#281 Outsmart Your Brain with Cognitive Biases

[Link] Michael: Hello and welcome back to the Level Up English podcast, the best place
to come to practice the English language, learn about the British accent and culture, with
me, your host, Michael Lavers. I'm coming at you today from a hot and actually somewhat
cloudy Bangkok and yeah, it's a nice day here. Hopefully I'll be able to get out later on when
it cools down a bit and enjoy the day.

[Link] But for today, I'm very excited. Maybe you can tell I'm very excited for today's
episode because this is a topic I really love and I'm really happy that I found a way to tie it in
with, uh, the podcast. So this is something that I'm interested in outside of this English
learning podcast as well. And this is something called a cognitive bias.

[Link] Or the plural would be cognitive biases, I believe is how you pronounce it. And I
will be mentioning a few phrases today that sound very advanced, and that's because they
kind of are. These are like psychological things about the human mind, right? So they're
related to the human mind. And I think I will just tell you if it's not super useful, I'll just let
you know.

[Link] Like, here is the name, but don't worry about it too much. But basically, in this
episode, I'm going to be talking about some ways in which our brains trick us into certain
things. Maybe into believing something that isn't true, or something like that. And I think
one really cool thing about this topic is the more you learn about it, the more you
understand your own brain, and maybe you can even outsmart your brain.

[Link] It's kind of a weird idea, isn't it? A weird topic that we're basically talking about
the brain outsmarting the brain. It's kind of strange, isn't it? How we are a brain. You could
say I am a brain. That's what I'm using to think right now. And yet it's still so mysterious to
us. There's still so much we don't know about the brain.

Email Community
[Link] Michael: Very strange, but anyway, before I ramble too much, I would like to
remind people about my email community. This is something I don't mention as much as I
should perhaps, but if you want to join thousands of other people who sign up for free mini
lessons, you can join the email community. This is available on the website.

[Link] There's also a button. In your podcast player that will take you right there That
says something like "Get Free Lessons" And that's because if you sign up you will get five
free lessons from Level Up English sent to your email address. So you can enjoy those free
lessons there. Then if you decide to stay signed up to the community, you will receive... how
often is it?

[Link] It's twice a month on a Thursday. You So basically once every fortnight. Fortnight
is 14 nights, two weeks. Once a fortnight I send one email with a mini lesson. Usually we're
learning some vocabulary, some grammar or something like that. But I also send a quick
update. So anything that I'm working on recently or my plans for the next few weeks, I will
write about it.

[Link] In this email, so it's a nice way to stay in touch with me and learn about what's
going on As well as getting some free content in return. So once again, if you want to sign up
you can go to the website and go right to the bottom There's a click a sign up button there.
Or there should be a link in your podcast player's description as well. Thank you for listening
to that.

[Link] Hopefully I can see you there on the email community. Thank you if you are
signed up already. I think I'll get right into it today. I have a few different ones to talk about
today, and I had to narrow the list down quite a lot because there's so many of these. So,
cognitive biases.

Sunk Cost Fallacy

[Link] Michael: The first one I want to talk about is one that some of you may have
heard of, and this is known as the sunk cost fallacy.

[Link] Fallacy is something that isn't true. Basically, it's something that isn't true. So The
Sunk Cost Fallacy. I think I will explain what each one means Before giving some examples of
each one and maybe talk about my own experience with them as well, or maybe how it can
relate to you I'll also talk about some vocabulary that may be relevant. Because sunk cost
could be a useful phrase. But basically the sunk cost fallacy is when people continue giving
their time or their money or their effort into doing something just because they have
already spent so much into it.

[Link] They've already invested a lot into it. And often this is even when it's no longer a
good idea, right? I think an example will help illustrate this the best, to kind of describe this
the best. So, I find this is really true with me. Well, I've experienced this before when it
comes to learning languages.

