Unit 1.

Learning a first language

Learning language: What is to be learned?

Learning a first language: Involves more than learning the patterns of sounds, words, and
sentences that make up speech. Language shapes our thoughts and makes shared
meanings possible.

First language acquisition

Children’s process of acquiring the first language

- Small babies= babble - coo - cry / vocally and non-vocally send and receive
messages
- End of first year= start to imitate words and speech sounds / use their first words
- 18 months= their vocabulary in terms of words increase / begin to use 2-words and
3-word sentences (‘telegraphic’) utterances ex.bye bye
- 2 years= comprehend more sophisticated language / start forming questions and
negatives
- 3 years= comprehend an incredible quantity of linguistic input and chatter
nonstop
- School age=
○ Start to internalise increasingly complex structures
○ Expand their vocabulary
○ Sharpen their communicative skills
○ Not only learn what to say, but what not to say (learn the social functions
of their language)

How can we explain this fantastic journey

- From that first anguished cry at birth to adult competence in language?
- From the first word to tens of thousands?
- From telegraphese at 18 months to the compound-complex, cognitively precise,
socio culturally appropriate sentences just a few short years later?
These are the sorts of questions theories of first language acquisition attempt to answer.

Different theories/approaches/views

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Behaviourism - Say what I say

The behavioristic position claims that:

- Children come into this world with tabula rasa (a clean slate bearing no
preconceived notions about the world or about language)
- These children are then shaped by the environment and slowly conditioned
through various schedules of reinforcement.

Focus on behaviour: Experiments performed on animals (Skinner, 1957) Verbal

behaviour
- learning = formation habit: stimulus - response - reinforcement

Behaviorist view of language learning

- An effective language behaviour=production of correct responses to stimuli
- If a particular response is reinforced, it then becomes habitual, or conditioned
- Traditional behaviourists believed that language learning is the result of imitation,
practice, feedback on success, and habit formation.
- Operant conditioning refers to conditioning in which the organism (a human
being) sends out a response, or operant (a sentence or utterance), without
necessarily observable stimuli.
- That operant is maintained (learned) by reinforcement (a positive verbal or
nonverbal response from another person)
- If a child says ‘want milk’ and a parent gives the child some milk, the operant is
reinforced and, over repeated instances, is conditioned.

According to Skinner, verbal behavior, like other behaviour, is controlled by its

consequences.
- When consequences are rewarding, behaviour is maintained and is increased in
strength and perhaps frequency
- When consequences are punishing, or when is a total lack of reinforcement, the
behaviour is weakened and eventually extinguished.

‘Say what I say’

- Learner=passive agent
- Environment=crucial element
- Habit=imitation+practice

- Today, virtually no one would agree that Skinner’s model of verbal behaviour
adequately accounts for the capacity to acquire language and for language
development itself.

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 - The behaviouristic views failed to explain the fact that almost every sentence you
speak or write is novel, never before uttered either by you or by anyone else.
- These novel utterances are even created by very young children as they play with
language, and that same creativity continued on into adulthood and throughout
one’s life.
- It would appear that that position, with it emphasis on empirical observation and
the scientific method, only began to explain the miracle of language acquisition.
- It left untouched genetic and interactionist domains that could be explored only
by approaches that investigated them more deeply.

The environmentalist approach to language learning

- Linguistics: Structuralism
- Psychology: Why is behaviour a key term to understand this theory? Why does the
environment play a crucial role?

BEHAVIOURISM: A psychological theory that all learning, whether verbal or non-

verbal, takes place through the establishment of habits. According to this view, when
learners imitate and repeat the language they hear in their surrounding environment and
are positively reinforced for doing so, habit formation (or learning) occurs.

Innatism - It’s all in your mind

The innatist position claims that:

- Children come into this world with very specific innate knowledge,
predispositions, and biological timetables.

The innatist view of language learning

The term innatism is derived from the fundamental assertion that:
- Language acquisition is innately determined.
- We are born with a genetic capacity that predisposes us to a systematic perception
of language around us, resulting in the construction of an internalised system of
language.

Focus on mind - Innate knowledge: Chomsky (1959): Competence & performance

- Learners have an inbuilt capacity for acquiring language
- Language is seen as a system of rules

1. Competence: is one’s underlying knowledge of the system of a language: its rules

of grammar, its vocabulary - all the pieces of a language and how those pieces fit
together.
- It refers to one’s underlying knowledge of a system, event, or fact.

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 - It is the non-observable ability to do something, to perform something.
2. Performance: is the actual production (speaking, writing) ir the comprehension
(lintening, reading) of linguistic events.
- It is the overtly observable and concrete manifestation or realization of
competence.
- It is the actual doing of something: walking, singing, dancing, speaking.

Language Acquisition Device (LAD)

A metaphor for the innate knowledge of the “universal” principles common to all human
languages. The presence of this knowledge permits children to discover the structure of a
given language on the basis of a relatively small amount of input.

