The effect of emotion on morphosyntactic learning in foreign language learners.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Liu X
PROVIDER: S-EPMC6261014 | biostudies-literature | 2018
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Publications
The effect of emotion on morphosyntactic learning in foreign language learners.
Liu Xinmiao X Xu Xiaodong X Wang Haiyan H
PloS one 20181126 11
Emotions have crucial influence on vocabulary learning and text comprehension. However, whether morphosyntactic learning is influenced by emotional conditions has remained largely unclear. In this study, we investigated how induced positive and negative emotions affect the learning of morphosyntactic rules in a foreign language. It was found that negative emotion increased the accuracy and efficiency of syntactic learning, but had no significant effect on the learning of morphological marking ru ...[more]
Similar Datasets
Project description:Listening is critical for foreign language learning. Listening difficulties can occur because of an inability to perceive or recognize sounds while listening to speech, whereas successful listening can boost understanding and improve speaking when learning a foreign language. Previous studies in our laboratory revealed that EEG-neurofeedback (NF) using mismatch negativity event-related brain potential successfully induced unconscious learning in terms of auditory discrimination of speech sounds. Here, we conducted a feasibility study with a small participant group (NF group and control group; six participants each) to examine the practical effects of mismatch negativity NF for improving the perception of speech sounds in a foreign language. Native Japanese speakers completed a task in which they learned to perceive and recognize spoken English words containing the consonants "l" or "r". Participants received neurofeedback training while not explicitly attending to auditory stimuli. The results revealed that NF training significantly improved the proportion of correct in discrimination and recognition trials, even though the training time for each word pair was reduced to 20% of the training time reported in our previous study. The learning effect was not affected by training with three pairs of words with different vowels. The current results indicate that NF resulted in long-term learning that persisted for at least 2 months.
| S-EPMC8291684 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Within a Complex Dynamic Systems Theory (CDST) framework, this longitudinal qualitative study explored the complex patterns and identified the degree of variability in three learners' developmental process. Learners' listening performance was tracked and examined every 6 weeks, followed by retrospective interviews and self-reflections every 7 weeks over the 43-month span. A series of CDST techniques were adopted for data analysis, including using min-max graphs to trace the minimum and maximum scores on the EFL learners' listening developmental indices over time. Monte-Carlo and Loess smoothing analyses were applied to gauge for degrees of variability. The results suggest that: (1) Min-max graphs and smoothed Loess curves depict flux developmental processes of learners' L2 listening; (2) learners differed from each other in the degree of inter-individual variability in their listening developmental trajectory; and (3) occurrence of unanticipated patterns confirm that learners demonstrated personalized intra-individual variability within their unique listening developmental process. Results indicate that variability is a pattern characteristic of CDST both between and within individuals, and inform us about how Chinese EFL listeners' language develops. We conclude by discussing the implications for researchers and practitioners who are concerned with learners' developmental trajectories and unexpected changing patterns in the process of foreign language learning.
| S-EPMC7887325 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The data derive from a survey collected from 182 bilingual and multilingual speakers who are foreign language speakers from six language groups, including Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, French, and Russian. They registered in beginning, immediate, and advanced levels of foreign language classes in a public four-year university in the Midwestern U.S. The survey was developed with an aim of exploring foreign language learners' enjoyment and anxiety in learning foreign languages. The survey was distributed by utilizing an online questionnaire, which is composed of four sections: 1) demographic information (9 items), 2) the Foreign Language Enjoyment Scale (FLES) (12 items), 3) the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) (8 items), and 4) open-ended questions (2 items). Both FLES and FLCAS took the form of a 5-point Likert scale. The entire dataset is stored in an Excel file (.xls). The entire questionnaire is included as a supplementary file.
| S-EPMC7139155 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Many researchers have acknowledged the role of metacognition in facilitating learning to write in English as a foreign language (EFL). Although research on metacognition has explored learners' metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive strategies in the field of EFL writing, little is known about the nature of learners' metacognitive experiences in EFL writing. To fill such an important gap, this study was designed to assess EFL learners' metacognitive experiences before, during, and after writing. Data were collected from a total of 760 undergraduates through three self-report questionnaires and a writing task. Results from quantitative analyses showed four subcategories of EFL learners' metacognitive experiences in writing: metacognitive feeling, metacognitive judgments/estimates, online task-specific metacognitive knowledge, and online task-specific metacognitive strategies. Based on the empirical evidence, we propose a model of metacognitive experiences in EFL writing. Theoretical, methodological, and pedagogical implications are discussed.