[Link] Learning a language is a really difficult thing and it takes many years to get even a
little bit good at a language for most people. And maybe for me, even longer, many, many
years for me. And once you've put in so many years of work, it's really difficult to stop
learning, right? But you kind of have to think, am I going to be learning this language
forever?

[Link] You know, all of you right now who are learning English, you have to ask yourself
that question, do I want to be learning English forever? Maybe a lot of you will be, yes, and
if so, that's fantastic. I think having that, uh, lifelong mindset, that learning mindset is very
healthy rather than just wanting to finish learning, uh, in the short term.

[Link] But for some people, maybe you have a goal to, you know, I'm going to learn
English until my trip to England, and then I'm going to stop. There might be some people out
there like that, and I think it's much more common with other languages besides English. So,
I have done that before. I have learnt, well, I have learnt little bits of many languages, such
as French, Spanish, German, Bosnian, Croatian, all these like random languages. I had a little
bit of Russian in there as well. Uh, I've learned many little languages and these are usually in
preparation for trips I have coming up or travel, right? But my goal is always to stop learning
them after the trip.

[Link] Because I think if I continued learning Croatian, it wouldn't be very useful. It

would take so much of my time and I rarely meet anyone from Croatia. So it wouldn't be a
very useful language for me, unless I want to keep going back there. But The Sunk Cost
Fallacy says that: oh, okay. I've already spent one year learning this language.

[Link] It really would be a shame to stop now because that kind of means my whole
year of progress is forgotten. So we kind of want to keep continuing something even though
it doesn't really make sense anymore I really had this problem with Cantonese as well. I
learned Cantonese for about two years And I was really... I felt like I was getting the hang of
it.

[Link] It was getting easier and then I had this decision like should I continue with
Cantonese or should I actually learn Mandarin instead, these two Chinese languages? and
for whatever reason, at the time, I decided to switch to Mandarin. I think the main reason
was because it's just more useful, and I had the goal of going back to Cantonese when my
Mandarin is a higher level.

[Link] That was my goal. Still waiting for that to happen. But that was really difficult
because I did feel like all of that time I invested into Cantonese was kind of just a waste of
time. And that is the sunk cost fallacy. However, I would say if I'm thinking more carefully, it
was not a waste of time because I had a really fun time learning.

[Link] You know, we say it's about the, the journey, not the destination. The learning
process was fun for me. And, uh, you know, maybe there were some other benefits. Maybe
I made some friends along the way. Maybe I still remember some phrases today. Maybe I
learnt a little bit about language learning itself that I can take with me into my next
languages.

[Link] So it's just interesting to think about.

[Link] I'll give you another example of the sunk cost fallacy. I guess it's very common in
like a business or a project you're working on. If the business is failing, you feel like you need
to keep continuing with it just because you've already spent so much money on it before.

[Link] So it would be a shame to give up now, even though it might be the best idea. It
could also happen in relationships where you've been with your partner for many, many
years and for whatever reason, it's just not working. You don't love them anymore, you
don't feel the same way that you used to, but you kind of feel like, well, we've had so many
memories together, it's been so, it's been so long, I've invested all this time into this
relationship and it would be a shame if I were just to stop it now and start again, right?

[Link] This is something that many of us can relate to, I'm sure, in different areas. And I
think just being aware of this fallacy, aware of this idea of a sunk cost, can help us overcome
it and maybe consider, you know, maybe it is a good idea to give up and move on from all
this effort. So, it is, I suppose, a good question.

[Link] Like, do you think this sunk cost fallacy is actually useful? Because sometimes, of
course, it's nice to keep a skill. If we want to, you know, keep these things that we've
invested, it can be a good thing. But I guess the main thing is to consider if it really benefits
you. And don't just continue doing something because of the sunk costs on their own.

[Link] I think that's the... the, uh, outcome here... you know, the, the moral of this, uh,
idea. But, I guess the expression we can learn in this one is to sink something. To sink into
something. So, we often use, uh, sunk with money. That's really common. Uh, and, yeah,
time as well. Money and time. Two very, uh, useful things in life.

