Linguistic theory in second language acquisition Edited by Suzanne Flynn and Wayne O'Neil (review)

The Role of Consciousness in Second Language Acquisition Edina Torlakovi! (edina_@scs.carleton.ca) Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies; Cognitive Science, Carleton University 2214 Dunton Tower, 1125 Colonel By Drive Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6 Andrew Brook (abrook@ccs.carleton.ca) Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies; Cognitive Science, Carleton University 2216 Dunton Tower, 1125 Colonel By Drive Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6 Abstract In this paper we argue that in order to resolve the controversy in Second Language Acquisition research concerning whether or not direct instruction is needed for second language acquisition, we need to use a broader sense of ‘consciousness’ than is used by second language researchers. Block's classification of consciousness into Access and Phenomenal consciousness seems promising. We associate Phenomenal consciousness with explicit knowledge and suggest that explicit instruction is useful. It enhances linguistic competence. Introduction This paper addresses a question that is of great importance for Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research. The question is 'what should the role of consciousness in second language (L2) acquisition be?' It is important to answer this question in order to resolve one of the biggest debates in the field of SLA, namely whether or not direct instruction is necessary or even valuable in L2 acquisition. SLA researchers interested in consciousness should start by considering what others have to say about it. This is necessary to develop a comprehensive picture of consciousness. The debate in SLA needs to be informed by an adequate notion of what consciousness is. Only in this way can we reach an adequate view about its role. One place to start is to consider what is said about consciousness in philosophy. We will start by comparing the different definitions of consciousness used by SLA researchers and by philosophers. Next we will introduce the controversy over whether L2 learners need to be conscious of grammar rules to learn the target language. Then we will examine Block’s well-known distinction between access (A) consciousness and phenomenal (P) consciousness and where language, or more specifically second language, fits into this categorization. With this, we might be one step closer to understanding the role of consciousness in L2 learning/acquisition. Issues and Positions Definition(s) of Consciousness How do SLA theorists and philosophers think about consciousness? As it turns out, quite differently. Let us look at some of the similarities and differences. When SLA theorists talk about consciousness, they use the term in a quite narrow sense. Schmidt (1995), for example, points out that there are three different senses of the term 'consciousness' as it is used in SLA theory: levels of perception, noticing, and understanding. By contrast, philosophers have a broader understanding of the term. According to Clark (2001), the possibilities include wakefulness, self-awareness, availability for verbal report, availability for control of intentional action, and qualia. To determine if all these terms are discussing the same, complex entity, they need to be further defined. If one desires to apply concepts of one discipline to another (philosophy to SLA in this case), this is something that we need to know. According to Schmidt, ‘levels of perception’ could be defined as levels of a process of obtaining and perhaps processing information. Schmidt defines ‘noticing’ as rehearsal in short-term memory, while by ‘understanding’ he refers to rule understanding, i.e., grasping the meanings of rules and becoming thoroughly familiar with them. Definitions of the terms from Clark's list of possibilities might go as follows: wakefulness is defined as a state in which we are sensitive to our surroundings and in which we can process incoming information and respond to it appropriately. Self-awareness he defines as a capacity to represent ourselves and to be conscious of ourselves 'as distinct agents'. Availability for verbal report is the capacity to access our own inner states and to describe them using natural language, while qualia concerns how things feel to us. From the above, one can conclude that SLA theorists take consciousness to be something narrower than philosophers

