Yanwen’s blog

10/5/2026

There is a Chinese term that most Chinese people understand: 卷 (juǎn), often translated as “involution” or used to describe relentless competition. It refers to a situation in which people keep working harder and harder just to get ahead, even when the extra effort brings diminishing returns. No one wants to fall behind, so everyone feels compelled to keep pushing.

My children may have heard this term, but they may not fully understand its implications in Chinese society.

A few days ago, I read a news story about mental health problems in China. It made me wonder whether the intense competition many people experience, beginning in childhood, might be contributing to the problem.

Research shows that the number of people in China living with depression and anxiety has increased substantially over the past three decades. A Global Burden of Disease analysis estimated that the number of people with depressive disorders rose by 54% between 1990 and 2021, while the number with anxiety disorders increased by 31%.

However, the picture becomes more complicated when the figures are adjusted for changes in population size and age structure. By these measures, the prevalence of depression actually declined slightly, while the prevalence of anxiety remained relatively stable. In other words, an increase in the total number of people affected does not necessarily mean that an individual's risk has increased.

Another important source of information is the China Mental Health Survey, published in The Lancet Psychiatry in 2019. This nationally representative study surveyed 32,552 adults across China and estimated that 16.6% had experienced a mental disorder at some point in their lives, excluding dementia, while 9.3% had experienced one in the preceding 12 months. Anxiety disorders were the most common category, with a lifetime prevalence of 7.6% and a 12-month prevalence of 5.0%.

These figures do not prove that competition causes mental health problems. But they make me think about the pressures people face, especially young people.

In China, competition can begin remarkably early. Some children face intense pressure to perform well in elementary school, prepare for examinations, attend extracurricular classes, and keep up with their peers. Parents worry that their children will fall behind, and children may absorb those worries. One family's anxiety can become another family's pressure, creating a cycle in which everyone feels compelled to do more.

Anxiety can spread through families, sometimes without anyone intending it. Parents who want the best for their children may communicate their fears through constant reminders, high expectations, or comparisons with other children. The children, in turn, may begin to believe that they are never doing enough.

This makes me think about my little grandson. I talked to my son about the importance of not placing too much pressure on the little boy as he grows up.

Then I realized something: perhaps I should start by examining my own worries. If I want my grandson to grow up with less anxiety, I need to be careful not to pass my anxieties on to his parents, either.

We cannot eliminate competition from life, nor can we protect children from every difficulty. But we can help them understand that their worth is not measured by grades, achievements, or how they compare with others. Perhaps giving the next generation a little less pressure begins with learning to worry a little less ourselves.

10/4/2026

Yesterday was Saturday. We went to Central Park in Manhattan with my son's family. It was the baby's first trip there.

That morning, I had read an article from Emory University about a study examining how grandmothers' brains respond to pictures of their grandchildren. The study, published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B in 2021, used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to observe brain activity in 50 grandmothers.

Here are the main findings.

1. Grandmothers showed strong emotional responses to their grandchildren.

When the grandmothers looked at pictures of their grandchildren, brain regions associated with emotional empathy showed increased activity. The researchers suggested that grandmothers may be especially responsive to their grandchildren's emotions. When a grandchild smiles, a grandmother may share the child's joy; when the child cries, she may feel the child's distress.

2. Their responses to their adult children were somewhat different.

When the same grandmothers looked at pictures of their adult sons or daughters, brain regions associated with cognitive empathy showed stronger activation. This suggests a more analytical kind of response: trying to understand what an adult child is thinking or feeling, and why.

The researchers suggested that young children's “cute factor” may help explain the difference. A baby's face can evoke an immediate emotional response that an adult child's face may not trigger in the same way.

3. Grandmothers may be part of a broader human caregiving system.

The study adds to evidence that caregiving involves a network of brain processes that extends beyond biological parents. Throughout human history, children have often been cared for by other family members, including grandparents. In some societies, grandmothers play a particularly important role in helping raise the next generation.

There is a Chinese saying, 儿不嫌娘多 (ér bù xián niáng duō) which roughly means, “A child can never have too many mothers.” It expresses the idea that a child can benefit from the love and care of more than one mother figure. In this sense, a grandmother's love is adding another source of care, affection and support.

Perhaps this is one reason grandmothers have played such an important role in families across generations. Science may help us understand the brain activity behind caregiving, but the value of having more people love and care for a child has long been understood in family life.