[Link] But if you have wasted a lot of money on something, you can say you have sunk
money into something It's not necessarily a waste because it may give you some benefit
later I think what this means is it's sunk. It's under the water and you cannot get this money
back. Right that that's what that word sunk means in this context. So I felt this a lot in the
early days of Level Up English. I don't even know how much money I sunk into the, the, the
website and the business, but it's probably quite a lot.

[Link] And at the beginning, it just wasn't really working. I had no members. No one was
interested. Even in the podcast, no one was too interested. So I sunk a lot of money trying
to make it popular. And I had the choice there to either give up and lose all that investment
or keep going. So hopefully I made the right choice to keep going in that case.
[Link] But maybe you can let me know an area in which where you have sunk a lot of uh
money or time into a project or something similar.

[Link] Okay, so that's a sunk cost fallacy, I think sunk could be a useful one.

[Link] It's a sunk cost. It's a a cost I cannot get back.

Loss Aversion
[Link] Michael: This next one is a bit different, but it's another bias.

[Link] Maybe I can mention this now, by the way, a bias, B I A S, is when you have a
tendency to lean towards a particular view, perspective, or idea in a kind of unfair way.
Maybe you have some reason why you cannot be fair in that situation. So I might say, 'Oh,
yes, the British accent is the best accent in the world.' But of course I have some bias
because I am from Britain.

[Link] So I have some bias, right? So a bias is having like an unfair uh leaning towards
some view in your mind. So that's what that word means.

[Link] Anyway, the next bias here is loss aversion. Loss aversion. Loss is the noun of
lose, to lose something. Aversion is kind of like avoiding something. Trying to stay away
from something.

[Link] So you want to stay away from losing something. Loss aversion. Could be useful.
Could be useful. So this is someone's tendency to prefer avoiding, uh, losses. So you want to
avoid losing something rather than gaining something. So, again, I think an example will be
useful.

[Link] I could say to you, you have to spend £50 and there's a really high chance, 80
percent chance that you will get £100 in return, this is your investment. It's your gamble. It's
like maybe you're at the casino So if you spend 50 pounds, there's a high chance you will get
a hundred pounds and double your money But there's also a small chance you will lose
everything you will lose your 50 pounds. And this is a really hard choice for many people
because even though there's a good chance you will gain money, the fear of losing money is
stronger for most people than the desire to gain money, right?

[Link] And this basically is because in the human mind negative feels much worse than
positives feel good.
[Link] I think it's, you know, how humans have survived over the... over the millennia,
right? And that's because we have avoided dangerous and scary things. So it's kind of in our
DNA, it's in our bodies to avoid bad things.

[Link] You know, another example of this is if you think of the worst pain you've ever
had and the best feeling you've ever had. Maybe a really strong, uh, pleasurable feeling of
happiness. And if someone said to you, do you want one minute of the worst pain followed
by one minute of the best feeling ever, would you take that deal?

[Link] Or would you just stay the same and be like you are now? There might be some
of you who would take that deal, but I think most of us would not take that deal because,
uh, again, the bad feels much worse than the good feels good. Hopefully that makes sense.
So we want to avoid losing something. We want to avoid negatives as much as we can.

[Link] I also think this is why many people stay in comfortable positions without risking
something more. This is something you see all over the world and we all do it in some way.
And maybe it's relatable for you or someone you know, right? Where maybe you have a job
or a situation, a friendship maybe, where it's kind of okay, you're comfortable, it's nice, it's
not bad, but it could be better.

[Link] You're kind of thinking. Maybe it could be a bit more it could be a bit better than
this. However, you're scared to try to go to that next level because it's a risk right? It's a risk.
And it could get much much better if you take that risk or it could get much much worse. So
because there's that worse possibility, you think it's safer to stay where you are and stay
comfortable. It's such a common thing with people. I'm not saying It's right or wrong to
make either choice, but again, just being aware of this bias will help you make a more
informed decision.

