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If there’s one thing guaranteed to make a pop-culture character look cool and sophisticated, it’s being multilingual. Think James Bond, Yasmin from Industry or Scrooge McDuck.

Learning a new language not only makes you look cool – it also allows you to familiarize yourself with another culture, connect with new people and enjoy a wider variety of art and media. And it’s good for your brain. Studies have shown that learning a new language is associated with improved concentration, stronger communication skills, a more powerful memory and greater creativity.

But if you’re not an international man of mystery, an heiress or a billionaire duck, how does one go about it?

While there are a number of ways to learn languages, there is one thing all polyglots – people who speak several languages – share, Dr Lydia Machova, a language mentor and former interpreter, said in a popular TED Talk: “We simply found ways to enjoy the language-learning process.”

Below, experts share how you can start learning a new language.

How do humans learn languages?

To understand how to learn a language, it helps to understand what happens in the brain when you do.

Language learning is not centralized in one part of the brain, Lindie Botes, a language coach, explains. “Multiple regions coordinate sounds, map meanings and produce speech,” she says.

When you start learning a new language, the new sounds are filtered through your native language before arriving at the meaning, Botes says. For example, if you’re an English speaker beginning to learn French and you hear or read the word “fromage”, your brain doesn’t automatically picture cheese. It first thinks of the English word “cheese”, and from there understands that fromage means pressed curds of milk.

This is a somewhat inefficient cognitive process. But Botes explains that over time, with regular practice and exposure to the new language, the brain forms new neural pathways and is eventually able to connect words and meaning without the linguistic middleman.

Do children really learn languages more easily than adults?

Yes. Children have greater brain plasticity, meaning it is easier for their brains to form new neural pathways necessary for learning a new language. Adults have more deeply entrenched cognitive patterns, which makes it more difficult for them to absorb language rules that stray from those patterns.

For example, it would probably be easier for an English-speaking child to grow accustomed to languages such as Japanese or Turkish, which place their verbs at the end of the sentence. For an adult, it would probably be more difficult to overwrite their existing understanding of syntax, which places a verb directly after the subject.

Not only that, it can be difficult for adult mouths to make certain sounds. “Certain muscles in the mouth and tongue that affect pronunciation accuracy develop earlier in our lives,” says Kerstin Cable, a language learning expert and consultant. “That can make it harder to start later and perfect your pronunciation.”

What is the best way to start learning a language?

Don’t worry – if you are an adult with firmly formed neural pathways, all hope is not lost.

Experts agree anyone can learn languages if they want to. “A lot of people say that they’re just not cut out for language learning, like they’re missing some gift that other people have,” Botes says. But in most cases, she says, these people don’t have a talent problem – they have a habit and mindset problem.

Cable says: “What I usually advise people is not to stop at just downloading Duolingo.”

Tips for learning a new language

Have clear goals: “Some people want to speak to loved ones. Others want to enhance their career opportunities ... Some people just want to have a chat on holiday,” Cable says. “Those people will practice different things.” Sometimes, Cable adds, curiosity will be its own goal. “I love intellectual curiosity as a reason to learn a language,” she says.

Learn in the right order: Botes suggests this order of operations.

• First, listen to as much of a new language as you can: music, podcasts, movies and the like. “It helps to get a feel for the sound, the pace and the intonation,” she says. It also lays a good foundation for pronunciation.

• Next, learn the writing system. This is especially important if it is different from your own. “It can be daunting, but it’s always better than relying on transliteration,” she says.

• From there, cover the basics: greetings, self-introductions and basic sentence structure. “It doesn’t help much to memorize the 100 most common words if you don’t know how to string them into a section,” Botes says.

Focus on high-frequency building blocks: Rather than trying to make sense of complex grammar rules, familiarize yourself with frequently used words and chunks of language, says Dr Jonathan Newton, associate professor at the School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies at the Victoria University of Wellington. “How you learn something influences what you can do with the resulting knowledge,” he adds. If you practice even the simplest form of communication, you will learn how to communicate. If you practice grammar and vocabulary exercises, you will learn how to do those exercises, but not much else.

Set realistic goals: People often set expectations that are way too high, Cable says. One of the most common she sees is people deciding to learn 50 new words a day “without allowing time for processing, digesting and actually using those words”.

Balance your skills: Rather than focusing only on reading or speaking, Cable advises tackling all the core skills. “Each skill informs the next one, so it is great to practice them all together,” she says.

Have a growth mindset: “It’s very easy to get demotivated if you focus too much on how difficult a language is,” Botes says. Shifting your perspective to see it as a lifelong learning opportunity can make it feel more manageable.