How Does The Difficulty Level Of A Language Impact Language Learning Fatigue?

While you can argue that all languages are equally difficult, it is a fact that people will find one language more difficult than the other.

Even if this is only a perceived difficulty, it still is harder for them compared to another language. Unfortunately the harder you find a language, the more likely you are going to suffer from fatigue when studying it.

This is all down to the fact that your brain will need to work harder to make sense of things and this will tire you out. The good news is that you will make progress and you will start to get comfortable and find things easier and when you do, you will not suffer as much fatigue.

All Languages Are Difficult In The Beginning

It doesn’t matter what language you are learning, it is going to seem difficult in the beginning and this is going to make fatigue more likely.

When you are just starting out, everything is new and you will be trying to comprehend every little thing.  You know nothing and this will make everything a struggle so you are going to have to use a lot of focus and brain power to get your bearings and this is going to make you fatigued pretty quickly.

Until you can start to feel comfortable in the language, you will be at a higher risk of fatigue, since you are just generally going to have to work harder to make sense of things.

If You Find A Language Hard, You Are More Likely To Get Fatigued

While all languages are equal in difficulty, you may find one more difficult than another. This will really depend on what your native language is as well as your previous life experiences. Every one of us will find some languages more difficult than others.

If you are studying one that you find more challenging, you are more likely to suffer from fatigue.

Everything you do in the language is going to be harder for you, and you will need to use more energy to try and process things, which if course is more likely to cause you to feel fatigued. 

This should fade as you improve in the language, as you should hopefully get more comfortable with it and therefore need to strain yourself less to use the language.

(You can read more about – What Are The Symptoms Of Language Learning Fatigue?)

You Will Be Using Your Memory More When The Language Is Hard

Using your memory is a big part of language learning and the harder that you find the language, the more you are probably going to be using your memory, which in turn is likely to make you feel more fatigued.

You may need to remember a grammar point that is very different to your own language, or you need to remember a new alphabet on top of the words you are learning which will require more brain power.

You may also find that there are less cognates (words that look similar to words in your language) so you need to actually remember things, rather than simply recognise them as words you already know, which again is going to make you actually use your memory.

This can all add up very quickly and you will feel a lot more fatigued from this extra work load.

You Will Have To Focus More Intensely

The more difficult you find the language; the more you are going to have to focus to make sense of the new concepts you have learned.

Having to think at this higher intensity is going to drain your brain power a lot faster and you will start to feel fatigued faster.

If I look at when I was learning Japanese, I noticed this happening a lot. Japanese sentences are basically worded in a completely different order to how English sentences are built and I am not quite comfortable with their structure yet.

This means I need to focus a little harder and spend more time and energy processing a Japanese sentence compared to other languages.

I need to sort of un-jumble things and reorder them in my head before I can understand them properly. This doesn’t seem like much, but it does make a difference and it does make me reach fatigue faster. 

(This is also a beginner mistake, this is an inefficient way to read Japanese and I need to learn to get comfortable with how they structure sentences, rather than re-structure them in my head into a more English-like order)     

Finding A Language Hard Is Likely To Be More Stressful

In general, a language you find hard is going to be more stressful. Your ability to make progress is going to be slower and you will spend longer in a state of not really understanding much.

This may not feel stressful, but it will be. Your brain will be working a lot harder than usual and this prolonged strain can build up and it will wear you down, making you more susceptible to fatigue.

You will also find this feeling of not really understanding much in the language can make things less fun at times, which in turn can make the whole process feel stressful, which again is going to drain you of your energy faster.   

(You can read more about – Should You Push Through Language Learning Fatigue?)

It Is Going To Take You Longer To Get Comfortable In A Language You Find Hard

If you are finding a language difficult, you will need to spender longer with the language until you start to get comfortable with it and can make sense of things and as I have already discussed, the longer you need to focus and strain yourself, the easier it is to become fatigued.

I have seen this happen constantly when learning Japanese. I find reading very difficult since I am not comfortable with the different letters, let alone the language. I have to really focus on both these things when I read and I will get fatigued quickly.

Having to deal with both of these things means it is going to take me a long time to get comfortable with Japanese, which is the total opposite of my experience with French. I could easily read French right away, since it’s the same alphabet and a lot of the words look the same , so I just had to focus on the language itself and I did get more comfortable with French a lot quicker because of this.

As You Get More Comfortable In A Language, Fatigue Is Less Likely

You will also find that the more comfortable you are in a language, the less likely you will get fatigued. I see this in my own experience from learning multiple languages.

In Japanese, I struggle a lot, it’s a not a comfortable language for me and I will quickly get fatigued. My brain has to work like crazy to comprehend even simple things and this is gets tiring fast.

If we then look at my French, I am a lot more comfortable. However, it’s still a language I am learning and it still requires a lot of brain power, but there are large parts I can just understand implicitly.  This does mean I get fatigued in French, but not so easily; it does take a while and usually happens when I push outside of my comfort zone.

Then if we then compare these both to English, my native language …a language I am very comfortable in, I can use it all day long and never get fatigued.

Fatigue Can Still Happen At Any Point When Learning A Language

I also think it’s important to remember that it doesn’t matter where you are at in a language, you can still become fatigued. While it does generally happen more at the beginning, when you find things more difficult, you could still get fatigued even when you are fluent.

Just look at your own language, if I got you to start doing some sort of spelling test, you will start to feel the effects of fatigue after a while, even though you are fluent.

You just need to push yourself outside of your comfort zone and you will start to feel the effects of fatigue, which is why you can feel it any point. It doesn’t matter what stage you are at in a language, there is always more to learn and you can tire yourself out by doing this and you will feel fatigued. 

(You can read more about – Is Language Learning Fatigue Normal?)

Conclusion

Now you can see that the difficulty of a language can affect how fatigued you get. If you are struggling and finding things hard, your brain is probably working overtime to try and make sense of things, so you are going to feel fatigued faster.

You can’t really avoid this. Learning a language will tire you out and all you can do is keep pushing and be consistent with your studies. Eventually you will start to make sense of things and they will get easier, and you will feel less fatigued in the process.

If you are struggling now and are feeling constantly fatigued, just keep pushing, you will make progress, things will get easier!