Personality and second language learning

Abstract

Relationships between personality differences and differences in language learning ability were studied by first administering the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) to 41 tertiary level students learning French as a second language. Subsequently, it was possible to examine relationships between scores on the EPQ scales and marks obtained in the French oral and written examinations. One major finding was that the personality dimension of Neuroticism accounted for 23% of the variance of French oral examination marks: a value which approaches the predictive power of the written French test. A second important finding was that individuals with high neuroticism and high extraversion scores did better on the oral test than on the written test when compared with individuals having high neuroticism and low extraversion scores who did better on the written test than on the oral test. These and corresponding factor analysis results conform to theoretical expectations and indicate that a “two-factor” model is necessary to explain observed relationships. One factor is attributed to differences in cerebral “arousal” that cause differences in neuroticism as well as determining differences in general learning ability. A second factor is attributed to differences in cerebral “arousability” that cause the psychological contrast between melancholic and choleric personality types. This includes differential performance on oral and written measures of language learning.