Your language brain matters more for learning programming than your math brain | Mind Control - Massive Science

New research contradicts long held assumptions about coding, according to a report from Amy Nippert, Neuroscience - University of Minnesota.

Photo: Christina Morillo from Pexels

When you think of learning another language, you probably think of French, Spanish, or Chinese. But what about Python or Java? The two processes might be more similar than you’d think. 

A recent study published from researchers at the University of Washington showed that language ability and problem solving skills best predict how quickly people learn Python, a popular programming language. Their research, published in Scientific Reports, used behavioral tests and measures of brain activity to see how they correlated with how fast and well participants learned programming...

Taken together, these result make the case for language skills being an integral aspect of learning programming (or at least of learning Python), while math skills weren’t very predictive of how well or quickly participants learned. This idea has important implications for the perceptions surrounding programming, which is often viewed as a “math intensive” field...

It’s true that some fields require both math and programming skills, but those aren’t necessarily the majority of programming jobs available. Based on this study, the requirements for advanced math classes for every computer science major seem unnecessary, and increased flexibility over math requirements could help recruit and retain students.
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Source: Massive Science