Abstract
The present contribution offers an overview of a new area of research in the field of foreign language acquisition, which was triggered by the introduction of Positive Psychology (PP) (MacIntyre and Gregersen, 2012). For many years, a cognitive perspective had dominated research in applied linguistics. Around the turn of the millennium researchers became increasingly interested in the role of emotions in foreign language learning and teaching, beyond established concepts like foreign language anxiety and constructs like motivation and attitudes toward the foreign language. As a result, a more nuanced understanding of the role of positive and negative learner and teacher emotions emerged, underpinned by solid empirical research using a wide range of epistemological and methodological approaches. PP interventions have been carried out in schools and universities to strengthen learners and teachers’ experiences of flow, hope, courage, well-being, optimism, creativity, happiness, grit, resilience, strengths, and laughter with the aim of enhancing learners’ linguistic progress. This paper distinguishes the early period in the field that started with MacIntyre and Gregersen (2012), like a snowdrop after winter, and that was followed by a number of early studies in relatively peripheral journals. We argue that 2016 is the starting point of the current period, characterized by gradual recognition in applied linguistics, growing popularity of PP, and an exponential increase in publications in more mainstream journals. This second period could be compared to a luxuriant English garden in full bloom.
Highlights
Emotions are the heart of language learning and teaching, and yet they have largely remained in the shadows in the past decades of applied linguistic research. Swain (2013) argued, “emotions are the elephants in the room – poorly studied, poorly understood, seen as inferior to rational thought” (p. 195)
We argue that 2016 is the starting point of the current period, characterized by gradual recognition in applied linguistics, growing popularity of Positive Psychology (PP), and an exponential increase in publications in more mainstream journals
Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi (2000) positioned PP as a rigorous scientific approach: “Positive psychology does not rely on wishful thinking, faith, self-deception, fads, or hand waving; it tries to adapt what is best in the scientific method to the unique problems that human behavior presents to those who wish to understand it in all its complexity” (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000, p. 7)
Summary
Emotions are the heart of language learning and teaching, and yet they have largely remained in the shadows in the past decades of applied linguistic research. Swain (2013) argued, “emotions are the elephants in the room – poorly studied, poorly understood, seen as inferior to rational thought” (p. 195). 3) and they label this emerging interdisciplinary field as “emotionology” (back cover) This view concurs with the one in Prior’s (2019) position paper on emotion in The Modern Language Journal. Research on learner and teacher emotions is reaching into the political sphere by focusing on hegemonic power relations (Benesch, 2017, 2018). In his own commentary of Prior’s (2019) position paper, Dewaele (2019a) combined the elephant in the room metaphor with the adynaton “when pigs fly” (i.e., something that will never happen) to describe the current interest in emotion as the time of the flying elephants. We will set the general academic context for the two periods, before distinguishing theoretical contributions (research agendas, theoretical considerations, overviews, assessment practices), empirical studies on learners and teachers, and PP intervention studies
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