This study is the first attempt to explore the relationship between rater variables focusing on raters' language aptitude and their judgments of second language (L2) speech. Thirty-four English listeners rated 65 spontaneous native and nonnative speech samples for comprehensibility, accentedness, and fluency. They also completed the LLAMA language…

Despite the widespread use and effectiveness of the Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT) composite score in predicting individual differences in L2 achievement and proficiency, there has been little examination of MLAT subtests, although they have potential for illuminating components of L2 aptitude and the mechanism of prediction. Here we use…

Young learners' language aptitude is understudied due to a lack of tests covering this period of life. Young learners, in contrast with adults, are still acquiring their L1. Consequently, a language-dependent aptitude test should be carefully designed for it to be valid. An additional challenge is found when the young learners who are to take the…

Widespread use of the Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT) in L2 studies of individual differences implicitly assumes that L2 aptitude is a distinct cognitive facet. There is considerable evidence for prediction from L1 abilities to L2 learning. In this longitudinal study, L1-MLAT-L2 relations were examined in 307 US secondary students based on…

Despite the extensive research on bilingual development, our understanding of how lexical competition unfolds in the bilingual mind remains limited. Previous studies have predominantly focused on crosslinguistic competition, neglecting the examination of the competition process within each language and the influence of diverse bilingual…

While much research has examined second language (L2) phonetic acquisition, less research has examined first language (L1) attrition in terms of the voice onset time (VOT) of voiceless stops. The current study examined L2 acquisition and L1 attrition in the VOT of word-initial voiceless stops among late English-Arabic and Arabic-English bilinguals…

This paper examines evidence for relationships among individual differences (IDs) in L1 achievement, L2 aptitude, and L2 achievement. It begins by providing an overview of my academic journey from L1 educator to L2 researcher and explains the development of the Linguistic Coding Differences Hypothesis (LCDH). Next, I review Peter Skehan's…

While language aptitude and motivation are considered to be important contributors to second language (L2) attainment, two major gaps in the past research have been (1) a lack of nonlinear models stemming from a naive and tacit assumption that learning outcomes are linearly related to their predictors, and (2) a lack of unified and integrative…

Lexical tone languages like Mandarin Chinese require listeners to discriminate among different pitch patterns. A syllable spoken with a rising pitch (e.g. "b[i-acute]" 'nose') carries a different meaning than the same syllable spoken with a falling pitch (e.g. "b[i with grave]" 'arm'). For native speakers (L1) of a non-tonal…

While an elicited imitation test (EIT) has been widely used as a measure of oral proficiency in second language acquisition (SLA) research, it is still unclear the extent to which memory capacity impacts EIT performance. In light of this gap, the present study sought to clarify the nature of elicited imitation by examining the relative…

We investigated age-related decline in adult learning of Dutch as an additional language (Ln) in speaking, writing, listening, and reading proficiency test scores for 56,024 adult immigrants with 50 L1s who came to the Netherlands for study or work. Performance for all four language skills turned out to decline monotonically after an age of…

Foreign language aptitude is defined as one's potential to learn a second language. A language learner with higher aptitude is predicted to learn more, faster, and reach a higher level of proficiency. If this is the case, one way to validate the construct of aptitude and its measure is to conduct a validation study in which measures of aptitude is…

Second language (L2) writing has been determined to be influenced by what is read, with language learners tending to borrow words and short phrases from input texts while writing (e.g., Wang & Wang, 2015). This phenomenon is referred to as lexical alignment. Only one empirical study has investigated the influence that the linguistic complexity…

In recent decades, integrated language competence has been highlighted in the language curricula taught in schools and institutions, and the relationship between test-takers' performance on integrated tasks and comprehension sources has been much studied. The current study employed the frameworks of reading and listening comprehension processes to…

Studies with U.S. secondary second language (L2) learners have revealed individual differences (IDs) in first language (L1) skills and L2 aptitude and shown that these IDs are related to L2 achievement and proficiency. In this study, U.S. students were administered measures of L1 achievement, L1 cognitive processing, and L2 aptitude; followed…