Looking through examples of the expression from the '70s, one can find both positive and negative senses. ![]() The post (also available here) gives two examples each from that decade of the word being used in public in the technical sense and in the currently popular sense (bolding added by me): : I just noticed a post from February 8, 2013, by the linguist Ben Zimmer, which identifies the 1970s as when the popular usage developed. The popular meaning of "steep learning curve" is "difficult to learn" the technical meaning is "quick to learn". Now there is also apparently an interpretation of the same curve in the negative sense - probably something about a large amount of learning existing, or that one never stops learning and keeps learning, but I'm not sure I understand how that's negative. This is the opposite of the popular usage. One natural interpretation of such a curve, which was the predominant early usage (according to Wikipedia) and still exists in some technical circles, is that the thing being learnt is easy - a great amount of learning happens in a small amount of time. ![]() Thus, a steep learning curve would look like this (excuse the poor drawing): It seems that people are thinking of something like climbing a steep curve (mountain) - it's difficult and takes effort.Īs it is technically used, however, a learning curve is not anything to be climbed, and is simply a graph plotting learning versus time. In informal usage, a "steep learning curve" means something that is difficult (and takes much effort) to learn.
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