândegarme", stumping the Spanish speakers who didn't know Portuguese.

I just finished reading a book about the brain. One of the topics was how do people think. The book mentioned people when they are thinking are either visual or linear. So then, the visual thinkers form pictures and the linear form words sentences. So, from what you said, you would be a visual thinker which does not involve language. The linear thinker forms words and sentences. I think that I am a linear thinker. which means that I can have trouble understanding a concept that a visual thinker is explaining to me. Evidently there is research detecting which parts of the brain lights up in different people when they observe something or explain something.

I tend to think in conversations. Almost as if someone is asking me questions and I'm answering.

I also think in concepts and then, if it's something I want to communicate, I put it into words. Then, I start "editing and rewriting" for clarity if I'm writing, but if I'm speaking, it goes out of my mouth and hopefully it makes sense.🤞

Feli, I do not know German (or Spanish, my other favorite) well enough to think in it, but your description of concept-based thinking intrigued me. I have a mode akin to that, but I only notice it after long and deep immersion in a complex problem results in a need to translate what feels like a sentence or two of results into many pages of English text.

Another way to think of it is… When you’re doing math either in your head or on a piece of paper are you doing it in German or English?

That's a hard question. When I speak I usually just speak in a particular language, without translating from one or the other. Yet there are some words or concepts which are harder to translate, in those times I have to stop and think about how to express it. I usually can't remember in which language I watched a movie or read an article, I just remember what I watched or read. However, I agree that there are situations which are tied to a particular language. At the same time, I can hear a voice speaking in my head but it's usually happens when I'm on my own and immersed in my thoughts or when I run through a past conversation. It doesn't happen when I actually talk to people or write comments like I'm doing right now.

Cool video! Such much interdesting... 🤔 Also really funny to hear you drop the term "douchey" - made me giggle.

My thoughts spoke in my head and it depends of the language that I'm dealing with at the moment of the the thoughts. Manly in French as it's my mother tongue and I live in Switzerland but I think in english when I'm watching a video like now or watch/listen something in english because I don't have to translate and a better reaction (less time)

I think in images and concepts but also in words (I'm monolingual) to the point where it's almost like a mental monologue or conversation.

I'm a native german speaker but i am also fluent in english. The more i speak one of the languages the more i start thinking in that language. I can also switch mid sentences between the languages, this is also why i don't translate anything in my head anymore, i just speak the language that is needed at that moment.

Great question!

I absolutely love your channel, and personality. Very honest and informative, I was just curious about Germany and now hooked on ykur channel ☺ Ive done a lot of traveling all over the USA. It suddenly hit me, you make me feel like I know you or recognize you lol I now know you're a combination of the best part of every woman I've met in all my travels. Now I'm stupid curious about your culture, or maybe it's just you. I guess this does kinda make you the perfect woman. Stay safe and keep the dream I look forward yo seeing what you make in life. Thanks

When I speak a language, I also think in this language. I also dream in different languages.

