scholarly journals Brain white matter structure and COMT gene are linked to second-language learning in adults

2016 ◽  
Vol 113 (26) ◽  
pp. 7249-7254 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ping C. Mamiya ◽  
Todd L. Richards ◽  
Bradley P. Coe ◽  
Evan E. Eichler ◽  
Patricia K. Kuhl
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
White Matter ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Fractional Anisotropy ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Language Immersion ◽  
Radial Diffusivity ◽  
Immersion Program ◽  
Brain White Matter ◽  
The Relationship

Adult human brains retain the capacity to undergo tissue reorganization during second-language learning. Brain-imaging studies show a relationship between neuroanatomical properties and learning for adults exposed to a second language. However, the role of genetic factors in this relationship has not been investigated. The goal of the current study was twofold: (i) to characterize the relationship between brain white matter fiber-tract properties and second-language immersion using diffusion tensor imaging, and (ii) to determine whether polymorphisms in the catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) gene affect the relationship. We recruited incoming Chinese students enrolled in the University of Washington and scanned their brains one time. We measured the diffusion properties of the white matter fiber tracts and correlated them with the number of days each student had been in the immersion program at the time of the brain scan. We found that higher numbers of days in the English immersion program correlated with higher fractional anisotropy and lower radial diffusivity in the right superior longitudinal fasciculus. We show that fractional anisotropy declined once the subjects finished the immersion program. The relationship between brain white matter fiber-tract properties and immersion varied in subjects with different COMT genotypes. Subjects with the Methionine (Met)/Valine (Val) and Val/Val genotypes showed higher fractional anisotropy and lower radial diffusivity during immersion, which reversed immediately after immersion ended, whereas those with the Met/Met genotype did not show these relationships. Statistical modeling revealed that subjects’ grades in the language immersion program were best predicted by fractional anisotropy and COMT genotype.

scholarly journals The Relationship Between Artificial and Second Language Learning

2015 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 822-847 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Ettlinger ◽  
Kara Morgan-Short ◽  
Mandy Faretta-Stutenberg ◽  
Patrick C.M. Wong
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
The Relationship

scholarly journals The relationship between students’ second language learning anxiety and language proficiency

10.32698/0141 ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 50
Author(s):  
Asnadia Binti Alias ◽  
Nur Atikah Binti Noor Rashid
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Test Anxiety ◽  
Language Proficiency ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
English Language ◽  
Learning Anxiety ◽  
Language Learning Anxiety ◽  
Spearman Test ◽  
The Relationship

Students in Malaysian Polytechnics must enrol in a second language course as one of the compulsory courses offered by the institution. There is no placement test for polytechnics students to enrol in English language class. Therefore, students with different level of proficiency are mixed together in a classroom to learn English language. Consequently, students encountered difficulties in learning the second language due to feeling of anxiety. Hence, the aim of this study was to determine the correlation between students’ language learning anxiety and their language proficiency. This study involved of 96 semester three students from Civil Engineering Department, Politeknik Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin which have been chosen randomly. A 33 item questionnaire of Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS) was analysed using SPSS 22. The study revealed that the students experienced moderate level of language learning anxiety. Correlations – Spearman Test was used to determine the relationship between students’ second language learning anxiety and language proficiency. Three types of anxiety was tested which are Test Anxiety, Communication Apprehension and Fear of Negative Evaluation. Correlations – Spearman Test demonstrated that only Test Anxiety showed significant relationship with students’ language proficiency. Several implications have been discussed to offer suggestions to the lecturers in dealing with students learning anxiety. Lecturers should be careful in correcting students’ error to avoid students feel humiliated. This is because students tend to feel anxious whenever lecturers correct their mistakes in the classroom. A further research should be carried out by using two approaches; qualitative and quantitative and adds more variables such as attitude and motivation towards learning a second language.

scholarly journals ‘I said it!’ ‘I’m first!’: Gender and language-learner identities

2011 ◽  
pp. 112
Author(s):  
Harold Andrés Peña
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Language Learner ◽  
Feminist Poststructuralist ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Learner Identities

While there has been an upsurge of research studying the relationship of gender and second language learning in cross-cultural contexts, far less has been investigated about preschool children’s gender and learner identities in contexts where English is a foreign language. In this paper I describe how gendered discourses are at stake in the classroom and how these discourses are related to the learner identities of a group of Colombian preschoolers. I use a Feminist Poststructuralist Discourse Analysis (FPDA) approach to pin down moments in which the assertion of power is manifested in second language practices like ‘classroom races’ during literacy activities. This assertion of power positions participants differently. Findings suggest the need to understand how children negotiate subject positions discursively in language learning activities. I am suggesting the need to erode discourses of approval that marginalize girls and favour boys.

scholarly journals Collaborative Instructional Strategies and Attitudes toward Second Language Learning

2020 ◽  
Vol 3 (5) ◽  
pp. 60-67
Author(s):  
Carolyn F. Pardo-Tolentino ◽  
Rischelle G. Aggabao
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Instructional Strategies ◽  
Learning Strategies ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Mind Mapping ◽  
Collaborative Strategies ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Experimental Group

This paper examines the effectiveness of using collaborative instructional strategies in teaching second language and presents the attitudes toward using these collaborative strategies among Grade 8 students. To determine the results, the experimental research design was used to test the relationship between the variables. Findings revealed that five collaborative learning strategies namely think-pair-share, jigsaw puzzle, mind mapping, round robin, and send a problem were assessed as satisfactory by the respondents. Though the data show these collaborative strategies received the same assessment, “send a problem” has the highest average mean. With regard to the respondents’ performance in the pretest and posttest, students who belong in the experimental group show a slight increase in scores than those students in the control group. Students from both groups have the same perception in using these collaborative strategies. Thus, the researchers believe that using collaborative instructional strategies help learners understand better the second language.

