In 2014, neuroscientist Albert Costa and his team at Universitat Pompeu Fabra published a study that challenged an idea we often take for granted: that language is merely a vehicle through which we express decisions that have already been made.
Their research showed instead that making decisions in a non-native language reduces emotional involvement and leads to more analytical evaluations. In other words, the language in which we reason is not neutral: it alters our perception of risk, the moral weight of a choice, and our willingness to compromise.
The study used moral dilemmas to measure this effect, but its implications extend far beyond the laboratory. A simple shift of perspective toward the business world makes its relevance clear.
What happens when a commercial negotiation is conducted entirely in English? When a contract is discussed in a language that is not the emotional one? When an international team makes strategic decisions using an acquired linguistic code rather than a native one?
It is not only the vocabulary that changes. The emotional distance from the decision changes as well.
A foreign language can encourage clarity and detachment, making certain decisions more calculated and less emotionally charged. At the same time, it may soften cultural nuances, simplify implicit implications, and reduce the intensity of concepts that would carry different weight in one’s mother tongue. It is a subtle shift in perspective, but in complex contexts subtle shifts make a significant difference.
The 2014 study found that when the dilemma was addressed in a non-native language, participants were more likely to opt for utilitarian choices, indicating a lower emotional impact and more rational processing. This phenomenon is now known as the Foreign Language Effect.
If language influences how we evaluate a moral decision in a laboratory setting, it is legitimate to ask how much it may influence an economic, legal, or strategic decision in the real world.
For this reason, language management is not a formal detail nor a merely technical step. It is an integral part of the decision-making process. In international contexts, interpreting, legal translation, and terminological support do not simply “transfer content,” but ensure that what is understood retains the same weight, precision, and responsibility, regardless of the language in which it is expressed.
Decisions are not made with numbers alone, but with the words that accompany and explain them. And when those words change language, method, expertise, and awareness of the impact of every terminological choice become essential.
Finking supports companies, professionals, and institutions precisely in those moments when language becomes a strategic component of the process: negotiations, contracts, decisive meetings, international communication. Because an important decision deserves to be fully understood, with the same clarity and value, in whatever language it is made.
