Spanish Learners Research Articles

Transfer of affective connotations in the basic lexicon of Spanish learners of L2 English

This study addresses emotion in second languages with the aim of understanding how late bilinguals incorporate the affective connotations of core vocabulary into their mental lexicon. Specifically, it examines whether there are emotionality differences between the L2 and the native languages of reference, and whether linguistic competence, contact with the L2 and its culture, and attitudes explain the different tendencies. For this purpose, a group of Spanish learners of L2 English assessed a corpus of 300 words on the affective dimensions of valence and arousal. Different statistical analyses showed that English learners value the lexical repertoire in a very similar way to Spanish speakers, differing markedly from English speakers. It is mainly concluded that the mother tongue exerts a significant influence on this perceptual process and that the emotional connotations of the L2 are incorporated into the mental lexicon through translations from the L1 as a result of an emotional transfer.

Maximising the potential of plurilingual subtitled audiovisual input: learning L3 words and multiword units with L2 audio

ABSTRACT Purpose This study proposes the use of plurilingual audiovisual input, combining viewers’ L2 English audio with an L3 target language subtitles, to facilitate beginners’ acquisition from original version television. Methodology We divided 84 beginner learners of Spanish into experimental and control groups, assessing their learning of target single and multiword units using a pre-/posttest design, measured with a Vocabulary Knowledge Scale. The experimental group watched twelve episodes of a TV series in the original L2 English version with L3 Spanish subtitles. Findings Statistical analyses revealed that the experimental group was nearly ten times more likely to score higher on the posttest than the control group, demonstrating a strong impact of plurilingual audiovisual input on vocabulary learning. Additionally, multiword units were learned better than single words. Originality This study breaks new ground in audiovisual input research by providing empirical evidence that incorporating a plurilingual approach benefits language learning and teaching.

Indigenous Latinx students and translanguaging: The possibilities and challenges of using K’iche’ in a kindergarten Spanish-English handwriting classroom

ABSTRACT Many Indigenous Latinx students in Spanish/English dual language programs in the US speak languages that are often not valued or taken advantage of in the process of learning Spanish and English. This participatory critical (collective) autoethnography explores the possibilities of handwriting lessons as a vehicle for the incorporation of K’iche’ (a Mayan language spoken in Guatemala) into the classroom. Findings reveal ways in which the activities helped to elevate the status of K’iche’ in the school and make students/families feel more valued, but also ways to improve the activities so that Indigenous Latinx families have a more central role.

Communication Strategies, Difficulties, and Speaking Tasks in Foreign Language Learning

This study explored the communication strategies of college students majoring in one of five modern foreign languages (i.e., English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish) and their relation to communication confidence. It also explored the association between their strategy use and the difficulty regarding the speaking components, and students’ feedback on pedagogical tasks to improve their speaking ability. A questionnaire survey of communication strategy was distributed to 538 college students in Taiwan, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 students. The results showed that there was a statistically significant difference between the majored language and the use of communication strategies. Specifically, a one-way between-groups MANOVA revealed that the participants adopted the message reduction/alteration and fluency-oriented strategies frequently and equally, regardless of the language they studied. English and Spanish learners employed social affective, phonological awareness, and negotiation for meaning while speaking strategies more frequently than German learners. Students who reported difficulties in fluency, lexical resources, grammatical accuracy, and pronunciation while speaking the major language employed social affective strategies less frequently. Finally, students’ preferences for particular tasks reflected the speaking components they wished to foster. It is concluded that lexical and grammatical knowledge should be emphasized first to build communication confidence and strengthen fluency.

Focusing on derivational-driven cognate patterns to promote vocabulary acquisition in Spanish

Cognates have been heavily incorporated into second language (L2) vocabulary instruction as they share form and meaning across languages and have demonstrated an advantage for learning. The present article aims to measure the effects of explicit, cognate, derivational-driven instruction in L2 Spanish. 49 intermediate-low Spanish learners participated in the experiment and completed a pre- and post-lexical decision task in Spanish, followed by a language history questionnaire. 25 learners composed the explicit instruction group and 24 composed the control group. Results from a three-way ANOVA (2x4x2) analyzing reaction times and accuracy demonstrate that both explicit and control groups process cognates and non-cognates faster in the post-test. However, participants in the explicit instruction group process cognates less accurately and non-cognates more accurately in the post-test, which could be attributed to the activation of formal lexical features of the instruction intervention. Results are interpreted in light of the nature of L2 instruction and lexical representation.