A Theoretical and Historical Context for Second Language Acquisition.- Linguistic Theory: Generative Grammar.- The Ontogenesis of the Field of Second Language Learning Research.- B Parameters.- Parameterized Grammatical Theory and Language Acquisition: A Study of the Acquisition of Verb Placement and Inflection by Children and Adults.- Nature of Development in L2 Acquisition and Implications for Theories of Language Acquisition in General.- Linguistic Theory. Neurolinguistics and Second Language Acquisition.- Second Language Acquisition: A Biolinguistic Perspective.- Neurolinguistics and Parameter Setting.- C Markedness in Second Language Acquisition.- The Acquisition of Infinitive and Gerund Complements by Second Language Learners.- Island Effects in Second Language Acquisition.- On the Role of Linguistic Theory in Explanations of Second Language Developmental Grammars.- L2 Learnability: Delimiting the Domain of Core Grammar as Distinct from the Marked Periphery.- Kinds of Markedness.- D Additional Evidence for Universal Grammar.- The Categorial Status of Modals and L2 Acquisition.- UG-Generated Knowledge in Adult Second Language Acquisition.- Prosodic Phonology and the Acquisition of a Second Language.- Universal Grammar in Second Language Acquisition: Promises and Problems in Critically Relating Theory and Empirical Studies.- E Complementary Perspectives.- Pidginization as Language Acquisition.- All Paths Lead to the Mental Lexicon.- Intermorphology and Morphological Theory: A Plea for a Concession.- F Universal Grammar from a Traditional Perspective.- Second Language Acquisition and Linguistic Theory: The Role of Language Transfer.- Grammatical Theory and L2 Acquisition: A Brief Overview.- Typological and Parametric Views of Universals in Second Language Acquisition.- List of Contributors.- Index of Names.- Index of Subjects.

This entry analyzes and synthesizes various studies in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) that appeared after the publication of Frawley and Lantolf's 1985 study and expanded on sociocultural approaches based on Vygotsky's theoretical framework and methodological approach. Researchers interested in diverse facets of SLA both in and out of educational contexts have utilized sociocultural theory in a variety of ways. Some have focused more on the internal aspects of language, the mental processes involved in making and communicating meaning through language activities, while others have focused more on the social, cultural, physical, and historical contexts of second language learning and acquisition. These approaches seek to understand language development in its manifold richness and draw on the experiences and introspections of second language learners, who learn language in very different contexts and situations of development. The entry does not attempt to give a comprehensive account of all of the work that has been done using Vygotsky's core concepts to investigate second language learning, teaching, and acquisition from a sociocultural perspective, but instead focuses on such primary concepts as zone of proximal development; dynamic assessment; inner speech; private speech; the regulatory function of speech; gesture; social situation of development; and the historical and theoretical work that has been central to sociocultural approaches to SLA research and that can contribute to this effort through a reconceptualization of Vygotsky's work.

One very active research tradition in the field of second language acquisition (SLA) attempts to establish causal relationships between environmental factors and learning. These include the type and quantity of input, instruction and feedback, and the interactional context of learning (Larsen-Freeman and Long 1991). A second very influential line of research and theory in SLA that came to fruition during the 1980s investigates the possible role of universal grammar (UG) in SLA (Eubank 1991b, White 1989). In the Chomskyan tradition, UG refers not to properties of language as the external object of learning but to innate properties of mind that direct the course of primary language acquisition. One question asked within this tradition has been whether or not second language learners still “have access” to UG, but it is assumed that UG principles are not accessible to learner awareness for any kind of conscious analysis of input. It is possible that SLA is the result of UG (a deep internal factor) acting upon input (an external factor), as proposed by White (1989), but what seems to be left out of such an account is the role of the learner's conscious mental processes.

Over the past few decades, the field of second language acquisition (SLA) has seen a remarkable increase of interest in the study of instructed second language acquisition (ISLA), which “investigates second language (L2) learning or acquisition that occurs as a result of teaching” (Loewen, 2014, p. 2). The ISLA literature shows that there is an array of pedagogical options that can be used to facilitate adult L2 learning, ranging from implicit to explicit techniques. Furthermore, the effectiveness of an instructional treatment seems to depend largely on the nature of the L2 feature (e.g., Ellis, 2002; Spada & Tomita, 2010). However, extant empirical studies have yielded rather mixed findings on the issue regarding which type of L2 feature benefits more from which type of instruction, rendering it difficult to provide straightforward guidance to L2 classroom teachers. There are several reasons for the disparities in research findings, such as differences in study designs, settings, learner characteristics, etc., but above anything else, the inconsistent findings can primarily be attributed to the varying conceptualizations of complexity. With an aim to enlighten future research in this line of inquiry, the present discussion emphasizes the need for a more integral definition of complexity.