| S-EPMC9478617 | biostudies-literature
Project description:While some first language (L1) reading models suggest that inefficient word recognition and small working memory tend to inhibit higher-level comprehension processes; the Compensatory Encoding Model maintains that slow word recognition and small working memory do not normally hinder reading comprehension, as readers are able to operate metacognitive strategies to compensate for inefficient word recognition and working memory limitation as long as readers process a reading task without time constraint. Although empirical evidence is accumulated for support of the Compensatory Encoding Model in L1 reading, there is lack of research for testing of the Compensatory Encoding Model in foreign language (FL) reading. This research empirically tested the Compensatory Encoding Model in English reading among Chinese college English language learners (ELLs). Two studies were conducted. Study one focused on testing whether reading condition varying time affects the relationship between word recognition, working memory, and reading comprehension. Students were tested on a computerized English word recognition test, a computerized Operation Span task, and reading comprehension in time constraint and non-time constraint reading. The correlation and regression analyses showed that the strength of association was much stronger between word recognition, working memory, and reading comprehension in time constraint than that in non-time constraint reading condition. Study two examined whether FL readers were able to operate metacognitive reading strategies as a compensatory way of reading comprehension for inefficient word recognition and working memory limitation in non-time constraint reading. The participants were tested on the same computerized English word recognition test and Operation Span test. They were required to think aloud while reading and to complete the comprehension questions. The think-aloud protocols were coded for concurrent use of reading strategies, classified into language-oriented strategies, content-oriented strategies, re-reading, pausing, and meta-comment. The correlation analyses showed that while word recognition and working memory were only significantly related to frequency of language-oriented strategies, re-reading, and pausing, but not with reading comprehension. Jointly viewed, the results of the two studies, complimenting each other, supported the applicability of the Compensatory Encoding Model in FL reading with Chinese college ELLs.
| S-EPMC5415605 | biostudies-other
Project description:The question of why native and foreign languages are learned with a large performance gap has prompted language researchers to hypothesize that they are subserved by fundamentally different mechanisms. However, this hypothesis may not have taken into account that these languages can be learned under different conditions (e.g., naturalistic vs. classroom settings). With a large sample of 636 third language (L3) learners who learned Chinese and English as their first (L1) and second (L2) languages, the present study examined the association of learning success across L1-L3. We argue that learning conditions may reveal how these languages are associated in terms of learning success. Because these languages were learned under a continuum of naturalistic to classroom conditions from L1 to L3, this sample afforded us a unique opportunity to evaluate the hypothesis that similar learning conditions between languages could be an important driving force determining language learning success. After controlling for nonlanguage factors such as musical background and motivational factors and using a convergence of analytics including the general linear models, the structural equation models, and machine learning, we found that the closer two languages were on the continuum of learning conditions, the stronger their association of learning success. Specifically, we found a significant association between L1 and L2 and between L2 and L3, but not between L1 and L3. Our results suggest that learning conditions may have important implications for the learning success of L1-L3.
| S-EPMC8443555 | biostudies-literature
Project description:We used event-related potentials to investigate morphosyntactic development in 78 adult English-speaking learners of Spanish as a second language (L2) across the proficiency spectrum. We examined how development is modulated by the similarity between the native language (L1) and the L2, by comparing number (a feature present in English) and gender agreement (novel feature). We also investigated how development is impacted by structural distance, manipulating the distance between the agreeing elements by probing both within-phrase (fruta muy jugosa "fruit-FEM-SG very juicy-FEM-SG") and across-phrase agreement (fresa es ácida "strawberry-FEM-SG is tart-FEM-SG"). Regression analyses revealed that the learners' overall proficiency, as measured by a standardized test, predicted their accuracy with the target properties in the grammaticality judgment task (GJT), but did not predict P600 magnitude to the violations. However, a relationship emerged between immersion in Spanish-speaking countries and P600 magnitude for gender. Our results also revealed a correlation between accuracy in the GJT and P600 magnitude, suggesting that behavioral sensitivity to the target property predicts neurophysiological sensitivity. Subsequent group analyses revealed that the highest-proficiency learners showed equally robust P600 effects for number and gender. This group also elicited more positive waveforms for within- than across-phrase agreement overall, similar to the native controls. The lowest-proficiency learners showed a P600 for number overall, but no effects for gender. Unlike the highest-proficiency learners, they also showed no sensitivity to structural distance, suggesting that sensitivity to such linguistic factors develops over time. Overall, these results suggest an important role for proficiency in morphosyntactic development, although differences emerged between behavioral and electrophysiological measures. While L2 proficiency predicted behavioral sensitivity to agreement, development with respect to the neurocognitive mechanisms recruited in processing only emerged when comparing the two extremes of the proficiency spectrum. Importantly, while both L1-L2 similarity and hierarchical structure impact development, they do not constrain it.