Cross-linguistic perception of Spanish intonation by Chinese speakers: Effects of linguistic experience and prosodic features

This study aims to explore the cross-linguistic perception of Spanish intonation patterns and the role of linguistic experience and prosodic features in identifying the question-statement contrasts. To this end, 43 Spanish native listeners and 75 Chinese learners of Spanish were presented with auditory stimuli in a gating paradigm for the recognition of sentence types. The results showed that listeners’ perception of target intonational contours was highly dependent on their language experience. Although Spanish listeners outperformed Chinese learners in perceiving different intonational cues, most Chinese learners were able to correctly identify sentence types after hearing the initial F0 peak due to the positive transfer of their tonal processing ability in their native language. In addition, our data revealed that the position of the final stressed syllable might also be a relevant factor for discriminating the sentence type depending on the length of the utterance. Overall, the findings seem to suggest a complex integration mechanism for cross-linguistic intonation perception, in which listeners’ language specificity and the prosodic structures of the materials should be accounted for evaluating non-native auditory performance.

Mexico's Afrodescendientes : A Multimedia Unit for Intermediate Spanish Learners

Mexico's Afrodescendientes : A Multimedia Unit for Intermediate Spanish Learners

Working memory training yields improvements in L2 morphosyntactic processing

ABSTRACT The present study investigated whether working memory (WM) training enhances morphosyntactic processing in the second language (L2). L2 learners of Spanish in the treatment group completed WM updating pre/post tasks and a moving window task containing sentences with gender agreement. Moreover, the treatment group trained with two WM tasks for five consecutive days, they completed a posttest and a delayed posttest two months after. The results show that the treatment group presented transfer to untrained WM tasks at both posttests, while the control group did not. While neither group showed sensitivity to gender disagreement at pretest, the treatment group was sensitive to violations after training, and this improvement in morphosyntactic processing was sustained at the delayed posttest. The control group, however, remained insensitive at posttest. Taken together, the findings suggest that WM is a malleable system and WM training may be used as a cognitive tool to facilitate L2 morphosyntax.

Racialized Sociolinguistic Processes in the Spanish Learning Journeys of Non-Latinxs in the U.S.

Sociolinguistic frameworks of race have not been widely applied to non-Latinx Spanish learners in the United States. Consequently, there is limited insight into the impact of race on different learners’ use of Spanish in their communities, including the local or national raciolinguistic dynamics between Latinxs and non-Latinxs that inform these outcomes. This article examines ethnographic interviews of women recounting interactions and experiences of using Spanish in different U.S. contexts. In their accounts, I identify three racialized sociolinguistic processes central to their Spanish learning journeys, which I title racialized positionality, racialized embodiment, and indexical fields of racialization. These processes highlight, respectively, (1) the raciolinguistic dynamics enacted by Spanish language usage in the U.S. by non-Latinxs, (2) the sociolinguistic input a learner comes across as raciogendered subjects, and (3) the social meaning they ascribe to racialized terms and discourses in Spanish. As critical approaches to Spanish language learning and pedagogy continue to emerge, more research is warranted on these three processes to trace the impact of race on Spanish language learning and use.

Non-scripted role-playing with heritage speakers and second language learners in the medical interpreting classroom

Abstract This article examines dialogue interpreting in unscripted role-plays in the community interpreting classroom. In 2019, faculty members from several departments at Viterbo University (La Crosse, Wisconsin) coordinated an interprofessional education collaboration via role-playing in the institution’s Clinical Simulation Learning Center. Nursing, social work and pre-medical students were given the health-professional roles of caring for community members with limited English proficiency (who acted as ‘patients’). Interpreting students, both heritage speakers of Spanish and second language learners (L2) of both English and Spanish, facilitated language access for all parties involved. Recordings of these dialogues were then transcribed, annotated, and analyzed via mixed methods. This study examines overall and comparative findings of how heritage speakers and second language learners interpret dialogue, focusing on the textual aspects of their exchanges. While no language profile seemed to perform particularly better overall, certain indicators were more problematic for L2 Spanish speakers and/or heritage speakers. The presentation of these results and conclusions intend to foster improved teaching interventions for classrooms with students of varying English <> Spanish language backgrounds.