This paper investigates the L2 acquisition of Spanish object drop by advanced learners whose L1s are English and Brazilian Portuguese, in order to assess effects on their knowledge of the interpretable and uninterpretable features conditioning the realization of object drop in their L2 Spanish. Object drop in Spanish is subject to semantic restrictions related to definiteness and specificity, as well as syntactic restrictions related to subjacency. Current debates about second language acquisition (SLA) have led to different hypotheses. On the one hand, the Interpretability Hypothesis/IH (Hawkins, Roger & Hajime Hattori. 2006. Interpretation of English multiple wh-questions by Japanese speakers: A missing uninterpretable feature account. Second Language Research 22. 269–301) claims that uninterpretable features will not be completely acquired. On the other hand, the Feature Reassembly Hypothesis/FRH (Hwang, Sun Hee & Donna Lardiere. 2013. Plural-marking in L2 Korean: A feature-based approach. Second Language Research 29. 57–86; Lardiere, Donna. 2009. Some thoughts on the contrastive analysis of features in second language acquisition. Second Language Research 25. 173–227) does not distinguish between interpretable and uninterpretable features for the purposes of SLA, arguing that the difficulty of the acquisition task hinges on the required amount of feature reassembly from the L1 to the L2 lexicon. Finally, the Full Transfer/Full Access (FT/FA) (Schwartz, Bonnie & Rex Sprouse. 1996. L2 cognitive states and the Full Transfer/Full Access model. Second Language Research 12. 40–72; Schwartz, Bonnie & Rex Sprouse. 2000. When syntactic theories evolve: Consequences for L2 acquisition research. In John Archibald (ed.), Second language acquisition and linguistic theory, 156–186. Malden, MA: Blackwell; White, Lydia. 2003. Second language acquisition and universal grammar. New York: Cambridge University Press) hypothesis treats SLA as equivalent to first-language acquisition, in terms of the potential for ultimate attainment. Both the FT/FA and the FRH are in principle compatible with full attainment in L2 acquisition. To assess these hypotheses, this study tests the L2 acquisition of the semantic and syntactic restrictions on Spanish object drop by learners whose L1 either lacks widespread object drop (English), or has regular object drop but realizes it differently from Spanish (Brazilian Portuguese). The Full Transfer/Full Access hypothesis seems to best explain the results of the two experiments.

The field of second language acquisition (SLA), a relatively new field of academic study, traces its roots only to the second half of the last century. The field of SLA has roots in various disciplines and areas of study, including the fields of child first language (L1) acquisition, linguistics, psychology, and language pedagogy. Thus, SLA has moved well beyond a one-sided focus on learner internal mechanisms, be they linguistic or cognitive. A great deal of SLA research has concentrated on differences between L1 and second language (L2) acquisition in terms of ultimate attainment. Some SLA researchers argue that learning is based on experience of language usage. More recent SLA research conducted within a cognitivist approach has been designed to provide online measures of processing and interpretation of the L2 and has thus shifted somewhat away from the analysis of naturalistic corpora.