Of course, the study has limitations. It involved only 50 participants, who were physically and mentally healthy and actively engaged as grandmothers. We cannot assume that every grandmother responds in the same way. The researchers also noted that further studies could examine grandfathers and explore differences across cultures.

What struck me most about this article was the connection between the scientific findings and my own experience. Perhaps the science is beginning to explain something many grandmothers have felt for generations: the joy of loving a child again, this time from a different place in life.

One reader asks, “好奇爷爷啥反应，与奶奶的又有啥量化上的区别?” 

—wait for another research on grandpa!

10/3/2026

We are all familiar with the Chinese saying 失败是成功之母 (Shībài shì chénggōng zhī mǔ): “Failure is the mother of success.”

Today, I heard another saying that challenges this idea: “Success is the mother of success.” In other words, small successes build confidence, develop skills, and pave the way for greater achievements.

But what about failure? I also heard this saying: 最好的失败是别人的失败 (Zuì hǎo de shībài shì biérén de shībài): “The best failure is someone else’s failure.”

Because we can learn from other people's mistakes without having to pay the price ourselves.

This reminds me of another saying: “Learn from other people's mistakes.” It also brings to mind a relative of mine who tried to shield her son from the unpleasant realities of life when he was growing up. But that's another story.

I like the idea that the best failure is someone else's. Here is why.

First, failure can be an expensive teacher.

When we make mistakes, we may gain wisdom, but we also pay a price: lost money, wasted time, damaged relationships, embarrassment, or missed opportunities.

When someone else makes a mistake, we have an opportunity to learn the same lesson without suffering the same consequences. In that sense, other people's failures offer us free lessons—if we pay attention.

Second, we often underestimate how easily we could make the same mistakes.

When we see someone else make a poor decision, we may think, “I'm smarter than that. I would never do such a thing.”

But life is rarely that simple. We may lack the information the other person lacked, face similar pressures, or fall into the same trap under different circumstances.

To learn from someone else's failure, we need to ask ourselves:

• What exactly went wrong?

• What did the person fail to notice?

• Which assumptions turned out to be wrong?

• What might I have done in the same situation?

• Under what circumstances could I make the same mistake?

The goal is not to judge the person who failed, but to understand what happened and what we can learn from it.

A biography, documentary, memoir, or even a friend's unfortunate experience can offer us something valuable: borrowed experience. We cannot live every life or make every mistake, but we can learn from the lives and mistakes of others.

Perhaps the best kind of wisdom is learning a lesson without having to suffer its consequences ourselves.

The best part is we don't have to experience every failure personally to become wiser.

10/2/2026

This is something I read last month and had planned to share, but kept putting off.

The article was published on the Chinese internet about a month ago. It was written by Dr. Jiang Yisen, a medical oncologist practicing in the United States.

He begins with a real case. An elderly patient went to the emergency room for kidney stones. During a CT scan, doctors happened to discover a 2-centimeter lesion on the kidney. It was not related to the patient's immediate problem, but it needed follow-up imaging within three to six months.

Everyone involved in the patient's care did what they were supposed to do. Yet the recommended follow-up was forgotten, and no one revisited the finding for 18 months.

This is a common occurrence in a complicated healthcare system: an incidental finding can easily fall through the cracks. 

The emergency doctor treats the immediate problem. The radiologist reads the scan. Another doctor may recommend follow-up. Each person completes his or her part, but no one takes responsibility for making sure the entire process is completed.

This made me think about an important distinction the author makes: access is not the same as ownership.

Today, patients and their families may have access to enormous amounts of medical information through patient portals and electronic records. Doctors can see test results and notes. Hospitals can share information within their systems. But having access to information does not necessarily mean that someone is watching the whole picture and making sure that every recommendation is followed through.

The U.S. healthcare system has gradually recognized care coordination as an important part of medical care. Medicare began covering Chronic Care Management in 2015, and newer programs have expanded support for coordinating care for people with serious illnesses. There are now nurse navigators, care coordinators, case managers and primary care physicians, each with different responsibilities.

But healthcare remains divided into specialties, institutions and individual episodes of care.

The patient, however, is one continuous person.

And in many cases, the person who has the most complete and continuous view is not a doctor. It is a family member.

The author argues that a family caregiver's most important role is not to become a “semi-doctor.” It is to become the longitudinal owner of the patient's health information and unfinished tasks.