Similarly Chomsky (1965) claimed:

- the existence of innate properties of language in such a short time despite the
highly abstract nature of the rules of language.
- this innate knowledge is embodied in a little device

- For the LAD to work. the child needs to access only samples of a natural language.
These language samples serve as a trigger to activate the device.
- Once it is activated, the child is able to discover the structure of the language to be
learned by matching the innate knowledge of basic grammatical relationships to
the structures of the particular language in the environment.

What is the function of LAD?

- An imaginary black box that exists in the brain.
- It contains all and only the principles which are universal to all human languages.

The innatist view considers that:

The child’s language at any stage is systematic in that the child is constantly:
- forming hypotheses on the basis of the input received.
- and then testing those hypotheses in speech and comprehension.
So, as the child’s language develops, those hypotheses are continually revised, reshaped,
or sometimes abandoned.

The innatist approach to language learning

- Linguistics: generative linguistics
- Psychology: (psycholinguists) which was the term that replaced ‘Language
Acquisition Device’?/Why are children seen as active participants in the language
learning process?

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Universal grammar: Children’s innate linguistic knowledge which, it is hypothesized,
consists of a set of principles common to all languages. This term has replaced the earlier
term LAD in work based on Chomsky’s theory of language acquisition.

It’s all in your mind

- Learner: active agent (creative construction)
- Language acquisition device (LAD): a special ability to acquire language
- Universal grammar (UG): a set of principles common to all languages

Focus on mind - Innate knowledge

Eric Lenneberg (1967) proposed that certain modes of perception and other language
related mechanisms are biologically determined.

Critical period hypothesis (CPH)

The proposal that there is a specific and limited time period for language acquisition.
There are two versions of the CPH. The strong version is that a language must be learned
by puberty or it will never be learned from subsequent exposure. The weak version is that
language learning will be more difficult and incomplete after puberty.

INNATISM
A theory that human beings in general that makes it possible to learn the specific
language of the environment.

Interactionism - Mom’s the word

The interactionist position claims that:

- Children learn to function in a language chiefly through interaction and discourse.

It is clear that the infant is tuned to speech:

- At birth: children cry
- 5 months: babbling
- 12 months: the first words
- Around 24 months: the first sentences (a grammatical approach/meaning and
function)

The first sentences: two-word sentences:

1. a grammatical approach: pivot vs. open words: ‘pivot-open class grammars’ are
related to Universal Grammar (from Chomsky)
2. meaning and function: interaction: ‘communicative functions’ are related to
systemic-functional linguistics (from Halliday)

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Stages in the development of children’s language

The first sentences: a grammatical approach

Consider the following sentences: my cap - all gone - more melon
The first class of words is called ‘pivot’, since they could pivot around a number of words
in the second, called ‘open’
Sentence = pivot word + open word

The first sentences: meaning and function

Performing socially communicative functions (Halliday, 1975):
- instrumental
- regulatory
- interactional
- personal:
● heuristic
● imaginative
● representational

Around 3 years: beginning of complex sentences

- negatives
- questions
- combining sentences

Around 6 years: mastering of all major structures

Not only the mastery of rules for generating and interpreting sentences, but also an
increasing of social awareness : the use of the language is communicative

Mom’s the word

- Learner: active constructor, in negotiation with others, of his/her own knowledge

of and about lang.
- ‘Motherese’ or caretaker talk: the importance of child-adult interaction.
- Modified interaction: adapted conversational patterns so that language can be
processed.

Caretaker talk = modified input

Adapted speech which adults use to address children and language learners so that the
child or learner will be able to understand. Examples of modified input include shorter,
simpler sentences, slower rate of speech, and basic vocabulary.

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Modified interaction
Adapted conversation patterns which native speakers use in addressing language learners
so that the learner will be able to understand. Examples of interactional modifications
include comprehension checks, clarification requests, and self-repetitions.

Focus on social interaction

The process of language development is ‘profoundly social’
● Edelsky (1989): the importance of the context in which language is learned
Key factor for the process of language development: social context
● Halliday (1975): the importance of the communicative functions the language
serves
○ instrumental
○ regulatory
○ interactional
○ personal:
■ heuristic
■ imaginative
■ representational
The functional approach adopted by the interactionists includes not only linguistic and
cognitive accounts, but also the social dimension
A successful language language-learning environment is vital to provide learners with
opportunities to acquire the language

Linguistics: systemic-functional linguistics: children learn to talk because the language

serves a particular communicative function for them.
Psychology: cognitive psychology: information processing approach/constructivist
approach

Cognitive psychology:
- Information processing approach: attention, perception and memory (how human
beings take in information, process it and act upon it.
- Constructivist approach: interaction between genetics and experience (how
human beings make their own personal understanding from their experiences)

The interactionist approach to language learning

- Communicative competence (Hymes, 1971-1972): The study of different
competences, not only the grammatical one (as claimed by Chomsky), but also the
rules of language use in social context and the sociolinguistic norms of
appropriacy.
Sociolinguistics: emerged as a new discipline

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 - Language learning: both internal and external factors play a key role. It is a
dynamic, social and communicative process. Emphasis in the functions of
language use in social context, the quality of interaction and learner’s cognitive
capacity in such a process.