Recent advances in linguistic theory within the principles and parameters framework have exerted considerable influence on the field of second language acquisition. SLA researchers working within this framework of syntactic theory have investigated the extent to which developing second language grammars are constrained by principles of Universal Grammar (UG). Much of the UG-based SLA research in the 1980s focused on adult L2 acquisition, but the role of UG principles in child L2 acquisition remained largely unexplored. More recently, however, this state of affairs has begun to change as SLA researchers are becoming more and more interested in child second language syntactic development. In this paper, I review recent and current developments in UG-based child SLA research, and I argue that child SLA has a valuable role to play in enabling us to arrive at a better understanding of the role of biological factors in language acquisition and in strengthening the links between SLA and linguistic theory. Specifically, I discuss the findings of child SLA studies with respect to the following issues: the role of UG parameters in child SLA, the status of functional categories and their projections in child SLA, and the nature of the evidence available to and used by child L2 learners. The overall picture emerging from these studies suggests that child L2 developing grammars are indeed constrained by Universal Grammar. While it is not fully clear at the present time whether the child L2 learners& knowledge is a result of direct access to UG or indirect access to UG (i.e., through the mediation of the L1), the evidence indicates that L1 transfer (at least in certain syntactic domains) cannot be entirely ruled out.

This article argues for a reconceptualization of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research that would enlarge the ontological and empirical parameters of the field. We claim that methodologies, theories, and foci within SLA reflect an imbalance between cognitive and mentalistic orientations, and social and contextual orientations to language, the former orientation being unquestionably in the ascendancy. This has resulted in a skewed perspective on discourse and communication, which conceives of the foreign language speaker as a deficient communicator struggling to overcome an underdeveloped L2 competence, striving to reach the “target” competence of an idealized native speaker (NS). We contend that SLA research requires a significantly enhanced awareness of the contextual and interactional dimensions of language use, an increased “emic” (i.e., participant‐relevant) sensitivity towards fundamental concepts, and the broadening of the traditional SLA data base. With such changes in place, the field of SLA has the capacity to become a theoretically and methodologically richer, more robust enterprise, better able to explicate the processes of second or foreign language (S/FL) acquisition, and better situated to engage with and contribute to research commonly perceived to reside outside its boundaries.

This article argues for a reconceptualization of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research that would enlarge the ontological and empirical parameters of the field. We claim that methodologies, theories, and foci within SLA reflect an imbalance between cognitive and mentalistic orientations, and social and contextual orientations to language, the former orientation being unquestionably in the ascendancy. This has resulted in a skewed perspective on discourse and communication, which conceives of the foreign language speaker as a deficient communicator struggling to overcome an underdeveloped L2 competence, striving to reach the “target” competence of an idealized native speaker (NS). We contend that SLA research requires a significantly enhanced awareness of the contextual and interactional dimensions of language use, an increased “emic” (i.e., participant‐relevant) sensitivity towards fundamental concepts, and the broadening of the traditional SLA data base. With such changes in place, the field of SLA has the capacity to become a theoretically and methodologically richer, more robust enterprise, better able to explicate the processes of second or foreign language (S/FL) acquisition, and better situated to engage with and contribute to research commonly perceived to reside outside its boundaries.

Cognitive Individual Differences in Second Language Processing and Acquisition contains 14 chapters that focus on the role of cognitive IDs in L2 learning and processing. The book brings together theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of cognitive IDs, as well as empirical studies that investigate the mediating role of cognitive IDs in various linguistic domains. Chapters include contributions from researchers working within second language acquisition (SLA), psycholinguistics, and cognitive psychology, sharing a common interest in the application of cognitive IDs to their respective areas of study. The interdisciplinary understanding of cognitive IDs presented in this book makes the book of interest to a wide readership of graduate students, faculty members, and academic researchers in the fields of SLA, psycholinguistics, cognitive psychology, and education.