Very interesting. My sister (Australian) married a German guy. While living in South Africa, they had 2 sons, that grew up speaking English and German (and Afrikaans, because it was on TV, and they had an African Nanny). When they each headed off to start school, they had the problem that they spoke a combined English/German/Afrikaans. I'm not sure how they went on sentence structure etc, but they would use words from all three languages, often in the same sentence. In their heads, they knew they needed the word for 'dog' or whatever, and the first 'language version' that they thought of, that was the one they used. So, that was quickly 'beaten out of them' by their teacher (no actual 'beating' involved, just an expression), as school needed them to talk in just one language at a time. (They ended up emigrating to Australia and losing both their German and Afrikaans, through lack of use. A couple of decades later, one of them moved to Germany, and pretty much had to learn German again from scratch). Now many, many years later I had a girlfriend that was 'Australian Born Chinese'. In her house, she grew up speaking English and Mandarin. But she grew up very close to her cousin, who spoke English and Cantonese at home. So my girlfriend learnt Cantonese from her cousin’s mother, (and her cousin learned Mandarin from my girlfriend’s mother), and so they both spoke all three languages, fluently. In fact, they were very good at ‘cross-talking’. Way back in the days of ‘landline’ phones, they would speak to each other after school (her cousin’s family moved some distance away, so they ended up at different high schools) but, to stop their mothers listening in, they would each speak whichever version of Chinese their mother did not speak. So they happily held a conversation where one was speaking Mandarin and the other Cantonese, and they both said that they did not even need to ‘think about it’ as they did. As a person that can barely speak one language fluently, I was very interested in exactly the question of ‘what language do you think in?’. And they both said, much like yourself, that they didn’t really seem to ‘think in a language’, as such. (Although they both said that, if they were having a conversation with someone, they ‘sort of’ thought in whatever language that conversation was in). Where it became interesting, was when my girlfriend became friends with a Korean girl, and decided to learn Korean, ‘just for fun’. It was during this process that she discovered the difference between ‘growing up with a language’ and ‘learning a language’. The moment when she realised that she could actually ‘think’ in Korean, without having to translate back and forth, was the significant breakthrough that lead to true ‘fluency’. But the question about your ‘inner monologue’, and what language it is in is still an interesting one. Various researchers have identified that people that are born ‘deaf and dumb’ (i.e. without a language), suffer from a somewhat deficient ‘inner monologue’. But, should they learn to ‘sign’, their ‘inner monologue’ improves significantly ... even though they do not ‘think’ in sign language. Having skills in a language, even if you do not actually seem to ‘think’ in that language, is a critical part of our development. I find it very intriguing ... even if I do not understand it.

Yaas! After a long trip in two different foreign languages, I felt like I didn’t think in either language! It was just…thought…like you say. The language is just a tool to realize it. I do listen for words and grammar yet in that language but the more I know, the less hesitation. But hesitation is still fine- I hesitate in my native language, obviously. It’s interesting, we do use linguistic structures to make sense of things. Best advice I’ve heard in crossing over in languages is just to listen for the sound of the language you want. Awesome, thanks Feli! Schönen Dank!!!

I have two layers of thought. The first layer is the fast layer, which mostly is in concepts. It is too fast to formulate a sentence. The second layer is slower and there I use a language. Its very much German, but it is very natural, as I am German and am surrounded with Germans. But there can be anglicisms in it, when I watch many english videos. The problem with these layers is, that it can be, that I can have (multiple) association-leaps, when somebody speaks. For example: He speaks about topic A. One thing he says reminds me of topic B, which for itself reminds me of topic C. I find it very frustrating, when I have to explain somebody the leaps I made mentally. More so, when I can't remember, what topic B was.

This would be a good question for Josh!

Servus, Moin, Hallo, Feli. To me it's the same thing. I think in concepts when i switch to another language. Love your channel. It's always an inspiration to me. Füat di aus Hamburg.. Du bist klasse.

I feel the same when it comes to movies or conversations. I mostly cannot rember the language I've seen it in or had the conversation in. I often do think or dream in English after English movies or series. Ich finde Deine Videos immer sehr unterhaltsam and I am looking forward to the next one.

Omg, I am relating so much! Especially the part with thinking of the english word instead of the german one! (the rent example)

As a Viet learning English as my second language, I do think in English when I have English conversation, even though I'm not very fluent in English. I do find it to be interesting that there is a regular no-word thinking process : it can happen to me but not regularly. For me everything I base my thought on before putting it into actions is words, and it can happen that my thinking process differs between my native Vietnamese and English. I might be wrong on this but I believe that Easterners and Westerners have different ways of thinking and even perspectives, so that may be affected when I speak different language as well? I do have moments in a conversation when I start speaking in one language and all of a sudden a word in another language pops up in the middle of my sentance, but I know when it happens and I usually try to find the word in the language that I'm using so I won't find myself slipping into the other language. What can happen sometimes is when I am not able to find the right word from the language that I'm currently speaking and my head keeps screaming at me in the other language, and the conversation will have a blank spot with me having a super long pause until I keep trying to find the right word but can't, and I'd go, "OYYY, forget that word in (either Vietnamese or English)!.", and to my brother he thinks it's hilarious when I start doing that. As for dreams, I did get a little excited-not much, when I saw myself dreaming in English for the first time. I didn't get excited because I thought I'd made an achievement in my English learning, but it was more of a funny experience that I could have myself a good laugh.