INTERACTIONISM: A theory that language acquisition is based both on learners’ innate

abilities and on opportunities to engage in conversations in which other speakers modify
their speech to match the learners’ communication requirements.

Unit 2. Learning a second language

Second language learning

Language acquisition
This is thought to represent “unconscious” learning, which takes place when the
emphasis is on communication and there is no attention to form.

Language learning
This is described as a “conscious” process which occurs when the learner’s objective is to
learn about the language itself, rather than to understand messages which are conveyed
through the language.

First language
The language first learned (=mother tongue, native language). Many children learn more
than one language from birth and may be said to have more than one mother tongue. The
abbreviation L1 is used.

Second language
Any other language other than the first language learned. The abbreviation L2 is used.

Target language
The language which is being learned, whether it is the first language or a second (or third
or fourth) language.

SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNING: It is an important branch of the overall field of

applied linguistics. The study of second language learning has a practical purpose: to
improve the success of learning and the effectiveness of teaching. Second language
learning is a domain of human experience that merits scientific study: second language
acquisition (SLA) research.

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Theories of second language learning
The theories that try to explain the process of acquiring/learning L2 are closely related to
those discussed for L1 acquisition.
The process that a child or an adult suffers when learning a L2 is different from that of a
child acquiring his/her L1 in terms of both:
- personal characteristics
- conditions for learning

Informal language learning setting

A setting in which the second language is not taught, but rather, is learned naturally, i.e.
“on the job” or “in the streets”, through informal conversations and interactions with
native speakers of the language being learned.

Formal language learning setting

A setting in which second language learners receive instruction and opportunities to
practise. In this context, efforts are made to develop the learner’s awareness of how the
language system works. Typically, this type of learning takes place in the second language
classroom.

Corrective feedback
An indication to a learner that his or her use of the target language is incorrect. This
includes a variety of responses that a language learner receives. Corrective feedback can
be explicit (for example, “No, you should say “goes”, not “go”) or implicit (for example,
“Yes, he goes to school every day”), and may or may not include metalinguistic
information (for example, “Don’t forget to make the verb agree with the subject”).

Modified input
Adapted speech which adults use to address children and language learners so that the
child or learner will be able to understand. Examples of modified input include shorter,
simpler sentences, slower rate of speech, and basic vocabulary.
This adjusted speech style is called:
- caretaker talk for L1s, and
- foreigner talk or teacher talk for L2s.

Theories of second language learning + SLA types of analysis

Behaviourism (contrastive analysis)

Formation of habits: stimulus-response pairings + (positive/negative reinforcement)
- Behaviourism (Skinner): language acquisition as habit formation
- Contrastive analysis (Fries/Lado): comparison of the L1 with the L2

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 ● Contrastive analysis hypothesis (CAH): Identification of similarities and
differences between two languages.
○ Positive transfer: if similarities, learner will acquire the TL with ease.
Learners use the similarities between their L1 and L2
○ Negative transfer (interference): if differences, learners will acquire the TL
with more difficulty. When a grammatical structure or sound is different in
the L1 and the L2, the L1 may intrude and cause difficulty in producing the
new form.
Errors of contrastive analysis:
- They are the result of the intrusion of L1 habits over which the learner has
no control.
- They are seen as L1 habits interfering with the acquisition of L2 habits.
- They must be prevented, or at least held to a minimum, so that the
formation of bad habits is avoided.

○ Criticism:
- Not all errors predicted by the CAH are actually made.
- While CAH predicts some errors, it clearly does not anticipate all.
- Learners may make errors which are not predictable on the basis of
the CAH.

Additionally, learners have intuitions that certain features of their L1 are

less likely to be transferable than others (i.e. idioms or metaphorical
expressions – they cannot be translated word for word)

○ Decline: When acquiring / learning an L2 ...“the influence of the learner’s

L1 is not simply a matter of habits, but a much more subtle and complex
process”.

Cognition-oriented theories, focus on one (error analysis)

Innatism (Chomsky)
Language acquisition as rule formation
Rule formation: learning a language follows a rule-governed process → Learners process
input, generate hypotheses, test them and refine or abandon them

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Error analysis (Richards)
Attempts to discover the structure of the L2
Description of the different types of errors in order to understand how learners process
the second language data
- Interlingual errors (interference errors): some are due to a process of interference
(transfer from L1). Errors caused by learners’ attempts to transfer rules from their
L1 into L2.
- Intralingual errors (developmental errors): some are not related to transfer, but
different types of processes. Errors caused by learners that also appear in
children’s process of acquiring their L1.

