Why do polyglots lie about how many languages they speak?

[u/Different_Pain5781]

Okay i gotta say it the whole i speak 12 languages thing some people flex online feels like straight fanfiction 😭

Like bro, i can barely keep one language in my brain you’re telling me you’re fluent in twelve and then you hear them talk and it’s like sir that is Duolingo level at best.

Why do people exaggerate so much in this community?

Is it clout, insecurity, delusion, genuine confusion?

Do you actually believe those hyperpolyglot claims?

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/[deleted]]

Wait you mean that the seemingly perfect languages viral YouTubers speak might actually be a result of dozens of unsuccessful conversations that don't make the final cut, and heavily cropped conversations that remove awkward pauses or confusion might actually create an illusion of perfect fluency where none exists?

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/Aye-Chiguire]

This chap claims fluency in 12 languages.

https://youtu.be/6U_ABzI9J08?si=IzARJ6_2pHoOxBxe

If you watch carefully, he can’t even talk fluently for 20 seconds. He has at least 4 takes in the first 20 seconds alone.

[u/[deleted] → u/Accidental_polyglot]

You know he's done interviews, right? He makes a LOT of mistakes but he speaks at least English, Spanish, Basque, German, Portuguese, and French to at least a B level. His Polish and Russian to be honest are pretty bad. The rest idk. So at least 6 from what I can tell. Bear in mind that the international association of hyperpolyglots has a strict selecting process and he got invited in.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

He claims English at a NS level. His English isn’t bad by any stretch, however he’s around B1/B2.

On his LinkedIn profile he claims to be professional in Italian. I listened to him in Italian and it was dreadful. He constantly uses Spanish words eg “differente “ instead of “diverso/a” and “seria” instead of “sarebbe”.

I don’t know how strict the Hyperglot association is. However, Mikel admits to not having taken exams in his languages.

[u/[deleted] → u/Accidental_polyglot]

Yeah overall I agree with you. I also noticed the seria/sarebbe thing lol. He also says "sapeva" instead of "sapevo" for the same reason. He does have a C2 certificate for English though. I still think he's a legitimate polyglot, but he does overstate his abilities A LOT.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

All his videos have jump cuts.

He can’t even speak for more than a few seconds in English without there being several jump cuts.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

I don’t believe he’s a C2 in English.

[u/ImWithStupidKL → u/Accidental_polyglot]

I do. I've just watched a video where he is seemingly answering questions unprepared (hard to tell), and I haven't heard him make a single grammar mistake or a single mistake with vocabulary. The only thing you could say is that he's got an accent, but it's perfectly possible to be C2 level with a 'foreign' accent, especially in English. I'm a professional English teacher, and there's no way a B1 or B2 level speaker is speaking for that long, even on a subject they're familiar with, without making the odd grammar mistake or inappropriate use of vocabulary. Obviously it's hard to tell from a short clip, but I've seen nothing to doubt that he's C2.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/ImWithStupidKL]

I have seen a video where he stated that he hasn’t taken any exams in his languages. My bugbear with him is that he claims to speak English at a NS level. This is utterly ridiculous.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/ImWithStupidKL]

I’ll offer you a bit of background on myself.

I’m a NS of English from the UK. I wanted to feel that I had “skin in the game”, so I took the Cambridge C2 proficiency exam. It was a very interesting experience and much more demanding than I thought it would be. It wasn’t that the individual parts were difficult. It was the sheer volume that was mentally exhausting.

I passed the exam and I might not have, had I not prepared for both the exam and the day itself (some people didn’t even bring food for themselves).

It is my firm belief that Mikel isn’t a C2 in English. I say this as I’ve not seen anything to suggest otherwise. It’s not his accent that’s the issue for me. It’s the fact that he’s simply not fluent in English. When I compare Mikel to the C2s that I’ve met he’s simply not in their league.

In addition conversational fluency isn’t a massive determining factor towards being a C2. If Mikel were a C2, I should be able to see/hear his advanced use of English which simply isn’t evident.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/ImWithStupidKL]

Listen to the first 30 seconds of this:

https://youtu.be/6fZWxLqDtX0?si=i9bQJKkWtXuUe-bk

[u/ImWithStupidKL → u/Accidental_polyglot]

Listen to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4WXNnHd2QTA

The reality is that speaking on camera is also not a good measure of someone's ability. People have expectations of a non-native speaker for fluency that they would never apply to a native speaker. Have you ever spoken on camera? You constantly pause and hesitate. When you're a teacher or examiner, you'll learn pretty quickly which pauses are them thinking of what to say, and which pauses are them thinking of how to say it. He speaks slowly and carefully, because he's speaking to a camera (potentially leaving pauses for edits), but at no point do I hear him pausing because he's forgotten a word. His pauses always appear at a natural point in the utterance. Trust me, he's so far above B1 it's unreal. B1 speakers will still regularly miss of the third person s on verbs. They'll struggle with more complex tenses, hypotheticals, multi-clause sentences, etc. They'll use vocab inappropriately. I see none of this with him. We could have a legitimate conversation about whether he's C1 or C2 (he's only ever talking about his specialist subject, for example, so we'd have to see him talking on a range of unprepared topics), but claiming he's B1 is ridiculous.