INPUT, INTERACTION, AND THE SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNER.Susan M. Gass. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1997. Pp. xi + 189. $45.00 cloth, $22.50 paper.

2000 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 114-115
Author(s):  
James F. Lee
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Development ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Language Learner ◽  
Second Language Learner ◽  
Second Language Development ◽  
Readable Book ◽  
The Relationship

Input, interaction, and the second language learner is, as the title suggests, a view of the relationship among input, interaction, and second language development. Susan M. Gass has written an extremely readable book that explicates many of the most discussed issues in second language learning in the 1990s. Her intention, successfully achieved, is to demonstrate where theories and frameworks coincide, not just collide.

Generative phonology and contrastive studies

1976 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jacek Fisiak
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Applied Linguistics ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Precise Formulation ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
Theoretical Status ◽  
Methodological Status ◽  
The Relationship

The development of contrastive studies (CS) in recent years, judging by the proliferation of projects and published materials, has been accompanied since the late sixties by vigorous discussions and controversies concerning the theoretical status of CS, their form and their place in both general and applied linguistics.Many linguists and language teachers have gone so far as to reject the validity and usefulness of CS (cf. Alatis, 1968). It seems that this attitude results from a number of misunderstandings created by such factors as the peculiar methodological status of CS, the lack of a clear-cut distinction between theoretical and applied CS (Stockwell, 1968:25; Fisiak, 1971:88ff), and the lack of any precise formulation of the different aims of theoretical CS and applied CS, as well as the confusion of the relationship between CS, psycholinguistic theories of interference and errors, and the theory of second language learning (Zabrocki, 1976). Some confusion also stems from the misunderstanding of the relationship between CS and linguistic theory.

scholarly journals The effects of working memory and declarative memory on instructed second language vocabulary learning: Insights from intelligent CALL

2019 ◽  
pp. 136216881987285
Author(s):  
Simón Ruiz ◽  
Patrick Rebuschat ◽  
Detmar Meurers
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Second Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Second Language Learning ◽  
Vocabulary Acquisition ◽  
Declarative Memory ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Computer Assisted ◽  
Instructional Condition ◽  
The Relationship

The extent to which learners benefit from instruction may be largely dependent on their individual abilities. However, there is relatively little work on the interaction between instructional effectiveness in second language learning and learner individual factors. In this study, we investigated the relationship between instruction, individual differences in cognitive abilities (working memory and declarative memory), and second language vocabulary acquisition in the context of web-based intelligent computer assisted language learning (ICALL). To this end, 127 adult learners of English, predominantly advanced-level, German-speaking learners, read news texts on the web for about two weeks using an ICALL system under two instructional conditions: form-focused and meaning-focused instruction. Learners in the form-focused condition read and completed automatically-generated multiple-choice gaps where phrasal verbs appeared in the text, while learners in the meaning-focused condition simply read and did not complete any gaps. Mixed-effects regression analyses showed that working memory was associated with vocabulary acquisition and that this association depended on the instructional context, with working memory being predictive of learning only in the form-focused condition, suggesting an aptitude-treatment interaction. Furthermore, declarative memory abilities were related to learning only as measured by the Continuous Visual Memory Task, and the relationship was not moderated by instructional condition. Overall, the study contributes to accounting for variability in second language learning in general, as well as in instructional contexts supported by intelligent CALL.

scholarly journals Sequential language learning versus language immersion in bilingualism: Diffusion MRI connectometry reveals microstructural evidence

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Razieh Khazaei ◽  
Soheila Sobhani ◽  
Farzaneh Rahmani ◽  
Mohammad Hadi Aarabi
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
White Matter ◽  
Corpus Callosum ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Diffusion Mri ◽  
Immersion Time ◽  
Structural Difference ◽  
Language Immersion ◽  
Arcuate Fasciculus ◽  
White Matter Tracts

Background: Bilingualism is a universal phenomenon. Study of bilingual brain has provided evidence to probable advantageous outcomes of early second language learning and brain structural correlates to these outcomes. Preservation of cognitive function with aging and executive dexterity are amongst proposed benefits. Method: Using the data deposited by Pliatsikas we analyzed through diffusion MRI connectometry structural difference in white matter tracts in 20 healthy sequential bilingual adults, who used English as a second language on a daily basis, and 25 controls in fiber differentiation analyses. Significant tracts were extracted with and without regression against language immersion period. Results: Connectometry results revealed increased connectivity in corpus callosum (CC), bilateral cingulum, arcuate fasciculus (AF), and left Inferior fronto occipital fasciculus (IFOF), of sequential bilingual adults. Also bilateral IFOF, AF as well as body and genu of corpus callosum were positively correlated with language immersion time. Conclusion: Mentioned white matter tracts with diffusion structural significance in young adults with long immersion into the second language, confirm results of previous results. These are also in consort with known pathways involved in neurophysiological processes in speech stream and in cognitive performance. Insertion of immersion time as a variable in the model, yielded the same results with higher FDR values, except for arcuate fasciculus. Future studies are warranted to address structural differences with larger samples, investigating the effects of early language immersion on white matter tracts versus individual and social variables that interfere with white matter maturation and integrity.

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