Errors:
● They are considered invaluable to the study of the language-learning
process.
● Some learners' errors are similar to those made by children acquiring their
L1 – they are called “developmental errors” (not due to L1 interference).
● They must be identified and classified in order to learn about the processes
learners adopt when learning the L2.

Mistake vs. Error

- Mistake: This is considered a random performance slip caused by fatigue,
excitement, etc. Consequently, it can be readily self-corrected.
- Error: This is a systematic deviation made by learners who have not yet
mastered the rules of the L2. It cannot be self-corrected, as it is a product of
the learner's current stage of L2 development.

Interlanguage (Selinker)
It is the language system that the learner constructs out of the linguistic input to
which he/she has been exposed.
It is a continuum between the L1 & L2 along which all learners traverse.

Fossilisation
Fossilizable linguistic phenomena are linguistic items, rules and subsystems which
speakers of a particular L1 tend to keep in their interlanguage relative to a
particular L2, no matter what the age of the learner or amount of explanation and
instruction he receives in the L2
Criticism: It fails to account for all the areas of the L2 in which learners have
difficulty.
● By analysing only learners’ errors, the focus is only on what learners are
doing wrong, and not on what it makes them successful.

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 ● It is also very difficult, if not impossible, to identify the unitary source of an
error.

Decline
The narrowness adopted by the EA perspective did not lead to its disappearance,
but rather to its incorporation into a different type of analysis – that of analysing
learners’ interlanguage performance (“performance analysis”), which was not
limited to just analysing the errors learners produce.

Cognition-oriented theories, focus on one (performance analysis)

The analysis of learners’ errors (both CA and EA perspectives) has contributed much to
our understanding of second language learning, but it does not tell us much about the
actual progression of learning. It is important to analyse a learner's performance or their
development over time (Sequences of development & Developmental sequences)

Developmental sequences:
- Grammatical morphemes
- Negative sentences
- Question formation

Read from Lightbown and Spada (first part)

There are sequences or “stages” in the development of particular structures or
grammatical features that are similar in both L1 and L2.
When focusing specifically on the process of learning the L2, it is surprising to
find that these developmental sequences are similar across learners from different
backgrounds. That is, what is learned early by one is also learned early by others.

Acquisition of morphemes
Based on the so-called “morpheme studies” (Brown, 1973) from L1 acquisition.
There was evidence for “developmental sequences”, that is the order in which
certain features of a language (i.e. grammatical morphemes) are acquired in
language learning.
There was also evidence for an order which was similar among learners from
different L1 backgrounds. That is, L2 learners acquire grammatical morphemes in
the same way as L1 learners/children do.

Acquisition of the negative

● Stage 1) No cookie. No bicycle.
● Stage 2) I no want it. He don’t like it. I don’t can’t sing.
● Stage 3) He can’t eat nothing (only for learners)

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 ● Stage 4) We didn’t have supper.

Acquisition of interrogative
There is a consistency in the sequence and order in which “wh-words” emerge in
language acquisition: what, where, who, why, how and when
Additionally, there is also a consistency in the acquisition of word order within
the formation of questions.

Performance analysis
This type of analysis was born as both contrastive and error analysis were
declined, as we cannot study the process of learning a L2 by just focusing on
analysing learners’ errors.
- Decline: Similar to contrastive analysis (CA) and error analysis (EA),
performance analysis (PA) served the field of SLA well. However, PA was
also found to be too limiting. Some of learners’ utterances may be
uninterpretable if we limit them to examine them “out of context” (at the
sentence level). Learners’ performance has to be examined in the whole
contextual situation in which a particular interaction takes place (at the
discourse level).

Krashen (1982)
1. The creative construction hypothesis
- Learners possess a “language acquisition device” that facilitates a
process of “creative construction”.
- Thanks to this innate mechanism, learners can create their own
internal grammar.
- This grammar is referred to as their “interlanguage” (i.e. a language
located somewhere on a continuum between their L1 and L2).
- The internal process of acquiring the L2 operates on language input.
Acquisition takes place internally as learners read and hear samples
of the language that they understand.

2. Monitor model hypothesis: five central hypotheses

1. The acquisition-learning hypothesis: There are two ways for adult
learners to develop L2:
- ACQUISITION: We unconsciously acquire as we are
exposed to samples of the L2 that are meaningful.
- LEARNING: We learn L2 consciously by a process of study
and attention to form and rule learning.
For Krashen, acquisition is more important.

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 2. The monitor hypothesis: The acquired system is responsible for
fluency and intuitive judgements about correctness. It forms the
basis for spontaneous communication. The learned system is a
monitor making minor changes and polishing what the acquired
system has produced. There are three conditions necessary for
monitor use: sufficient time, focus on form, and knowing the rules.
3. The natural order hypothesis: L2 learners acquire the features of the
L2 in predictable sequences as in the acquisition of L1. The natural
order in which the features are acquired is independent of the order
in which rules have been taught.
‘Morpheme studies (from performance analysis) ’ - The study of
how children acquire grammatical morphemes.