[Link] I think that's really important.

[Link] Again, for each of these biases, I'm going to try to relate it to my own life to make
it a bit more interesting, but I'll see if I can also relate it to language learning or English
learning as well.

[Link] So just to get a bit open with you, a bit, uh, personal that this is something that I
feel quite a lot when it comes to the Level Up English empire. No, I'm just kidding. Uh, let's,
let's call it the business, right? The Level Up English business. Um, I always have big ideas for
how to hopefully improve it in the future and make it better.

[Link] And it's always very scary to do that because once again, It may make it better,
but also it may make it worse. So right now I have some people who are supporting me and
some people like you who are listening or watching and that's good. I'm quite happy with
that. If I make a change, a big change, I may get more, but I could also lose everyone.

[Link] Maybe all of you will hate me and stop listening. And that is much, much scarier
than the positives that could come out of it. So every... Every change you make in a business
is a risk and that can be really scary for many people.

[Link] So I think it's very relatable this idea right that I would rather stay the same than
risk making something worse. That's what we're talking about.

[Link] But I think it's also interesting how when I reflect on the past when I think back to
the past, almost all the changes I have made have been good. People have been happier.

[Link] It's been a positive change. So once you're aware of that, you can maybe learn
and reflect a bit more logically and hopefully act in a, in a way that is wiser, more wise,
right?

[Link] And I suppose another kind of loss is the feeling of making a mistake when
speaking a language. I feel like this is kind of related.

[Link] Because the possibility of making a mistake when you're talking in English can be
very scary. And it can lead many people to not even want to try to do something new. I
always try to encourage people on the website, you know, try to use very difficult language
and advanced structures, uh, in your writing or speaking because the more mistakes you
make, the faster you will learn.

[Link] But again, I think people, including myself, it's so much easier to say, I would
rather just be comfortable at my level than risk embarrassing myself and making a mistake
and trying to go to that next level.

[Link] So that's something that we have to overcome, you know, if we do feel that way,
right?

[Link] So anyway, that is loss aversion. I may have to make this episode shorter and
maybe do a part two in the future because I'm Rambling a bit more than I expected. But
again, that's because I enjoy this topic and I hope you do as well.

Confirmation Bias
[Link] Michael: The next one is actually a very popular one. So you may have heard of
this one.
[Link] This is called confirmation bias. Confirmation bias. And this is something I know
you have done. I know everyone's done this, right? This is the tendency to search for
information that confirms your own opinions or confirms your own beliefs.

[Link] A really, really good and kind of funny example of this is when you want to
research something to see if you are correct, say on Google, the way you search it is an
example of confirmation bias. Let's say that I think... here's a random example, so it's a
common stereotype that British people have really bad teeth, right?

[Link] I'm, not sure it's true. I don't think it's that true. I think... how are my teeth? I
think they're fine, but It's a common stereotype that especially Americans will kind of poke
fun at the British people, make fun of us and say, why are your teeth so disgusting? Why are
their teeth always really bad? And maybe I want to prove them wrong by researching which
country has the worst teeth.

[Link] If I want to kind of research in an unbiased way, I might research like that, like
"countries that have the worst teeth", or the worst, you know, dentist, uh, something like
that. I don't know. However, I kind of, I don't want to be wrong, so I'm going to research
"why British people have good teeth". Or, actually, British people have good teeth.

[Link] I'm going to research something like that. So, the results I find online will
hopefully be confirming what I already believe. Right, so this is a big problem on the internet
where, uh, the wording you use can just confirm your own beliefs and you never really see,
uh, beliefs that are different from you.

[Link] It's got a big problem.

[Link] We also call these bubbles on the internet. You might be in your bubble or your
echo chamber, that's another similar word where basically you're in this community online
or in real life where everyone around you is saying the same thing. So you never hear a
different idea. So therefore you really more strongly believe over time that your opinion is
the correct one.