<p><em>Over the past few decades, the field of second language acquisition (SLA) has seen a remarkable increase of interest in the study of instructed second language acquisition (ISLA), which “investigates second language (L2) learning or acquisition that occurs as a result of teaching” (Loewen, 2014, p. 2). The importance of this subfield has particularly been emphasized for the sake of adult L2 learners, who, due to biological and cognitive constraints, have difficulty acquiring a target language (TL) solely based on naturalistic input (e.g., Han, 2004; Long, 1990). For this, ISLA research has suggested the utilization of focus on form (FonF), a pedagogical approach that attempts to engage learners’ metalinguistic attention in an otherwise solely meaning-based environment (Doughty & Williams, 1998; Long, 1991; Long & Robinson, 1998). According to Doughty and Williams (1998), FonF involves an array of pedagogical options, ranging from implicit techniques (e.g., input flood, input enhancement, and recasts) that attempt to attract leaners’ attention to form, to explicit techniques (e.g., processing instruction, consciousness-raising, and dictogloss) that attempt to direct their attention to form.</em></p>

Over the past few decades, the field of second language acquisition (SLA) has seen a remarkable increase of interest in the study of instructed second language acquisition (ISLA), which “investigates second language (L2) learning or acquisition that occurs as a result of teaching” (Loewen, 2014, p. 2). The importance of this subfield has particularly been emphasized for the sake of adult L2 learners, who, due to biological and cognitive constraints, have difficulty acquiring a target language (TL) solely based on naturalistic input (e.g., Han, 2004; Long, 1990). For this, ISLA research has suggested the utilization of focus on form (FonF), a pedagogical approach that attempts to engage learners’ metalinguistic attention in an otherwise solely meaning-based environment (Doughty & Williams, 1998; Long, 1991; Long & Robinson, 1998). According to Doughty and Williams (1998), FonF involves an array of pedagogical options, ranging from implicit techniques (e.g., input flood, input enhancement, and recasts) that attempt to attract leaners’ attention to form, to explicit techniques (e.g., processing instruction, consciousness-raising, and dictogloss) that attempt to direct their attention to form.

Although the field of second language acquisition (SLA) has largely advanced over the last few decades, the area of second language (L2) phonology has not been a focus of many studies. Major (1998) found that “of the nearly 200 articles published in Studies in SLA [from 1988 to 1998], only about a dozen focused on phonetics and phonology” (p. 131). Since then, the area has largely expanded, as discussed in Eckman (2004), evolving from studies that cited first language (L1) influence as a main explanation for L2 phonology to research that has turned to universal principles driven by Universal Grammar (UG). Several crosslinguistic speech perception models have been developed as well, and many empirical studies have been undertaken to yield support. One of the most fertile domains for the investigation of L2 phonology has been the syllable (Eckman, 2004, p. 527). However, most of the studies have concentrated on the onset or the coda, while there is much yet to be explored for the acquisition of the nucleus of the syllable – the vowel. This paper is a literature review of the emerging area of L2 phonology, focusing on the perception of English vowels by adult L2 learners.

Aim. This study investigates the development of knowledge and major trends in the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) from 1947 to 2022, employing both scientometric and bibliometric approaches. Methods. Data from 7,964 SLA studies across three prominent databases – Scopus, WOS, and Lens – were analysed using CiteSpace and VOSviewer to minimize bias towards specific journals. From a psycholinguistic perspective, the analysis clustered these studies into 14 major themes, representing the key topics examined by SLA researchers. These clusters include late L2 learners, L2 acquisition, English learners, working memory, world Englishes, L2 learning experience, subset principle, parameter-setting model, corrective feedback, and various aspects of second language research (e.g., SLA of phonology, SLA of morphology, etc.). These themes reflect the cognitive and psychological processes underlying language learning, such as memory, attention, and individual differences. Findings revealed key emerging trends in SLA, with the US leading in all databases, and top journals varying across databases. Major publishers included Wiley, Cambridge University Press, and Sage, while related subject areas were social sciences, linguistics, psychology, and computer science, highlighting the interdisciplinary nature of psycholinguistic research. Results. The study’s results offer critical insights and implications for understanding the development, interdisciplinary nature, and prominent contributors in the field of SLA while shedding light on the central themes explored by researchers. By emphasizing psycholinguistic dimensions, such as the role of cognitive mechanisms, automatic processing, and individual differences in language learning, this study provides an overview of SLA research and identifies future directions for exploring the cognitive and psychological foundations of SLA.