4. The input hypothesis: Apart from being exposed to input, learners

need to comprehend it. The input the learners receive has to be
beyond their current level of competence, that is, at the i+1 level.
(Krashen’s (1985) comprehensible input hypothesis.

5. The affective filter hypothesis: It is an imaginary barrier that

prevents learners from acquiring language from the available input.
- Affect: motives, needs, attitudes and emotional states. The
filter will be up when the learner is stressed. It will be down
when the learner is relaxed and motivated. If the affective
filter is low, learning is easy for the learner.

KRASHEN’S MONITOR MODEL: Krashen’s writing has been very influential in

strengthening the recent focus on communicative language teaching. On the other hand,
the theory has also been seriously criticised for failing to meet certain minimum
standards necessary in scientific research. Most teachers and researchers see in the
creative construction theory much which is intuitively appealing. There is, however, a
great deal of research required before the details spelled out in Krashen’s Monitor Model
can be taken as adequately supported.

Context-oriented theories, different theories (The interaction hypothesis)

Input hypothesis (Krashen)

Apart from being exposed to input, learners need to comprehend it.
The input the learners receive has to be beyond their current level of competence,
that is, at the i+1 level. (Krashen’s 1985 comprehensible input hypothesis).

Output hypothesis (Swain)

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 Apart from being exposed to input, learners need to have opportunities to practise
the L2 (=output)
By producing the L2, learners notice how the language is used in order to express
their intended meaning

Interaction hypothesis (Long)

- Social interaction: plays a mediating role in the process of language
learning.
- Cooperative learning (=negotiation of meaning): benefits in terms of
providing both comprehensible input & opportunities for output.

Conditions for second language learning

- Input: exposure to appropriate and comprehensible samples of language
- Output: opportunities for using language in different contextualised and
communicative situations
- Output: opportunities for using language in different contextualised and
communicative situations
- Feedback: correction of incorrect or inappropriate use of the language
(explicit or implicit)

Scaffolding hypothesis (Vygotsky)

- Social interaction: provides the substantive means by which learning
occurs.

1. SCAFFOLDING: the way in which, with support from others, a learner can
reach levels of achievement (=cooperative learning / guided learning)
2. ZONE OF PROXIMAL DEVELOPMENT: the domain of performance
that a learner cannot achieve on his/her own, but is able with the help of
scaffolding (=in collaboration with more capable peers)
CONTEXT-ORIENTED THEORIES: The interaction hypothesis & scaffolding
hypothesis both focus on the immediate context in which social interaction takes place.
The acculturation model & social identity model both extend the perspective outward to
the wider sociopolitical context of learning.

Acculturation model (Schumann)

How learners adapt to a new culture and how they become comfortable in the L2
community.
“Second language acquisition is just one aspect of acculturation and the degree to
which a learner acculturates to the target- language group will control the degree
to which he acquires the second language”
Acculturation is expressed in terms of:

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 ● SOCIAL DISTANCE: Becoming a member of a target language group
● PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTANCE: How comfortable learners are with the
learning task

Social identity model (Norton)

How language and identity are linked: language is one means by which identity is
constructed and identity affects the ways in which we use language.
- IDENTITY: is not constant, but multiple, fluid and dynamic. When a
learner consolidates his/her identity in a new community, his/her ability to
learn the language increases.

Discourse analysis
Developed in the 1970s, the field of discourse analysis is concerned with "the use
of language in a running discourse, continued over a number of sentences, and
involving the interaction of speaker (or writer) and auditor (or reader) in a
specific situational context, and within a framework of social and cultural
conventions"
To view language from a discourse perspective means to work with units of
language above the sentence level. Discourse analysis is concerned not only with
how interlanguage forms evolve (focus in the previous type of analysis: PA), but
how learners learn how to use those forms appropriately for a particular discourse
function.

Conversational analysis (CA)

This is one of the sub-areas within the field of discourse analysis, which
deals with the study of natural conversation.
The analysis of talk-in-interaction.

SLA TYPES OF DATA ANALYSIS:

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 Unit 3. Individual learner differences
Social influences on language learning
- Learning an additional language is a difficult and complex task.
- It is important not only to be grammatically correct, but also appropriate and
effective when communicating in real-life situations.
- Aim of applied linguistics: to solve real-world language-driven problems and
concerns
- How language learning and the social context in which it takes place are linked

‘Language learning takes place in a social context which consists of a number of

influential social factors. These factors include the physical scene or setting and the
participants, including the learner, which together establish the conditions or the
environment for language learning.’ (Barkhuizen, 2004)

Interaction in different social contexts can influence both interlanguage use and overall
interlanguage development. (Tarone and Liu, 1995)

A model of language learning

Learning an additional language necessarily involves at least 5 elements: learner, unput,
social context, interlangue, output.
Aim of SLA: to discover how these obligatory elements fit together… in order to explain
how languages are learned.

