Journal of Second Language Studies - Volume 7, Issue 1, 2024

Instructed second language (L2) research has frequently addressed the effects of spacing, or, alternatively, the distribution of practice effects. The present study addresses Rogers and Cheung’s (2021) concerns about the ecological validity of such work via a natural experiment (Craig et al., 2017). Learners’ self-determined exposure and in-app behavior were examined in relation to language gains over time. Duolingo learners of Spanish or French (N = 287) completed a background questionnaire, scales measuring L2 motivation and grit, and two tests of L2 proficiency before and after a six-month period of user-controlled app usage. Total minutes of app exposure exhibited a correlation with written but not oral proficiency gains. More dependable correlates of gains were frequency- and curriculum-oriented measures. Additionally, L2 grit and motivation were weakly to moderately correlated with several in-app behaviors. We conclude with implications for how apps can best be leveraged to produce L2 gains.

When learning a second language, some connectives are more difficult to acquire and to master than others. While previous research has assessed different factors responsible for this difficulty by using offline tasks, little is known about the extent to which L2-readers are sensitive to different connectives while reading. In our study, we compared self-paced reading times of native and non-native speakers of French for sentences that were correctly or incorrectly marked with either the infrequent connective cependant (‘however’) or the more frequent mais (‘but’). Results showed that incorrect uses only produced longer reading times when mais was used. Yet, in a sentence-evaluation-task using the same set of sentences, L2-speakers were able to discriminate incorrectly marked sentences with cependant from correctly marked ones. We conclude that a good theoretical understanding of connectives for L2 (Experiment 2) does not always warrant a quick activation of their meaning while reading (Experiment 1).

Integrating corpus-based analyses with instructed SLA, this study explores how lexical bundles can be used to teach prepositions to EFL learners. It first identifies lexical bundles occurring most frequently with preposition errors in a learner corpus of L1-Korean high school student writing. It then uses the 10 identified bundles to compare three different types of instructional treatment: one hundred L1-Korean high school EFL students received either implicit instruction (teaching each bundle as a unit with no emphasis on embedded prepositions) or one of two types of explicit instruction (focusing on embedded prepositions with or without input enhancement). The explicit-instruction-with-input-enhancement group showed the greatest improvement, followed closely by the implicit-instruction group; the other explicit group showed the least improvement. These results suggest that textual enhancement can facilitate L2 preposition acquisition and that recurrent sequences such as lexical bundles can serve as a useful pedagogical means to teach linguistic forms.

The present study investigated the nature of Chinese as First Language (L1) speakers’ anxiety when completing an oral task in English as Foreign Language (L2). Chinese second-year university students (n = 96) performed a video narration task and completed questionnaires measuring their trait anxiety, foreign language anxiety, and task anxiety. Exploratory factor analysis identified the underlying sub-facets of the task anxiety construct, including language-related difficulties, environment-related anxiety, setting-related anxiety and physiological symptoms. Language-related difficulties explained the largest amount of variance and emerged as the most influential factor. Structural equation modelling demonstrated that task anxiety was an independent construct subject to direct influence from foreign language anxiety and indirect influence from trait anxiety. Findings suggest that task anxiety is a context-specific construct that warrants distinct attention from teachers and researchers. Implications for helping students to cope with anxiety in task-based pedagogy and practice are discussed.

We present three studies that investigate the effect of group-level language ability expectations on language ability judgements. Study 1 identifies expected English-language ability levels that native English speakers’ have for a number of non-native English-speaker groups. Based on the results, two text-based written-guise studies were conducted investigating the level of detriment that grammatical and lexical/typographical errors created on English-language ability ratings for different author guises (Swedish, Chinese, English) in formal (Study 2) and informal contexts (Study 3). In both contexts, grammatical errors produced by the guise representing the lower-ability non-L1 group were overlooked, while the same errors produced by the other guises significantly lowered the ability ratings. Our results coincide with the idea of the ‘sympathetic native speaker’ and expand it, suggesting that expected language level based on linguistic group membership inversely affects the level of sympathy/tolerance demonstrated. We link this to possible pedagogical implications.

Different models of L3 acquisition have different predictions about the cross-linguistic effects of previous learning. The ‘Cumulative Enhancement Model’ predicts that both L1 and L2 have cumulative facilitative effects on L3, but L2 the Status Factor (L2SF) claims that L2 has stronger effects on L3 acquisition. Similarly, while the Typological Primacy Model claims that among the already acquired languages, a typologically similar language transfers more properties to L3, the Linguistic Proximity Model predicts a transfer of structurally similar properties from the previously learnt languages. On the other hand, the Scalpel Model, besides considering linguistic similarity, gives importance to factors such as frequency of use and nature of the input, language dominance, and learning context. The current paper contributes to this debate by presenting data collected from two groups of Balochi learners of English in Balochistan (Pakistan) who were taught British English (BrE) aspiration contrast in plosives at the allophonic level after they had acquired Pakistani English (PakE) as adult L2 learners. Thus, Balochi was L1, PakE L2, and BrE L3 of the learners. After teaching for more than a year, the learners were tested for accuracy in VOTs for BrE plosives. The results support the L2SF and Scalpel Model.