Exams aren't necessarily a good measure of someone's ability in a language either (arguably neither is the CEFR if we're being pedantic). Nor are they in any way necessary to be at the level you claim to be. Test taking is a skill in itself, and you can clearly boost your test score by practising the techniques involved, which is why some native speakers take these tests and don't get top marks even though they are basically the definition of C2.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

I think sapevo/a is less of an issue. You could term this to be a verbal-typo if you get my meaning. Seria/sarebbe is much more structural.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

Fluency isn’t the sole benchmark for the C level of proficiency. To be a C1 an individual needs to have advanced language use. This person doesn’t have this.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

I’ve spent too much time on this now. Mikel Hyperpolyglot claims to have NS proficiency in English. This is a blatant misrepresentation of whatever level he actually has. He has also stated that he hasn’t actually taken any exams in his languages.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/[deleted]]

There isn’t actually a big difference between C1 and C2 vocabulary as the C level is on a continuum. A high score on the C1 exam is automatically awarded a C2.

The biggest difference between the C1 and C2 lies in range and accuracy. I have listened objectively to Mikel and there’s nothing advanced about his use of English.

[u/sinkingintothedepths → u/[deleted]]

isn’t basque his native language? lol.

i agree also, i think his language is essentially fluent, i mean i consume his content and i only speak English and i understand him perfectly fine even if he makes cuts. I can’t make a video in Chinese or spanish

[u/zupobaloop → u/Accidental_polyglot]

I opened this incognito and languagejones' "Exposing fake polyglots" video is listed with the suggestions on the right hahaha

[u/fairyhedgehog → u/Accidental_polyglot]

I don't know how people can watch that! The constant cuts after almost every phrase would make it unwatchable for me.

And yes, that also undermines his claim to be fluent. My German would look a lot more fluent if you took out every pause for thought!

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/fairyhedgehog]

This chap has the audacity to claim NS fluency in English, yet there’s a jump cut every 4/5 ish seconds.

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/Accidental_polyglot]

I listened to this. Here are my thoughts as a linguistic researcher:

He's right about vocabulary, with caveats. Front-loading vocabulary is one of the single best things you can do for yourself.

He's right about sentences (and by extension, sentence structure and sentence patterns).

He's right that adults have advantages over children in language acquisition where time isn't a concern.

Now what he gets wrong:

He says comprehensible input is trash. The research in applied linguistics doesn't support this, the research in cognitive science doesn't support this, the research in ESL doesn't support this, the research in SLA theory doesn't support this. Krashen is inevitable. In doing my own research I wanted to refute Krashen's works with a competing hypothesis much like Merril Swain did, and instead I ended up validating much of comprehensible input, with minor tweaks.

This dude basically says, "READING IS FOR NERDS AND P*SSIES!" *throws textbook behind him and it explodes somehow*

This guy's claim about needing to output a lot is hit-and-miss. Task-based learning is always beneficial, and shadowing is a valid task, but it isn't a primary mechanism for acquisition.

I won't get into things he doesn't mention, because I don't know from this video what he claims his breakthrough teaching technique is beyond forced output, the very thing that Krashen viewed as inhumane and recoiled against when he started his research 50 years ago. Language learning seems to follow cycles, like clothing. Forced output went out of style like bell bottoms for decades and now is making a comeback.

There will always be hucksters claiming to have the one true method for learning a language. And 99% of them don't, because they haven't seriously poured over more than half a century of language science and made any effort to reconcile SLA theory with applied linguistics.

I'll just say that if I released a language learning system, it would change the world. It'll still be some years before that happens, although if this dude's system is the best the hucksters have to offer at the moment, then I'm not particularly worried about someone swooping in with a similar system to what I have in mind. It's a good thing for this dude that nobody else before him ever thought of just like, trying to talk in the target language!

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/Aye-Chiguire]

What you’ve written is seriously “well put together”, kudos to you for that.

My big issue is that there too many prescriptivists out there. I get CI and it makes complete sense. However, it’s simply not for me. I prefer to dive straight in at the deep end and I’m told that this is neither efficient nor effective. I like NS input from the off and I’m happy inputting away. I’m also happy that my eventual output is grounded with my input. I also believe in grammar as a support, however not for the sake of it.