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Social influences on L2 learning: input and output
1. Input: the type of language learners listen or read in the target language.
2. Output: the type of language learners produce in the target language.
Written and spoken input (and output) are external to the learner (they are part of the
social context) ... and access to them is gained through interaction, in modified,
negotiated, or scaffolded forms.

Interlanguage
It is the internal language system that the learner constructs out of the linguistic
input to which he/she has been exposed.
It is a continuum between the L1 & L2 along which all learners traverse.
- Pragmatics: the study used to communicate in contexts.
- Interlanguage pragmatics: interest in interlanguage development – not
only to
- know how linguistic knowledge is acquired, but how this knowledge
relates to the ability to communicate successfully and appropriately.

The learner
- There are four main social factors, which mediated through learner
attitudes, affect L2 learning
- These social factors influence the attitudes held by learners to L2 learning
- Their final effect of L2 learning depends on how their interrelationship is
displayed in a social context

1. AGE: misconception “younger learners are more successful at learning

languages than older ones”
2. GENDER: “females generally do better than males in classroom settings
and display more positive attitudes”
3. SOCIAL CLASS: “belonging to or being labeled a member of a particular
social class involves more or less chances of being in contact with the L2”
4. ETHNIC IDENTITY: ethnicity (race, nationality or culture) affects L2
learning: “learners with a positive attitude towards the L2 community will
be likely to learn the L2 better”

The complexity of the social factors (age, gender, social class, and ethnicity) are
not experienced as a series of discrete background variables, but are all, in
complex and interconnected ways, implicated in the construction of identity and
the possibilities of speech.

The previous social factors related to the learner (i.e. age, gender, social class,
ethnic identity) are external factors that affect L2 learning. They have to be

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 distinguished from individual differences of each learner (i.e. learner beliefs,
affective variables, learning strategies, etc.) which are internal factors that affect
L2 learning.

Individual differences

Language learners thinking, feeling, and acting persons in a context of

language use grounded in social relationships with other people
Thinking persons (cognitive factors), feeling persons (affective factors),
acting persons (learning strategies).

Introduction
Related to the field of psychology: the study of individual differences (IDs),
as characteristics or traits in respect of which individuals may be shown to
differ from each other. Within educational psychology, there has been a
trend to think more in terms of the collective rather than the individual by
adopting a “group dynamics-based perspective”
● L1 acquisition: children acquire their mother tongue “almost
always” with a native-level proficiency. But even considering this
fact, IDs are still active here (i.e. children with different learning
styles and rates).
● L2 acquisition: the most consistent predictors of L2 of learning
success are attributed to IDs.

Definition
IDs concern anything that marks a person as a distinct and unique human
being.
There is individual variation from person to person only to the extent that
those individualizing features exhibit continuity over time. IDs constructs
refer to dimensions of enduring personal characteristics that are assumed
to apply to everybody and on which people differ by degree.

Individual differences SLA

There is a particularly wide variation among language learners in terms of their ultimate
success in mastering a L2. This fact originated the study of IDs as an important area of
research in SLA studies, since learners’ particular characteristics affect their process of
learning the L2.

Individual differences in L2 learning

Introduction

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Learners vary enormously in how successful they are in learning a language.
How can we explain these differences in achievement? with cognitive and affective
factors.
There has been a radical shift in the way learners are seen: From considering them
as persons, who are innately endowed with or lacking in language learning skills,
to ...
viewing them as persons, who possess different kinds of abilities and
predispositions that influence learning in complex ways.
Research on individual differences has sought to explain why some learners
succeed more than others: the characteristics of the good language learner: thus,
individual differences in one of the major areas of enquiry in SLA.

Review
What are the factors responsible for individual differences in L2 learning?
Language aptitude and learning style

Cognitive factors
● INTELLIGENCE:
○ Intellectual ability related to reflection and reasoning.
○ Influence only when learning formal aspects of the L2
● LANGUAGE APTITUDE: one of the “big two” individual difference
factors (the other is motivation). This factor has been referred to under
different names: a ges. Someone with a high aptitude will pick up the L2
relatively easily, whereas for another person the same level of proficiency
can only be achieved by means of hard work and persistence.
○ It is the language-related aspect of intelligence
○ It determines the rate of learning and the amount of energy the
progress is likely to require of the learner.
○ Natural ability or innate talent to learn languages
○ Influence in learning better and faster the L2
● MEMORY:
○ Temporary storage and manipulation of information that is
assumed to be necessary for a wide range of complex cognitive
activities
○ Influence in making learners’ notice aspects of the L2

Language aptitude
Stenberg’s (2002) theory of ‘successful intelligence’
- Analytical intelligence
- Creative intelligence
- Practical intelligence

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There is evidence that cognitive abilities, as measured by language aptitude
tests, can account for a substantial proportion of the variance in
achievement scores in L2 learners.
But it is important to note that language aptitude does not determine
whether or not someone can learn a language. If a learner is not a natural
language learner, this can be compensated for by various other factors such
as high motivation or the use of effective language learning strategies.

