Abstract
This state-of-the art paper focuses on the poorly explored issue of foreign language aptitude, attempting to present the latest developments in this field and reconceptualizations of the construct from the perspective of neuroscience. In accordance with this goal, it first discusses general directions in neurolinguistic research on foreign language aptitude, starting with the earliest attempts to define the neurological substrate for talent, sources of difficulties in the neurolinguistic research on foreign language aptitude and modern research methods. This is followed by the discussion of the research on the phonology of foreign language aptitude with emphasis on functional and structural studies as well as their consequences for the knowledge of the concept. The subsequent section presents the studies which focus on lexical and morphosyntactic aspects of foreign language aptitude. The paper ends with a discussion of the limitations of contemporary research, the future directions of such research and selec ed methodological issues.
Highlights
In the research on individual differences, foreign language aptitude (FL aptitude) has recently become one of the most often debated topics among scholars in the field of SLA and language education and neurolinguistics
Neurological techniques of brain examination have ushered in a new era in research on SLA in general and on individual differences in particular
Methods such as PET, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), anatomical magnetic resonance imaging (aMRI), event related potential (ERP), and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), which measure either changes in brain activity or in brain anatomy, help to discover how a foreign language is organized in the brain, how the age of onset, aptitude, proficiency level and training affect this organization, and what functional and structural features differentiate monolinguals from bilinguals at different levels of linguistic proficiency and with different lengths of exposure to a foreign language
Summary
In the research on individual differences, foreign language aptitude (FL aptitude) has recently become one of the most often debated topics among scholars not. As Jensen (1997, 2002), a major proponent of the hereditarian position, argues, all the variation in mental performance has a biological basis He explains that there is a negative correlation between the intelligence quotient (IQ), which is a measure of general cognitive ability, and the reaction time of a person. The higher the IQ level of a person is, the less time he or she needs to solve a problem or to learn something His arguments rest on interdependencies between the results obtained using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), electroencephalogram (EEG), event related potential (ERP), emission tomography (PET), and studies of nerve conduction velocity and IQ scores. Applied linguists and language educators cannot fail to include these breakthroughs from neuroscience into FL aptitude research
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