Statistical learning (SL), the ability to detect and extract regularities from inputs, has been considered as an early-maturing and domain-general mechanism that is critical for typical language development. However, recent evidence in neurotypical adults and children have found that individuals can vary in their SL abilities across linguistic and…

Learning in a multimedia environment puts many demands on a learner's limited working memory, but this can become even more demanding as the level of distraction increases in a lesson. What has not been investigated much in previous literature is whether higher levels of distraction in lessons are more harmful to some learners than others. This…

Children and adult learners benefit from viewing hand gestures at instruction across domains (Cook, Duffy, & Fenn, 2013; Huang, Kim, & Christianson, 2019; Ping & Goldin-Meadow, 2008). Within the domain of mathematical learning, gesture at instruction has been shown to benefit children and adults in laboratory and classroom settings…

Second language acquisition has been observed to be variable in its outcome such that, unlike native speakers, all second language learners do not achieve total success. Second language acquisition is made of macro and micro processes. External and internal (e.g., age, individual differences) factors are assumed to affect language processing in…

Millions engage in learning a Second Language (L2) using their mobile devices with a wide range of success. Concomitantly, there exists a growing interest in research on the effects of mobile-assisted language learning and predictors of learner outcomes (e.g., Loewen et al., 2020; Sudina & Plonsky, 2023). However, few of these apps and studies…

This study examined the functionality of learning difference programs in secondary independent schools, as well as ways to improve this programming for students with learning differences, and help these students define success. This study was designed to explore if programming for students with learning differences needs to exist in all secondary…

Executive function (EF) predicts children's academic achievement; however, less is known about the relation between EF and the actual learning process. Furthermore, more research is needed to better understand how different aspects of the learning environment interact with EF to influence learning. The current dissertation includes two studies to…

Natural language is highly complex and can be challenging for some learners, yet the contribution of complexity to individual differences in language learning remains poorly understood. This poor understanding appears due to both a lack of consensus among researchers regarding what complexity is, and to on-line language research often employing…

Lexical categories like noun and verb are foundational to language acquisition, but these categories do not come neatly packaged for the infant language learner. Some have proposed that infants can begin to solve this problem by tracking the frequent nonadjacent word (or morpheme) contexts of these categories. However, nonadjacent relationships…

This study explores professional learning of teachers in a web-based Open-Ended Learning Environment (OELE). Adult learning theorists suggest that adults are self-directed, experience-based, personally- and socially-related, problem-oriented, and application-focused learners. Constructivists suggest that the OELE affords learners opportunities to…

The development of reading skills from age seven until age 19 was investigated for children who were referred for special education preschool intervention using latent growth curve analysis (n=206). Approximately one-third of the study sample did not require special education services after preschool, providing a natural comparison group. Reading…

Bilingualism (Sanz, 2000), motivation (Pintrich, 1989), and language aptitude (Grigorenko, Sternberg, and Ehrman, 2000) are crucial individual differences that contribute to successful adult language learning. Since Gardner's (1985) seminal work on motivation, many studies have shown that motivation is dynamic and that it affects language…