Developing translingual competence and awareness in a study abroad Spanish language classroom

ABSTRACT Recent research highlights how agentive capacities for complex meaning-making can be developed among language learners during study abroad (SA) (e.g. Diao and Trentman 2021. Language Learning in Study Abroad: The Multilingual Turn. Multilingual Matters). In this regard, we focus on students’ translingual development, or their emerging capacity to communicate across sociopolitically-constructed linguistic and cultural borders (Canagarajah 2013b), during a 12-week program for U.S.-university students in Guatemala. Drawing on ethnographic data, particularly audio-recordings from a small, intermediate-level, second language (L2) Spanish class, we compare classroom interactions from the beginning and the end of students’ sojourn. Our qualitative findings demonstrate participants’ increasing utilisation of diverse semiotic strategies – along with linguistic resources associated with multiple languages and varieties – to make meaning and further their Spanish learning. In so doing, students and their instructor transformed their classroom into a translanguaging space where their full linguistic repertoires and identities were activated and encouraged (Wei 2018. “Translanguaging as a Practical Theory of Language.” Applied Linguistics 39: 9–30. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amx039). We further note students’ translingual development in their emerging ability to engage in transcultural reflection and communication as time progressed. As such, this paper argues for the promotion of translingual development in SA and L2 pedagogies.

Foreign Language Anxiety: A Study on Spanish Learners

Foreign Language Anxiety: A Study on Spanish Learners

Ideology, Indexicality, and the L2 Development of Sociolinguistic Perception During Study Abroad

This article explores one second language Spanish learner’s development of sociolinguistic perception in Peru involving target language variation and social indexicality in a study abroad context. Specifically, it investigates the perceptual mechanism that evolves in this context and enables L2 learners to interpret dialectal target language forms by linking them with elements of character, group traits, and other social attributes. An analysis of ethnographic data revealed two phases in this development. While the initial phase was characterized by the learner’s formation of contrastive social and linguistic categories and first-order sociolinguistic indices linking ways of speaking to kinds of people, the latter phase involved a rationalization and justification of these links. I claim that this produced an ideological field in which the learner located specific morphosyntactic variants as indexing social qualities like ‘licentiousness’ and ‘ineptitude’ via their association with brichero and cholo social types from the host society. These findings implicate language ideologies as the fundamental perceptual mechanism that enables L2 learners to interpret the social meaning of TL practices. This case study recommends critical pedagogies and innovative curricula to bolster L2 learners’ development of sociolinguistic competence during study abroad.

Towards the implications of positive teacher interpersonal behaviors for Spanish learners’ academic engagement: Voices from Chinese SFL learners

With the advent of positive psychology in the area of language education, more focus has been placed on the consequences of favorable teacher communication behaviors in language classes. Nonetheless, the function of language instructors' interpersonal behaviors in raising learners' engagement is somehow unknown. Furthermore, to the best of our knowledge, no research study has been carried out in Spanish language classes to explore the function of teacher communication behaviors in learners' engagement. To fill this lacuna, the current inquiry looked into the role of teachers' positive interpersonal factors in Chinese SFL learners' behavioral, cognitive, and emotional engagement. For this purpose, a random sample of 32 SFL learners was chosen to participate in our online interview sessions. The answers of SFL learners to the interview questions were thematically analyzed via MAXQDA software. The thematic analysis findings pointed to the value of teacher communication behaviors in improving SFL learners' engagement. The analysis outcomes also demonstrated the potential of 11 positive interpersonal behaviors (rapport, care, clarity, credibility, confirmation, immediacy, closeness, praise, feedback, respect, and stroke) in increasing Spanish language learners' academic engagement. The practical implications that may emerge from the present study's outcomes are finally discussed.

The Role of the L2 Learning Environment in Shaping Individual Learner Factors and Language Achievement: A Comparison Study of Danish and Spanish Learners of L2 English

The Role of the L2 Learning Environment in Shaping Individual Learner Factors and Language Achievement: A Comparison Study of Danish and Spanish Learners of L2 English

Development of verb argument constructions in L2 English learners: A close replication of research question 3 in Römer and Berger (2019)

Abstract This study closely replicates the analyses of the third research question in Römer and Berger (2019), which reported that the associations between verbs and verb argument constructions (VACs) used by German and Spanish learners of English move closer to a native usage norm as the learners’ proficiency increases. This study conducted the same correlation analyses from the original study but with a substantially expanded version of the learner corpus used therein. Additionally, we conducted zero-inflated negative binomial analyses to estimate the relationship between the frequencies of verb-VAC combinations in the British National Corpus (BNC) and in the learner subcorpora representing different proficiency levels. Our findings were consistent with the original study in showing significant positive correlations between frequencies of the verb-VAC combinations in the BNC and in the learner subcorpora but further revealed the potential effect of topic on the learners’ VAC usage. Implications for future studies are discussed.

