Valence-differential mechanisms of the foreign language effect in decision-making under risk

ABSTRACT

A growing body of research has provided evidence for the foreign language effect on thinking, notably decision-making. Our prior work found reduction of recency effect following positive feedback in a foreign language as compared to the native tongue during even-probability gambling. However, the fundamental mechanisms underlying this effect remain unclear. The present study, therefore, aims to probe into this by engaging Chinese-English bilinguals in a functional magnetic resonance imaging version of our gambling task, which required participants to make decisions between playing and leaving equal-odds bets whilst manipulating language and valence of feedback. Results showed fewer ‘play’ choices following positive feedback presented in English relative to Chinese while no cross-language differences were observed after negative feedback. This valence-dependent language effect on risk-taking behaviour was supported by a language-emotion-decision neural circuit involving interplay between the right lingual gyrus, left fusiform gyrus, and right inferior frontal gyrus. Overall, our findings suggest valence-differential mechanisms of the foreign language effect in the risky decision. That is, the use of a foreign language in feedback presentation attenuates emotional reaction to positive feedback and thus diminishes subsequent risk-taking behaviour. Differently, negative counterparts seem to trigger detachment from negative emotion, leading to dissociation between feedback-encoding and decision-making.

KEYWORDS:

• Foreign language effect
• decision-making
• feedback
• emotion
• functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 31600880]; Humanities and Social Science Fund of Chinese Ministry of Education [grant number 17YJC740023]; Social Science Planning Project of Sichuan Province [grant number SC20WY013].