[Link] And again, I just think the internet makes this problem, this bias, so much more
prevalent, so much worse, so much stronger, because it is easy to find information that
agrees with what you think. It's very common in politics as well. If you have a political view,
you will look for new sources from websites that agree with your political view.

[Link] Let's say, if you're really right wing, right wing political stance, it's less likely, that
you will find information on a left wing news website, right? So you'll, you'll probably want
to read, uh, only your own opinions. It's more fun, it's more comfortable to read that.
[Link] And this also comes up in friendships as well, perhaps, where you may only like
people who have the same opinions as you. Uh, because opposing beliefs, that means our
opposite beliefs, make you uncomfortable. Right, so you're kind of confirming your own
beliefs by choosing the friends that you spend time with.

[Link] And again, it's not to say that's always wrong. It's nice to be around people who
are not always disagreeing with you, of course. But I think it is good to be aware of this still,
to be aware of your confirmation bias.

[Link] And if nothing else, you can just have some awareness that your opinion is not
always correct. What are the chances that you are correct on everything? I think pretty
much zero. Like, I have a lot of opinions but I don't think there's any chance that I am
correct on all of them. So I think that's a really nice way to view something.

[Link] Okay, I may be wrong but this is what I believe at the moment. So that's one
really big bias that we might have.

[Link] Maybe we have time for two more. I, I, again, I did have a longer list, uh, but
unfortunately I forgot how much I like to ramble. But I hope you're enjoying this anyway. I
hope this is interesting for you. You'll have to let me know too if you knew about any of
these before, uh, or how many of these are new for you today.

[Link] That would be interesting.

The Framing Effect

[Link] Michael: Okay, the next one is known as a, or The Framing Effect. Framing Effect.
So to frame is like you might frame a picture, which is where you put, uh, something around
a photo. We call it a photo frame, a picture frame. It's usually like a, I guess it looks, it can
look like it's metal or wood.

[Link] I guess the material depends. It could be plastic, but it's something that goes
around a picture to make the picture look nicer to display on your wall. That's a frame. And
yeah, a frame just kind of, it changes how you view something based on the context, I
suppose.

[Link] So the framing effect is decisions that are influenced by the way information is
shown or presented, rather than the information itself.

[Link] I have a really good example of this from my own experience, but I'll give you
Hopefully a clear one to start with, an example. So let's say you were choosing some
medical treatment, uh, that was maybe going to change your life, some really, uh, nice
medical treatment to improve your health. And it said "90 percent survival rate."

[Link] Okay. That sounds pretty good. 90 percent of people will survive. Oh, not bad.
That sounds quite nice. But then you look at a different one that says. "10 percent mortality
rate." Mortality rate means how many people die. Mortality is your life. So how many
people will die. And that's oh, that's quite scary 10 percent of people will die That's 10 in
100.

[Link] That's really scary. Wow. I'm not i'm not gonna do that. Are you crazy? But of
course, it's the same thing right 90 percent survival 10 percent dying. It's the same. It's just
the framing makes it sound different So if you focus on the positive, it sounds more positive.
That's basically what that means.

[Link] Another example is in products and marketing and advertising It's so so common
in marketing and once you know about this Framing Effect, this bias, you will see it
everywhere and you might be less likely to be tricked into buying something.

[Link] I made up an example here that, maybe you won't quite see this, but something
similar to this. You might have one product with two different packages. One package,
again, it says, uh, 10 percent sugar. And you might think, oh, that's a lot of sugar. I don't
know about that. 10 percent sugar? That's huge. But then you look at another package that
says, 90 percent natural ingredients.

[Link] Oh, okay. That sounds really good. That 10%? Yeah, it doesn't matter. It's
nothing, right? Even though it's the same. So yeah, I think framing is very very big in
marketing.