Learning styles
Learning styles are relatively stable indicators of how learners perceive,
interact with, and respond to the learning environment.
They refer to learners’ predispositions to particular ways of approaching
learning.
Differences in learning styles reflect the different ways learners respond to
learning situations.
● Some people like to work independently, while others prefer
working in a group.
● Some people like to spend a lot of time planning before they
complete a task, while others spend little time planning and sort out
problems that arise while they are completing a task.
● Some people learn best when they use visual cues and write notes to
help them remember, while others learn better through auditory
learning, without writing notes.
They refer to an individual’s preferred way of processing information and
of dealing with other people.
- Field dependence: holistic / global approach. Social interaction is
easy and pleasurable.
- Field independence: analytic / specific approach. Individualistic and
less inclined to social interaction.
Willing’s (1987) model of our learning styles
- concrete learning style
- analytic learning style
- communicative learning style
- authority-oriented learning style

Reid’s (1957) model of six learning styles

- Visual learners
- Auditory learners
- Kinesthetic learners Tactile learners
- Group learners
- Individual learners

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 Review
What are the factors responsible for individual differences in L2 learning?
motivation, anxiety and personality

Individual differences

Affective factors
● Transmit feeling of confidence in students Give constructive feedback and praise
● Pay attention, listen to students
● Smile, make eye contact
● Show interest in answering students’ questions
● Take personal interest in students Check for student understanding
MOTIVATION: one of the “big two” individual difference factors (the other is language
aptitude), as it has been found to significantly affect language learning success
‘It is easy to see why motivation is of great importance: i) it provides the primary impetus
to initiate L2 learning, and later ii) it is the driving force to sustain the long and often
tedious learning process’. (Dörnyei, 2005)

Motivation
● Educational psychology
○ Extrinsic motivation: external sources of motivation (e.g. parents’
willingness or pass an exam)
○ Intrinsic motivation: personal interest and willingness to learn the L2
● Social psychology
○ Integrative motivation: learner wishes to integrate within the L2
community (e.g. immigration or marriage)
○ Instrumental motivation: learner wishes to achieve goals using the L2 (e.g.
for a job or for a career)

Motivation is a dynamic process (Dörnyei, 2001)

- Pre-actional stage: Choice motivation (motivation needs to be generated)
- Actional stage: Executive motivation (the generated motivation needs to be
actively maintained and protected)
- Postactional stage: Motivational retrospection (learners’ retrospective evaluation
of how things went)

Extrinsic vs. intrinsic motivation

- Extrinsically motivated behaviors: those actions carried out to achieve some
instrumental end (i.e. external, introjected and identified)

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 - Intrinsically motivated behaviors: those actions done to engage in an activity
because it is enjoyable and satisfying to do so (i.e. knowledge, accomplishment
and stimulation)

Four principal aspects of motivational teaching practice (Dörnyei, 2005)

- Developing the basic motivational conditions
- Generating initial motivation
- Maintaining and protecting motivation
- Encouraging positive self-evaluation

10 commandments for motivating

1. Set a personal example with your own behaviour
2. Create a pleasant, relaxed atmosphere
3. Present the tasks properly
4. Develop a good relationship with the learners
5. Increase the learners linguistic self-confidence
6. Make the language classes interesting
7. Promote learners autonomy
8. Personalize the learning process
9. Increase the learners’ goal-orientedness
10. Familiarize learners with the target language culture

Affective factors: anxiety

- Anxiety: is quite possibly the affective factor that most pervasively obstructs the
learning process (Arnold & Brown, 1999)
‘This is a transitory emotional state or condition characterized by feelings of tension and
apprehension and heightened autonomic nervous system activity.’ (Jonassen &
Grabowski 1993: 309)

Types of anxiety
● Trait anxiety: it is an inbuilt tendency to feel anxious (i.e. a permanent character
trait, as in a person who is predisposed to be fearful of many things).
● Situational anxiety: it it occurs in particular contexts (i.e. arises in response
● to a particular situation or event, as for example in the foreign language
classroom).

Anxiety: is it the cause of poor achievement or the result?