| S-EPMC6063416 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Frequency effect on vocabulary acquisition has been widely investigated in second language acquisition (SLA) research, whereas comparative studies of vocabulary acquisition of learners from different language types, such as hieroglyphic writing and alphabetic writing, are still rarely found. This type of studies could be of great significance in exploring some unique characteristics of how second language learners of native languages of different writing perceive and acquire second language. Using artificial words of alphabetic writing and low-frequency English words as experimental materials, this study aims to compare the effect of frequency on the acquisition of grammar and meaning of alphabetic words between Chinese learners of the hieroglyphic native language and foreign learners of alphabetic native languages. Specifically, the study intends to find out whether frequency effect plays the key role in language acquisition; to what extent frequency effect affects language acquisition; and whether there are any differences between learners of different language types for vocabulary acquisition in terms of frequency effect. The results show that Chinese and foreign learners of English language have no significant differences as a whole in terms of type of languages affecting the acquisition of grammar and meaning of artificial words and English words, indicating the difference in the type of mother tongue might not be the factor causing differences on grammar and meaning acquisition of vocabulary. Learner types, language types, frequency and part of speech of a word have interaction effect toward the acquisition of grammar and meaning of a word. However, exposure frequency of vocabulary plays the determining role in the acquisition of grammar and meaning of words.
| S-EPMC10411516 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Introduction Previous studies have highlighted the challenges faced by Chinese Japanese-as-a-foreign-language (JFL) learners (whose L2 is English) in acquiring L3 Japanese loanwords. These challenges arise from the linguistic characteristics of loanwords and the limited emphasis on teaching and learning them. However, there is a lack of research on the specific factors that influence the processing of Japanese loanwords among Chinese JFL learners. Significant motivation exists, therefore, to investigate these influencing factors as they provide valuable insight into the integration of phonographic and ideographic language systems, ultimately facilitating future lexical acquisition. Methods In this study, an experiment was conducted on 31 Chinese JFL learners to investigate the effects of loanword familiarity, English vocabulary proficiency, English-Japanese phonological similarity, and context on the processing of Japanese loanwords. Results Data analysis, using a (generalized) linear mixed-effect model, provided the following insights: (1) the processing of Japanese loanwords is influenced by English-Japanese phonological similarity, loanword familiarity, context, and learner English proficiency. Among these four factors, familiarity has the most significant impact on Japanese loanword processing; (2) the effects of context and phonological similarity on the processing of Japanese loanwords are not consistently positive. As learners improve their proficiency in L3 Japanese, they tend to decrease their reliance on English knowledge and instead access loanword representations directly to conceptual representations. Discussion Based on the findings of this study, a processing model for Japanese loanwords among advanced Chinese JFL learners is proposed. The model emphasizes the critical importance of the characteristics of loanwords, including phonological similarity and familiarity. It is necessary to determine the specific circumstances in which context considerably enhances learner processing ability.
| S-EPMC10469616 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Self-regulated learning in technology-supported environments has attracted much scholarly attention in recent years. With the rapid expansion of online education, students’ emotions have also been studied extensively in second language acquisition. However, few empirical studies have examined the interrelationship between students’ self-regulated learning and emotions in the emerging field of language MOOCs (LMOOCs). This study bridged this gap by exploring the relationship between foreign language enjoyment (FLE), boredom (FLB), self-regulated learning (SRL), and perceived effectiveness in LMOOC learning. Data were collected among 356 successful learners of a language MOOC in mainland China through a cross-sectional study. The results showed that LMOOC learners had a high level of enjoyment and a moderate level of boredom. A significantly positive relationship was noted between FLE and SRL while a negative relationship was found between FLB and SRL. SRL was confirmed to be the mediator between FLE, FLB, and PE, which partially mediated the effects of FLE on PE and fully mediated the effects of FLB on PE. Perceived effectiveness was predicted by all SRL strategies and time management significantly predicted perceived effectiveness. The results provided pedagogical implications for students to develop positive emotions and effective SRL strategies to achieve better learning outcomes in LMOOC learning.
| S-EPMC10311251 | biostudies-literature