That means four things:

1. Keep the big picture.
   Maintain the patient's major health history, medications, diagnoses, test results and important medical decisions.

2. Track the open loops.
   Keep a list of things that have been recommended but not yet completed: a follow-up scan, a referral, a blood test, a biopsy, or another appointment. This may be the most important responsibility.

3. Turn information into questions.
   Instead of trying to interpret everything independently, ask doctors clear questions: What does this mean? What needs to be done? Who will arrange it? When should it happen? What would change the plan?

4. Protect the patient's autonomy.
   A family member can organize information, ask questions and help make sure plans are carried out without taking over the patient's right to make his or her own medical decisions.

The author suggests that a family health-tracking system doesn't need to be complicated. Four things may be enough: 1. the patient's current health status and medications, 2. a timeline of major medical events, 3. a list of pending tasks, and 4. a record of important medical decisions.

In fact, one organized sheet of paper may be more useful than hundreds of scattered screenshots and medical reports.

The article also discusses AI. Patient portals can provide access to records, and general AI tools can help summarize information and prepare questions for a doctor's visit. Specialized health-management tools are being developed to organize records from different providers and identify missed follow-ups.

But the author makes an important distinction: AI should not be thought of primarily as a replacement for doctors. Its more immediate value may be helping ordinary people organize information that has become too complicated for them to manage.

For me, this is the most interesting idea in the article.

Modern medicine has become increasingly specialized. That specialization brings enormous benefits, but it also creates fragmentation. Everyone may be doing his or her job, yet the patient can still be left with something unfinished.

A family member or the patient can keep asking: What happens next? Who is responsible? Has it been done? If not, why not?

That may be one of the most valuable things we can do— making sure that medical care doesn't stop between one appointment and the next. In a fragmented healthcare system, someone needs to hold the whole picture. Technology can help, but for now, that someone may still be a person who cares enough to keep track.

10/1, 9/29/2026

A Parents' and Teachers' Guide to Bilingualism by Colin Baker.

One of them is related to bilingual and brain.

"Is it better for my child to learn a language early to secure better storage in the brain?" I've never thought this way!

"One recent area of research on bilinguals is how their two languages are stored and used in the brain. For example, if someone learns two languages from birth, with bilingualism as their first language, are the two languages stored differently in the brain from someone who learns a second language at school or in adult life?"

"One much publicized piece of research by Mechelli and colleagues (2004) suggests that learning a second language increases the density of the brain's gray matter. When comparing 25 monolinguals, 25 early bilinguals and 33 late bilinguals, brain gray matter density was greater in bilinguals than monolinguals, and with early bilinguals having an increased density over late bilinguals. The authors concluded that the 'structure of the brain is altered by the experience of acquiring a second language' (p.757).

Each parent speaks a different language to the child. This is often called the "one person-one language" )OPOL approach.

What are the advantages of my child becoming bilingual?

It will affect the rest of their lives and the lives of their parents. For children, being bilingual or monolingual may affect their identity, social arrangements, schooling, employment, marriage, area of residence, travel and thinking. ... Bilingualism has educational, social, economic and cultural consequences.

For many mothers and fathers, it is important for them to be able to speak to the child in their first language. This may enable a subtle, finer texture of relationship with the parent. Many parents can only communicate with full intimacy, naturally and expressively in their first language. ... At the same time, both parents are passing to that child part of their past, part of their heritage.

A bilingual child can bridge between generations.

The advantages of being bilingual: communication, culture, cognitive, curriculum, cash (economic benefits)

With two languages goes a wider cultural experience, and greater tolerance of cultural differences and less racism.

Bilingualism requires motivation and a positive attitude from parents, often considerable perseverance to achieve a distant goal, and a willingness not to expect too much too soon.

One important example of using a minority language is when the children are in their teenage years. If a parent speaks the majority language with a foreign accent, the teenager may be embarrassed. By speaking a minority language, the parent may retain more authority and credibility, and be more valued by the teenager. Continuity in minority language experience from early childhood through the teenage years is important if that minority language is to survive through to early adulthood.

There is a need to engineer the language environment in the home.

What are the most important factors in raising a bilingual child?

Children are born ready to become bilinguals and multilinguals. 

Mistake to avoid: the child has learned that bilingualism is associated with pressure, anxiety and constant correction.

Avoid making it a source of conflict, a series of mini crises, and a competition against monolingual standards. A language castle is simultaneously built and attacked.

