The Relationship between Implicit and Explicit Knowledge and Second Language Proficiency

Abstract

Implicit and explicit knowledge as two important concepts have long been at the center of attention in second language research. In this paper, first of all some theoretical backgrounds about the nature of linguistic knowledge and implicit and explicit L2 knowledge, interface issue and its pedagogical implications, and operational definition of implicit and explicit L2 grammatical knowledge were presented. And then, previous studies about the two types of knowledge and L2 proficiency operationalized in different ways were discussed. The results showed that the relationship between explicit knowledge and L2 proficiency is still not clear and previous investigations have found mix results concerning this relationship. Therefore, future investigations are needed to better probe the relationship between explicit knowledge and L2 proficiency in second language learning.