Language revitalization linked to better Indigenous health, says UBC research

New research to come from UBC highlights the positive link between Indigenous language revitalization and the health and wellbeing of First Nations communities. (Courtesy: MoA)

Editor’s note: This story mentions suicide. If you or anyone you know is struggling with mental health there are a number of ways to get help, including by calling or texting Suicide Crisis Helpline at 988. A list of local crisis centres is also available here.

Indigenous communities have long touted the wellness benefits of speaking and sustaining their ancestral languages, and now there’s evidence that supports it – courtesy of new research from the University of British Columbia.

The review, led by a UBC team and assisted by the University of Toronto and the University of Sydney, saw researchers analyze more than 260 studies from Canada, the United States, Australia and New Zealand for references of language use being connected to better health.

The most surprising element of the findings wasn’t that there was a connection between the two but the extent of that connection, with various aspects of health shown to be benefitted by First Nations members conversing in their own language.

“I think a lot of people are aware that there is a link between the two at some capacity, but there hasn’t really been a thorough review to see what this link really is, how prevalent it is, what it means exactly,” said Julia Schillo, a PhD student in the department of linguistics and co-author of the study.

“I hear a lot about how language revitalization has been important for First Nations people for things like trauma healing and for mental health, but there were so many articles talking about how it played into things like physical health and diet and spiritual well-being, too,” she said, noting how around 78 per cent of the material discussed a positive correlation.

Stronger educational performance, greater social connection and, in some cases, lower suicide rates, were also found to be directly connected to the use of Indigenous language.

Many of the findings, particularly from studies in Australia and northernmost Canada, showed how there are typically better outcomes when health services are offered in First Nations languages, with patients more likely to better understand their treatment plans, and feel more comfortable and respected in a medical facility.

Likewise, there were worse health outcomes reported when patients weren’t able to receive health care in the language they needed.

“There were some reports of issues with people receiving health care without being able to provide informed consent, or translators not being called even when they were available,” said Schillo.

The research process had been lengthy and involved Schillo and the study’s lead author Louise Harding searching a number of databases, pulling around 10,000 potential articles and going through the summaries of those articles for relevant information. That search was then narrowed to 1,000, then a few hundred.

Schillo hopes it will be the first of many studies into the relationship between health and Indigenous language use, as further research is needed to truly understand the finer elements, like the potential confounding variables.

“Socioeconomics, English language, fluency, things like that that need to be looked at in more detail to actually get a solid picture of what’s going on here,” she said.

Mark Turin, an anthropologist, UBC associate professor and co-author of the study, said the next step should be two-fold.

First of all, there needs to be “grounded, site-specific, ethnographically informed and culturally rich studies” of the specific Indigenous communities who have established language programs.

Turin said he would also like to see a pivot towards research that focuses more on the strength and resilience of First Nations communities.

“Some of the formative research has been about negative associations, whether through causation or correlation, namely a decline in Indigenous youth suicide being related to language transmission and cultural continuity,” he said.

“This is extremely important research, but also really painful because of the devastating effects of suicide in Indigenous communities.”

For further research and efforts to revive Indigenous language to get underway, however, funding, of which there is little, is required.

“Right now, so much language revitalization work is being done on short-term funding grants that are not guaranteed to be renewed,” said Schillo.

“That interruption undermines the long-term investment that it could provide to people’s health.”