The wind of influence usually blow in the direction of the majority language. The balance of language experience needs tilting in favor of the minority language. While ensuring the child becomes fully fluent in the majority language, some sheltering from a pervasive majority language may be important.

A most important factor in raising a bilingual child is the language that surrounds language.

Will my child become equally fluent in two languages?

The answer is 'no' with only a few exceptions.

For a bilingual, each language tends to have different purposes, different functions and different uses. Bilinguals tend to use their two languages in different places at different times with different people.

It is important not to compare bilinguals with monolinguals in their language development. Bilingual should be compared with bilinguals. Bilinguals are not two monolinguals inside one person. They own a unique combination of two languages that are both separate and integrated within the thinking system. While two languages are visible in production, in the thinking quarters of the brain, one feeds the other. One language helps the other to grow. In this sense, there is integration between the two languages. Ideas and concepts learned in one language can be easily transferred into the other language.

The bilingual is a different language creation from the monolingual. For many bilinguals, bilingualism is their language. For those who acquire two languages from birth, bilingualism is their first language.

B10: Are there benefits if my child has a less well-developed second language?

Take heart and think positive. A less well-developed language is still a success. The child or teenager will still have a foundation, a passive knowledge of that language, a readiness to develop and use that language in the future. Early second language learning that fades does not die. Relearning from the beginning will not be needed. Much can be quickly reactivated.

The gift of a second language can be stored. Later, when the time, people and place is right, the gift is employed, expanded and esteemed. Developing a weaker second language in the family is an investment that can be banked for the future.

Having two or more words for each object and idea may mean there is more elasticity in thinking.

B15: Will my child's attitude affect the learning of a second language?

...if children's attitude, motivation and interest in their language are not inspired, the parent may find that hopes about bilingual development are not fulfilled.

It's important for the child to have a positive self-concept about their two languages.

C7: Will my child's thinking be affected by being bilingual?

The answer is yes, and probably for the better. The presence of two languages in the operating system of the brain is likely to produce a more richly fed thinking engine.

E22: What language strategies are used in immersion classrooms?

Immersion education is based on the idea that a first language is acquired relatively subconsciously. Children are unaware that they are acquiring a language in the home. Immersion attempts to copy this process in the early years of schooling. The focus is on the content and not the form of the language. It is the task at hand that is central, not conscious learning.

Ten specific techniques used by immersion teachers

1. Providing plenty of contextual support for the language.

2. Deliberately giving more classroom directions and organizational advice to the students.

3. Extensive use of visual material.

4. Being a role model 

5. Indirect error correction...

...............................

The bilingual is a different language creation from the monolingual. For many bilinguals, bilingualism is their language. For those who acquire two languages from birth, bilingualism is their first language.

This passage makes an important point: a bilingual person should nosyst always be thought of as “a monolingual person who has added a second language.”

1. “The bilingual is a different language creation from the monolingual.”

This means that a person who grows up with two languages may develop a different linguistic system and experience from someone who grows up with only one language.

Instead, the two languages can become part of one integrated linguistic life. The person may use one language with certain people, another language in other situations, and sometimes move between them naturally.

So “different language creation” is probably the author's way of saying that bilingualism is not simply monolingualism plus an extra language.

2. “For many bilinguals, bilingualism is their language.”

The author is saying that for someone who regularly lives through two languages, being bilingual itself becomes the person's normal way of communicating.

For example, your grandson might eventually speak English with his father, Chinese with you, and perhaps switch between the two depending on who he is talking to. He wouldn't necessarily think:

Now I am using my first language. Now I am using my second language.

For him, using both languages is simply how language works in his life.

3. “For those who acquire two languages from birth, bilingualism is their first language.”

This does not mean that such a child has literally one language called “bilingual.”

It means that if a child grows up hearing and using two languages from infancy, the experience of managing two languages is present from the beginning. There isn't necessarily a period in which the child first establishes one language and then later adds another.

This is particularly relevant to your grandson.

If he hears English from his parents and Chinese from you and other Chinese-speaking family members from infancy, you could say:

> Chinese would not be a “second language” added to his life later. It could be one of the two languages through which he first experiences the world.

That is a much more interesting idea for your essay than simply saying, “Babies can learn languages easily.”

And it connects beautifully with your reason for wanting him to learn Chinese: you are not merely teaching him a foreign language. You are helping make Chinese part of his earliest experience of family, love, stories, songs, and culture.