[Link] I will tell you my own experience now. So basically If you're a foreigner in
Thailand, even if you live in Thailand for long term for a long time, you'll always be treated
as a foreigner here.

[Link] I think that's just a common thing in asia in general. And it's not a nice feeling all
the time. And one thing you might find is even if you have a work permit in Thailand You
may still have to pay a foreigner price Because of where you were born. Even maybe your
skin color could could come into effect in some cases. So sometimes it feels a little bit
uncomfortable when me and a Thai friend we're going to the same place. They get to pay a
very very small entrance fee. And because I'm a foreigner, I have to pay much, much more,
and there are good reasons for that, you know, you might say, okay, foreigners don't pay tax
like Thai people do, so that could be why, but sometimes even the foreigners who do pay
taxes still have to pay the higher fee to go into like a temple, for example.
[Link] So yeah, it doesn't feel that nice, and it's like we're being charged more because
we are foreigners. So that's not a good framing right there.

[Link] However, here's the opposite. I also went to China earlier in the year and I went
to a national park where I had to pay an entrance fee and it said this is the fee to enter the
park and then it had another bit underneath that said locals can enter for free, right?

[Link] It's a discount for people who live in the area. Essentially, this is the same thing,
right? If you're not from there, you pay more. If you're from there, you pay less. But the
framing is different. So in Thailand, foreigners pay higher than the entrance fee. In China,
they're kind of saying, okay, foreigners pay the normal fee.

[Link] If you're local, you get a discount. So the discount is good. A higher fee is bad. So
the framing is... is very important. And the Chinese framing in this case, was much nicer. It
sounded much nicer, uh, to me. So hopefully that makes sense. And if you are working for
the government or tourist, uh, agency, then maybe you could take this into consideration so
you don't get so many angry foreigners about the price.

[Link] Trying to kind of attach this one to language learning, I couldn't really think of a
great example, but again, it's so common when you're buying something you're paying for
something.

[Link] So maybe if you're looking for a language course try to focus on the success rate
of the course or the exam or the reviews of the course because again, if someone says "95
percent of students pass this course", that sounds really great.

[Link] Wow 95 percent that's fantastic. But imagine if it said " 5 percent of students will
fail". It sounds a lot worse, right? 5 percent will fail. So just that framing is so important.

[Link] I think it's a good metaphor or good analogy for life as well. How you frame
something changes your perspective.

[Link] You could frame the rain as being depressing and sad and cold. Or you can frame
it as refreshing and, you know, helping the plants grow and, you know, beautiful and, I don't
know, relaxing. There's two different ways to frame one event, which is a great, uh, way to
approach life.

[Link] Let's do one final one.

Cognitive Dissonance
[Link] Michael: Now, this is known as Cognitive Dissonance. I will probably just say for
this one. It's not super important that word dissonance. It's not really that common of a
word. We don't really need to learn it. So don't worry about that one. Cognitive, it's not
super useful. But basically it's related to the mind the brain. Your cognitive power is your
brain power.

[Link] So Cognitive Dissonance is the name but to try and make it a bit simpler, this
means the mental the brain mental discomfort that you might experience when you have
two, uh, contradictory beliefs or values.

[Link] Contradictory means you might have two beliefs that don't go together. You
know, they don't match together. They contradict, right? They cannot go together.

[Link] So, what really commonly happens is when you try to talk yourself into believing
something to avoid accepting your cognitive dissonance. So, for example, you might buy
something really, really expensive. Let's say you buy a really nice new iPhone. But then, the
next day, you see an iPhone for sale on another website that's much, much cheaper.

[Link] And, you might think like, oh no, I wasted so much money on that iPhone. I spent
so much more money. If I waited one more day, I could have saved a lot of money.

[Link] If you are experiencing cognitive dissonance, you might say something like, well,
Because I got it earlier, I got some more features. I think my phone, this one's better than
that phone. Actually, that discounted phone is probably not very good. Maybe it's not even
a new phone. Maybe they did something to it.

