Speaking more than one language may slow the mental aging process

Children who speak a second or third language may have an unexpected advantage later in life, a new Tel Aviv University study has found. Knowing and speaking many languages may protect the brain against the effects of aging.

Dr. Gitit Kavé, a clinical neuro-psychologist from the Herczeg Institute on Aging at Tel Aviv University, together with her colleagues Nitza Eyal, Aviva Shorek, and Jiska Cohen-Manfield, discovered recently that senior citizens who speak more languages test for better cognitive functioning. The results of her study were published in the journal Psychology and Aging.

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Date: 09 May 2008

How do baby birds learn to sing? By babbling

Baby birds babble much like human infants do, and they have their own special brain circuits to do it, researchers reported on Thursday.

Their findings suggest that learning to sing -- and also to speak -- is a process independent of adult singing or speech.

Perhaps other aspects of infant learning are equally independent in the brain, Michale Fee of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and colleagues suggested.

"Young birds learn their songs in a series of stages. They start out just as humans do, by babbling," Fee said in an audio interview on the Web site of the journal Science, which published the findings.

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Date: 07 May 2008

Jihadis get short shrift as US minds its language

And now from the people who brought you the phrase "axis of evil", a guide to non-inflammatory language for the Middle East.

The Bush administration has directed employees in the state department and other government agencies to recouch the way they refer to America's enemies. Islamo-fascist, once a favourite designation of neo-conservatives, is out - too much potential to offend Muslims, the new instructions say.

So too are the terms jihadi and mujahideen, which apparently err in the opposite direction by glamorising combatants that the Bush administration would prefer to dismiss as terrorists and extremists.

"It's not what you say, but what they hear," said a memo prepared last month by the extremist messaging branch at the national counterterrorism centre, which was obtained by the Associated Press.

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Date: 06 May 2008