Some European languages pose challenges for young math students

In a Q&A published on The Wall Street Journal, ‘Some European languages pose challenges for young math students’, Sue Shellenbarger discusses how languages affect learning processes, explaining how some European languages make it harder for children to learn math due to the complex structure of their number names, resulting in, for instance, German and French pupils performing worse than other European children. What does that say about the nature of cognitive processes in our brain and their interaction with language? How much of our abilities are innate and how much do they depend on language? Recent studies seem to suggest that languages strongly influence the way our brain is wired, possibly in ways we don't fully appreciate yet.