I can "hear" voices, even accents in my head when I call say, Jack Nicholson to mind. I don't know how to describe the feeling of bringing an accent to mind, but when I do, I'll often go from hearing a particular line from a movie, to having my thoughts come through in that accent. Also, sometimes I dream that I can understand Spanish, even though I only know what I've picked up in pop culture or from living in a heavily Spanish-speaking neighborhood.

Great topic! I'd love to hear you do a video on "famous catch-phrases" from German/Austrian-based movies, just to give us a feel for popular culture (of course, you'd have to set up the scenes for us). Don't worry, we won't ask you about Ah-nold's "I'll be bahk." Promise.

I think in languages. I noticed that when I first visited London for a week. At first I could not believe that I would think in another language than German but after a few days, I started thinking in English, too.

I also may be more of a concept thinker. In 1947 and '48, at age 2 and 3, I lived in Schwäbisch Hall, where I was bi-lingual, at a little kid level, as a military dependent. (My father was also bilingual and my mother spoke basic German.) I stopped using German when I began school, back in the USA. When I got out of the Army in 1965, I took a year of German at college. (Ich hatte meines Deutsch vergessen.) I also began playing soccer in the Anchorage (Alaska) City League, winding up with the German Club team for three years. On several occasions, the guys would yell at me, lauf Mensch, links, rechts, schnell, pass auf, usw. Later, I would be asked, if I understood. I would answer, of course...but in retrospect, I always thought I was hearing the shout as if in English...hearing the shout as a concept, as you so aptly describe. I have watched several of your posts now and like them all very much!

I'm from Germany, moved to England, it was weird when you start dreaming mixed, half German, half English.

I have 2 native languages but I think in English because I use it the most. The second native language is only used at home and around others who understand it. Since both are a native language, there are no translations that occur in my mind when listening to either langauge. I'm learning German and although I'm not quite fluent yet, I have found that when I hear German, it translates directly to English. So "Ich mag nach Amerika Reise" translates to "I like to America travel." Which, when listening to German, that messy English makes perfect sense to me and no further translation is need for me to reply. Long answer, but thanks for reading!

I think it is so funny how some people from other countries can speak English without any accent. And then there are those who choose (?) to keep it even after decades of being here. You have a beautiful smile BTW .

This question is probably one that is mostly asked by someone who has an imperfect grasp of the foreign language. Once you become truly bilingual, you cannot tell anymore. Being a translator, I do have to keep the two languages separate, professionally. However, I am completely with you! For me, thinking is partly in concepts (and I know the situation when speaking to have to keep up with the speed of the thoughts) - but sometimes, certain terms need verbalization in thinking, as well. But most often, speaking amounts to a translation of thoughts into words. So, here I am mostly with you. However, I believe that if you try to remember times long past when you were actually still learning English, you had German words first and had to translate things. If you don't use a language on an (almost) daily basis, you are stuck at that point. It can, by the way, even lead to someone losing their native language.

It's called inner monologue. Most people have it, few people don't.

You're the type that doesn't see or hear your own words in your head. Me, I have a constant monologue in my head, and sometimes also see my sentences. It's just such a constant in my life that's it's near-impossible to imagine what it would be like to _not_ hear my own thoughts. Always in English - I have to translate each word internally for other languages.

I dream in both even though I was born here in Canada but my family is from Austria. Kinda miss Mom and Dad because all we spoke at home , even though sometimes English and German were mixed lol! Thanks Feli you make my day ,sometimes when I'm bummed out your smile and great attitude is infectious!😀

2:45 - I know EXACTLY what you mean. And so many times I end up forgetting a great idea before I ever put it to words. Super frustrating! But the thing about thinking in concepts has me puzzled. Are you saying you just visualize an idea and it plays out without 'narration'? Like instead of "build a house", you visualize a house being built silently? Idk - that's my best guess but even that I find mind-blowing. My 'inner voice' is speaking at just about all times.

Thanks for the video. I come from a mixed asian family and grew up in Canada where the languages taught in school were North American (English, French, Spanish) so sometimes I think of different words and sometimes they get mixed together.