The study of how language influences thought, and vice-versa, has a long history in a variety of fields.
The bits of linguistic information that enter into one person's mind, from another, cause people to entertain a new thought with profound effects on their world knowledge, inferencing, and subsequent behavior.
In the act of speaking, thought comes first, while spoken or written language is an expression that follows.
They were also inspired by Alan Turing's work on causal processes that require formal procedures within physical machines.
Alan Turing's work on physical machines implementation of causal processes that require formal procedures was modeled after these beliefs.
These are non-linguistic tasks that were analyzed to see if their counting system or more importantly their language affected their cognitive abilities.
The results showed that they perform quite differently from, for example, an English speaking person who has a language with words for numbers more than two.
[5] Their declined performance is an example of how a language can affect thought and great evidence to support the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis.
For instance, many Australian Aboriginal Nations, such as the Kuuk Thaayorre, exclusively use cardinal-direction terms – north, south, east and west – and never define space relative to the observer.
Instead of using terms like "left", "right", "back" and "forward", speakers from such cultures would say, "There is a spider on your northeast leg," or "Pass the ball to the south southwest."
The consequence of using such language is that the speakers need to be constantly oriented in space, otherwise they would not be able to express themselves properly, or even get past a greeting.