[Link] It's actually broken and they're trying to resell it, right? So can you see here that
I'm trying to make up some reasons as to why my decision was the best decision. So rather
than admitting that I made a mistake, I'm trying to come up with some reason to help me
feel better about it. So that's one example. Another really common one that I see all the
time is with eating meat.

[Link] Many of you will know that I do not eat meat. So I think I'm maybe more aware
of this I I I feel like if you don't eat meats you see this more and more. It becomes more
obvious. But you might see someone for example holding a hamburger like a beef burger or
something eating a cow literally, and they're going, Oh, I love animals.

[Link] I would never hurt animals, eating their burger. And it's kind of like, well, there's
some cognitive dissonance there because it's likely that that person hasn't attached, you
know, what they're eating to the animal that they are saying they love. Right? And I think
the cognitive dissonance here comes because there's distance from what they are
purchasing and the action of killing the cow.
[Link] Right. Right, so there's a separation there. So that is a very common example of
cognitive dissonance.

[Link] What they're saying and what they are doing does not match up. So therefore,
it's cognitive dissonance. They're trying to talk themselves into believing what they're doing
is correct.

[Link] But that's just the two examples that I could think of for this one if you can think
of any more Uh for this one or for any of them, please. Let me know. I always love hearing
your opinions and seeing your comments It's always one of my favorite parts of doing the
podcast. So please let me know.

Spotify Comments
[Link] Michael: I think I'll do something today that we haven't done in a little while and
this is read some comments from Spotify. And I've actually noticed that since I've been
reading them, the comments have got a bit longer. So I think some of you have realised that
I read them on the podcast and you want to actually make them more interesting.

[Link] So thank you. On Episode 277, we have a comment from Luis Fernando who says,
"The best interview ever". Wow, that's so nice. Thank you. That's really nice. Another one
on that episode from MSMM who said, "I really enjoyed the episode. I like the fact that it is
discussing something we all want to learn, despite our level in English. Thank you. Sama
from Saudi Arabia". Thank you both very much for those comments on that episode.

[Link] Danny said on Episode 275, "Awesome episode, Michael". Nice simple comment,
but thank you very much Danny, appreciate that you liked that one.

[Link] On Episode 274, finally, it had a few comments from one from Mohammed, who
said, "Absolutely beneficial episode that gave us much confidence to complete our journey
to learn". That's great to hear.

[Link] Hanen said, "Wonderful episode. Thank you.:

[Link] Jude said, "Age is never a reason to learn new things, especially learning English".

[Link] I think it maybe you mean age is never a reason not to learn new things Maybe
that makes more sense. But yeah, I get what you mean. Thank you very much Jude.

[Link] And finally Nicola or Nicholas says, "Thank you, Michael. It's always a pleasure to
listen to your podcast," and Likewise, it's always a pleasure to read your comments.
[Link] So thank you so much really appreciate them all. You're welcome to leave a
comment on Spotify or a review on Apple Podcasts and I will read them eventually. Thank
you for that.

Quote
[Link] Michael: Let's just end with a little quote now. It's a nice quote and I don't
believe this has an author but it's a very common saying which is

[Link] It's not what you say, but how you say it. So this is kind of related to the Framing
Effect right it's not what you say, but how you say it. Right, and I think that just says the tone
of your voice is so important in language and, uh, giving people compliments or insults, it's
really important, and when you're learning English, please don't forget about this, it's really,
really common in, uh, probably all languages, but especially in English, when the way that
you say something will affect the meaning and how other people will see it. Right, so always
remember that and try to develop your pronunciation naturally to use this kind of tone,
right?

[Link] I'll leave it there now. I am starting to get a bit hot so I'm going to stop recording
and turn the aircon back on. Thank you so much for watching or listening.

[Link] I will see you in the next one. Goodbye.