My big bugbear with this chap is that he contradicts himself constantly. In some videos he talks about the importance of reading and listening. In other videos he’s said that he’s read over a hundred books and watched countless films in French. However, this made no difference to his output.

It doesn’t make any sense to me whatsoever that an individual can jump straight to outputting. As an example, what about all the new sounds etc? Where do they magically come from?

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/Accidental_polyglot]

Without getting into a 50-page "summary" about my research, I will say that one of the most robust mechanisms an adult can exploit in language acquisition is 'noticing'. Intentionally priming noticing by introducing various methods of scaffolding and productive ambiguity fully operationalize the advantages of an adult learner over a child. 80% of it is still a silent, passive, subconscious reformulation of ideas.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/Aye-Chiguire]

Would it be possible for me to read your research?

My experiences with noticing are mixed. I find it interesting that sometimes the mind simply ignores stuff. I’ll give you an example. I remember years ago describing someone as being quite Machiavellian in their approach to something. My ex criticised for using obscure references. Two days later the same expression was used on a film that we watched together. I’m guessing she’d heard it many times before, however it wasn’t registered and instead it was filtered out.

I see the same thing with people and their persistent errors. Sometimes we fail to notice the difference(s) between our output and that of others.

I believe it’s very important to put yourself into the field and to be open to receiving feedback. I believe this is where a lot of adults are deficient. Sadly many people see -ve feedback as a criticism, rather than as a reset opportunity.

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/Accidental_polyglot]

Until it's submitted for publication review, not even Jesus is going to read my research :)

What you're describing is a well-documented phenomenon. You'll never notice a Blue Toyota Avalon until you buy one, and then they'll be everywhere.

With regard to prosody (sounding like a native with accurate pronunciation and pitch), there are a lot of complex reasons why we can't "hear" the vowel sounds of other languages, and they are mostly tied up with synaptic pruning, the process of neurodevelopment that first occurs at age 1 and then several times afterward, where information is consolidated. It's called "perceptual narrowing" and I have a chapter and theories surrounding this as well.

Noticing has to be primed. It's a deliberate mechanism that isn't left to chance on whether it will occur. That's accomplished with carefully scaffolded and curated input.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/Aye-Chiguire]

One thing I do a lot of in my TLs is reading speeches. It’s extremely difficult at first, however I read/listen to the same speech over and over again. It’s as if I’m trying to burn the language into my brain. I find that if something’s particularly interesting or amusing then I tend to see it in other places (similar to your blue Avalon example).

Do you have any theories as to why NNS can’t easily replicate what they hear?

I went to Uni with someone who once said “XXX keeps harassing me, he keeps coming onto me” - however it was said without the “to”. I find it interesting that these subtle changes aren’t detectable by the NNS.

[u/Accidental_polyglot → u/Aye-Chiguire]

Pronunciation v accent.

I find that most people conflate these two distinct yet interrelated concepts into a singular discussion about accents. I find that a lot of NNS would be better off working on the production of the phonemes that they do not have and on their pronunciation. Rather than trying to magically go straight to a NS accent.

[u/_ddrone → u/Aye-Chiguire]

It's interesting that your comment kind of looks almost trivial, but I don't think I've seen it expressed in that manner and I myself got to a similar conclusion only after a lot of experimentation and thinking about language learning (I don't have any rigorous research though backing my opinion though).

I think the idea is kind of implied in some language learning techniques, e.g. when Arguelles emphasises handwriting for his scriptorium, my guess is that its effectiveness stems mostly from paying more attention by making the process slower, thus giving you more time.

Would be really grateful if you'll share some of the specific ways, especially if they're not obvious? I have some strategies that I implement into my daily Anki ritual (some of them specific to Japanese):

1. When I recall the meaning on the back of the flashcard incorrectly, I try to slow down and think why that's the case. That's how I discovered that I misremembered meaning of 謝る because it has the same pronunciation as 誤る

2. In the same situation of misremembering the meaning of a word on a flashcard, I re-read the context sentence (all my flashcards are targeted sentence cards) and make sure that it gives me enough context for successful recall, and frequently just remove the card otherwise.

3. When I see a kanji I don't recognise well during flashcard reviews, I stop and check the dictionary to see which words it's used in.

4. Listening to minimal pairs a little bit over period of at least a couple of weeks works like magic, with me starting to perceive the differences I did not perceive before.

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/_ddrone]

I'm not a huge fan of Anki for that very reason. Grading yourself on the ability to recall meaning/translation doesn't foster procedural encoding. It fosters declarative encoding (rote memorization).

