Abstract
It is an ultimate goal for second language learners to attain a high-level of proficiency and produce L2 accurately as well as fluently. Yet, according to second language learning enormity particularly in a later stage, a considerable number of learners may experience excruciating difficulties. Suffice it to mention that some learners may not even succeed in developing language rudiments. To ascertain the learners’ potential, second language acquisition theories have, for long, attempted to account for the difficulties faced by second language learners who tend to think and produce language in a rule-governed way. Inherent to such theories, explicit versus implicit learning approaches attempted to uncover the associated factors affecting second language learning. Accordingly, this has amassed a growing body of research over the issue of implicit learning which has been investigated in various disciplines including SLA and pedagogy, psycholinguistics, and cognitive and neuroscience. This paper places focus on implicit learning highlighting its importance in second language learning as well as its benefits which extend to language automaticity. The paper presents studies probing the effectiveness of implicit learning on various levels; after which neuroscientific data is presented to account for the advantages and development of implicit learning explicating the memory systems underpinning the learning process as well as the neural processes lying at the core therein. Finally, implications are provided.
Highlights
Attaining a rapid, fluent, accurate and effortless performance in second language (L2) has long been an ultimate and a fundamental goal to second language learners
While some teaching approaches depended mainly on explicit instruction and emphasis on grammatical rules (i.e. The Grammar Translation Method which focused on grammatical rules, memorization of vocabulary, and translation from L1 to L2), others depended on oral drills and repetition (i.e. The Audiolingual Method which is characterized by structure-based dialogue form of teaching, memorization of set of phrases, use of repetitive drills, little/no grammatical explanation, and emphasis on form rather than meaning; The Direct Method which depends on oral interaction, little analysis of grammatical rules, and spontaneous use of language)
The studies in this paper show that implicit learning is feasible on various language levels
Summary
Fluent, accurate and effortless performance in second language (L2) has long been an ultimate and a fundamental goal to second language learners. It is presumed that L2, like L1, is learned implicitly via interconnections between linguistic forms and their associative functions [10] since, seemingly, advanced language learners who attain a high level of L2 proficiency are normally unaware of the explicit L2 rules despite their intuitive understanding [11]. To this end, a substantial amount of research has been conducted on the effect of explicit/implicit teaching on second language acquisition. Implicit learning has been brought to the fore
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