Developing proficiency and intercultural competence are goals promoted by the Modern Language Association and widely shared by postsecondary second language programs across the United States. Although the development of proficiency has been studied extensively in this context, comparatively little is known about how intercultural competence…

Languaging--that is, using language to mediate thinking, orally or in writing--facilitates second language (L2) learning. As languaging requires the deliberate, analytical action of L2 learners, learners with higher language aptitude are likely to benefit more from languaging than those with lower aptitude. Thus, this study investigated the extent…

Emotions in foreign language (FL) learning have become an increasingly popular research avenue in applied linguistics. Such research is often carried out using linear correlational or regression methods, which are limited in the extent to which they can depict interrelations. In this study, we aimed to reexamine the relationships between the…

Flow is an intrinsic motivational state associated with full task engagement, positive affect, and enhanced performance. While research has examined how different language tasks interact with flow experiences, no study has examined learner flow experiences in a wide range of tasks using an experience sampling method to determine how universal…

This study examined the relationship between lexical coverage (i.e., the percentage of known word tokens in a text) and second language (L2) reading comprehension. Several studies have suggested that adequate comprehension occurs between 95% and 98% coverage, but no study has investigated beginning-level learners reading under the conditions of…

Research examining rule formation and second language (L2) explicit knowledge during guided inductive instruction has focused on co-constructed metalanguage or depth of processing (DoP) using think-aloud protocols, but without analyzing rule features. Studies have not focused on the architecture of the rules that L2 learners create individually.…

Although most children learn to communicate in their first language (L1), there is normal and expected variation in their rate of acquisition across all components of the language system. Until recently, most second language acquisition and second language (L2) researchers have assumed that individual differences (IDs) in L1 acquisition are small…

Listener-based judgements of fluency play an important role in second language (L2) communication contexts and in L2 assessment. Accordingly, our meta-analysis examined the relationship between different aspects of utterance fluency and listener-based judgements of perceived fluency by analyzing primary studies reporting correlation coefficients…

The emerging interest in grit, referred to as sustained perseverance and passion for reaching long-term goals and conceptualized as a facet of conscientiousness, has shown that language-specific grit is positively linked to foreign language (FL) achievement. Evidence from recent studies on intended effort and academic buoyancy--constructs…

Willingness to communicate (WTC) is an important individual learner difference that can help account for varying rates of language-learning success across individuals. As learner talk is considered to be a key pedagogical activity, instructors and researchers often strive to identify and manipulate key variables that will increase and arouse a…

In discussions about relationships between research and pedagogy, teachers and researchers are often characterized as facing each other across a "gap" that separates them. Teachers are described as having practical concerns about their own classrooms and little patience for "theoretical" issues. Researchers are described as…

Multiple regression is a family of statistics used to investigate the relationship between a set of predictors and a criterion (dependent) variable. This procedure is applicable in a variety of research contexts and data structures. Consequently, and similar to quantitative traditions in sister-disciplines such as education and psychology (see…

Metacognition is a topic of increasing interest in the field of instruction and learning, but its relation to actual teaching behaviors is seldom investigated in second language (L2) classroom research. The purpose of this study was to examine whether and how language teacher metacognition and executive function are linked to high-leverage…

Motivational interactions during multiple language learning have been largely neglected in language motivation research. To fill this gap, we investigate longitudinal relations between Swiss German students' value beliefs in English, French, and German in upper secondary schools and whether there are differences in motivational development between…

Reading in a foreign language has value for learners as a potentially rich source of input as well as enjoyment. It requires persistence, however. Within models of self-regulated learning, persistence relates to learners' self-efficacy and use of strategies to aid task completion and regulation of engagement. Yet the relationship between…