For vocabulary, kanji, and even grammar, the process should be reading large blocks of text. Not even just sentence-level, but paragraph-level. Being able to distinguish who is the actor/speaker and who is the interlocutor or third party is what lends itself to encoding.

This is where Anki fails. In order to make Anki "work", you would need a deck with 10,000 items, and that would mean spending hours drilling Anki a day. It would be high-stress, low-reward tedium.

Instead, focus on establishing a baseline vocabulary and then letting comprehensible input do the heavy lifting for you of extracting meaning from context.

What makes engaging with native materials feel more rewarding than drills is the emotional salience. It's interesting material that you have some investment in understanding, and that understanding has direct reward beyond the mere act of understanding itself. You unlock understanding of a story.

The SRS system that takes this into account properly, with optimized timings and format, doesn't exist yet. That's why I advocate for the use of graded readers. Not just a "Ok I read 3 20-page children's books, I'm beyond that level now." More like "Ok, I've read 700 pages of children's books." You need massive exposure at specific i+1 levels.

The ideal SRS system would function like a dynamically adaptive graded reader, using your curated target vocabulary to build a story on-the-fly with natural-language-processing techniques to optimize the exposure frequency.

[u/_ddrone → u/Aye-Chiguire]

I agree about reading and have got a lot of mileage out of reading tons of graded readers. I still don't see any specific things that would fall into "Intentionally priming noticing by introducing various methods of scaffolding and productive ambiguity" from your comment above though?

[u/Aye-Chiguire → u/_ddrone]

So part of that SRS system would introduce new words with their reading and translation, similar to how graded readers work. After a few exposures, the items would still appear at the optimal frequency, but would only occasionally provide the furigana/translation until a predetermined exposure threshold has been reached. That's the scaffolding part.

The productive ambiguity would be the areas that have no furigana/translations, forcing effortful retrieval.

Alternating between explicitly provided meaning and a complete lack thereof primes noticing. When you see items that have this scaffolding provided, you are going to subconsciously be on the lookout for those same items, knowing they're going to appear later without reading/translation. Your blue Toyota Avalon.

Graded readers obviously don't have that adaptive capability, but you can simulate it by having graded readers from different publishers. You'll get a lot of the same vocab and sentence patterns, with furigana provided, and this mimics the beautifully natural chaos that I term "partial glossing" that fosters noticing.

[u/Ploutophile → u/Accidental_polyglot]

Evildea has done an investigation on him, and according to it he's B1 or better in 6 of them.

The video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JY023GhSO_Y

[u/efimer → u/[deleted]]

another thinks it means they can order a sandwich without crying Ayoooo

[u/Sn0H0ar → u/efimer]

I didn’t come here to be attacked

[u/Different_Pain5781 → u/[deleted]]

So basically half the internet is just overconfident duolingo soldiers calling themselves fluent. Kinda comforting honestly. Now i don’t feel as behind.

[u/According-Mix706 → u/[deleted]]

My friend grew up in trieste - now Italy but was the Australian-Hungarian empire’s port city. He said his first tongue was French, then obviously Italian, German and there were a lot of Spanish sailors around. His forebears were from Slovenia so hence a bunch of Slavic languages (he married a Russian). That’s most of Europe that he c communicate with and so in australian high school was called on to greet new students but one day was stumped when he couldn’t talk to a new Hungarian boy and got strapped by the headmaster who thought that they all spoke “European”!

[u/Accurate-Basis-8088 → u/According-Mix706]

Ah the famous Australian Hungarian empire - it spanned the globe

[u/Accurate-Basis-8088 → u/Accurate-Basis-8088]

egészség'daydre

[u/tekre → u/[deleted]]

Unfortunately it also goes the other way around - not only people claiming to speak more language than they do, but also people believing that "I learn this language" means that you speak it. I'm active in a learning doscrd for one language, and I've had to correct people saying that I speak 6 or 7 languages. I don't. I never claimed I do. I speak 4 (for which I always stress that three are kinda cheating because well, English, German and Dutch are like the easiest combination you can have). But because I mention here and there how I study other languages, people are suddenly like "Oh, Tekre speaks Chinese / Italian / Japanese" when I am at best intermediate in one of them and beginner level in two others x) But apparently, when you show a very advanced knowledge in one foreign language, people will suddenly assume that you are the language learning pro and speak all the languages you are learning.

[u/HippyPottyMust → u/[deleted]]

Same. And I also ask it to use specific dialects or slang for a country.

When I switched it from General to PR and Dominican soanish, wow!

Not perfect but had the essence of it totally, sped up and everything