1. students’ anxiety about learning an L2 is a consequence of their learning
difficulties (Sparks et al., 2000)

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 2. learners’ abilities do affect achievement, which in turn can induce anxiety
(Horwitz, 2000)

Model psycholinguistic processing (MacIntyre and Gardner, 1994)

● Input stage: anxiety is a function of the learner’s ability to handle unfamiliar
external stimuli
● Central processing stage: anxiety is aroused when the learner attempts to store
and organize input
● Output stage: anxiety occurs as a result of the learner’s attempts to retrieve
previously learned material

Sources
● Classroom performance: many kinds of language activities can generate
performance anxiety (e.g. speaking in front of others is often the most anxiety-
provoking of all).
● Learner’s opinion about the L2: they feel that L2 learning process is an annoying,
irrelevant, or hopeless waste of time (e.g. when they are coerced into doing so to
meet parental or societal expectations)

Ways of reducing anxiety in the language classroom

● Awareness
● Positive climate
● Self-talk
● Cooperative or group learning
● Diaries and dialog journals
● Rewards
● Behavioral contracting
● Relaxation
● Student support groups

Personality
Is a key factor for explaining individual differences in L2 learning, since it refers to “one’s
whole character and nature”.
‘it represents those characteristics of the person that account for consistent patterns of
feeling, thinking, and behaving.’ (Pervin and John, 2001)

Variables: risk-taking, tolerance of ambiguity, empathy, self-esteem, and inhibition.

- Extraversion: extraverted learners are likely to interact more and more easily with
other speakers of the L2 (fluency)

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 - Introspection: introspected learners may find it easier to study the L2 and develop
higher levels of cognitive academic language proficiency (accuracy)

Theory of personality (Eysenck)

Extroverts are:
● Less easily distracted when operating from short-term memory
● Better equipped physiologically to resist stress
● Have lower levels of anxiety, which allows for greater attentional selectivity

Review

What are the factors responsible for individual differences in L2 learning? learner beliefs
and learning strategies.

Learner beliefs
Constructs that L2 learners hold about such matters as the difficulty of the language they
are learning, their own aptitude for learning a L2, and the best way to learn.
‘Learners’ beliefs are influenced by the social context of learning and cover a wide range
of issues that can influence: i) learners’ motivation to learn; ii) their expectations about
language learning; iii) their perceptions about what is easy or difficult about a language;
as well as iv) the kind of learning strategies they favor.’ (Richards and Lockhart, 1994)

Types
● Higher-order “conceptions”: are concerned with what the learner thinks the
objects and processes of learning are.
● Lower-order “beliefs”: are concerned with what the learner holds to be true about
these objects and processes.

Conceptions
- Quantitative / analytic: Learning an L2 is mostly a matter of learning grammar
rules. To understand the L2 i must be translated into my L1.
- Qualitative / experimental: Learning an L2 involves learning to listen and speak in
the language. It is OK to guess if you do not know a word.

Key issues
1. The relationship between learners’ beliefs about language learning and their
beliefs about learning in general
2. The extent to which beliefs are culturally determined
3. The relationship between learner cognitions and success in learning an L2
4. The extent to which learners’ beliefs change over time

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Learning strategies
- Learner actions: the approach learners adopt in learning an L2. They have been
variously labeled: “behaviors”, “tactics”, “techniques”, and “strategies”.
- Strategies: “behaviors or actions which learners use to make language learning
more successful, self- directed and enjoyable” (Oxford, 1989)

- Learning strategies: “specific actions taken by the learner to make learning easier,
faster, more enjoyable, more self-directed, and more transferable new situations”
(Oxford, 1990: 8)

‘Learning strategies are the specific procedures learners use with individual L2 learning
tasks. When confronted with a particular L2 learning task, the learner can choose several
different ways of completing the task. The appropriate choice of a particular learning
strategy can enhance success with the L2 learning task.’ (Richards and Lockhart, 1994)

● They contribute to the main goal – communicative competence They allow

learners to become more self-directed
● They expand the role of teachers
● They are problem-oriented
● They are specific actions taken by the learner
● They support learning both directly and indirectly They are not always
observable
● They are often conscious
● They can be taught
● They are flexible
● They are influenced by a variety of factors

Oxford’s (1990) classification of learning strategies

● Memory strategies
● Cognitive strategies
● Compensation strategies
● Metacognitive strategies
● Affective strategies
● Social strategies

Chamot’s (1987) classification of learning strategies

● Metacognitive strategies
● Cognitive strategies
● Social/affective strategies

The study of learning strategies has been motivated:

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 1. by the wish to contribute to SLA theory by specifying the contribution that
learners can make to L2 learning, and
2. by the applied purpose of helping learners to learn more efficiently by identifying
strategies that “work” and training them to make use of these.
What seems to characterize successful learners is the flexible use of learning strategies.
Good language learners have a range of strategies at their disposal and select which
strategies to use in accordance with both their long-term goals for learning the L2 and
the particular task to hand.

FActors that influence strategy use

● learner age
● stage of learning
● gender
● the target language
● learner cognitions (=beliefs)
● learning style
● cultural background
● personality
● previous experience of language learning
● the setting in which learning takes place

Conclusion
There is a need to establish a theory that explains how these factors (=individual learner
differences) influence both the rate/success of learning and the processes involved.
This theory must, among many other issues, reflect the fact that the role of individual
learner factors is influenced by the specific setting in which learning takes place and the
kinds of tasks learners are asked to perform in the L2.

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