Learning with a purpose: Acquisition of compliments and compliment responses by beginning learners of Spanish in synchronous online exchanges

This research examines the effect of explicit pragmatic instruction and student's perceptions of guided reflections on the acquisition of compliments and compliment responses (CRs) in beginning learners of Spanish. It adopts a pragmatic consciousness-raising approach and a four-step lesson plan for teaching compliments and CRs in the language classroom. Unlike many studies in interlanguage pragmatics conducted in classrooms or laboratory settings at the intermediate and advanced level, this study examines the acquisition and use (or lack thereof) of compliments and CR's though synchronous online face-to-face conversations of L2 learners with L1 speakers of Spanish. It analyzes change overtime with the same learners using a pretest-posttest design. A quantitative analysis indicated statistically significant differences in the production of compliments, yet no significant differences were observed in the production of CR's. The qualitative analysis of the guided reflections highlighted a need for more in-class practice with compliments and CR's. Students' responses suggest that reflections can help raise awareness of the use (or lack thereof) of these speech acts. This study contributes to L2 pragmatics and to our understanding of L2 acquisition developmental stages.

The interpretation of verbal moods in Spanish: A close replication of Kanwit and Geeslin (2014)

Abstract This study is a close replication of Kanwit and Geeslin (2014), a variationist investigation of the interpretation of verbal moods in adverbial clauses in Spanish. Whereas the first language (L1) of the second-language participants in the initial study was English, we explore whether Kanwit and Geeslin’s results extend to other L1 populations—Swedish and French learners of Spanish. Participants in the replication study completed the same interpretation task and grammar test as those in the initial study. Results showed, for example, that multiple factors influenced their variable interpretation of verbal moods, there was evidence of change between course levels, and there were certain differences in interpretation between the French and Swedish groups. This study contributes to knowledge about the interpretation of a variable structure by enhancing the confirmatory power of some of the initial study’s findings, while also suggesting that the learners’ L1 leads to diverging findings.

L1 Influence on the Use of the English Present Perfect: A Corpus Analysis of Russian and Spanish Learners’ Essays

Background: Mastering verbal tenses, especially those expressing aspect, in a second language presents a challenge as learners frequently link the semantic nuances of verbal forms in their second language (L2) to the characteristics of the verbal systems in their native languages (L1). This study explores the impact of L1 on the usage of the English Present Perfect (PP) among non-native speakers. Purpose: In an effort to contribute to the ongoing research on the mechanisms governing the acquisition of English tenses, this study focuses on the variations that affect the usage of the PP in the writing of English learners. The investigation is particularly centered on university students whose L1 is Russian and Spanish, seeking to delve into the ways in which their first language influences the utilisation of the PP in their English writing. Method: Analysis of L2 English by Russian and Spanish learners, based on corpora of argumentative essays written by undergraduate Russian and Spanish learners of English, controlled by a corpus of essays produced by native speakers of English; frequency and distribution of the PP in learner writings; examination of semantic contexts; identification of error types. Results: The findings indicate that, despite a higher occurrence of the PP in texts produced by Spanish learners compared to Russian learners, the rate of errors in its application is nearly identical in both learner corpora. These errors are likely attributable to challenges in comprehending the functions of the PP and in distinguishing its semantics from those of other English tenses, particularly the Past Simple. Conclusion: The study suggests that the increased prevalence of PP usage by L2 learners may be attributed to positive transfer from their L1 when it exhibits structures analogous to the English PP. Conversely, patterns indicative of, for example, undergeneralisation of semantic contexts suggesting the relevance of an action, or of overgeneralisation of adverbs compatible with the PP can be interpreted as evidence of negative transfer. The results of this study hold significance for language pedagogy, as they highlight potential challenges in acquiring the PP that learners from diverse L1 backgrounds may encounter.

Missed Opportunities: Oral Corrective Feedback, Heritage Learners of Spanish, and Study Abroad in Peru

Abstract This study explores how negative attitudes toward U.S. Latinx students during a study abroad program can be embodied and transmitted through instructional practices that result in missed opportunities for learning Spanish as a heritage language. Specifically, we employ ethnographic and discourse analytic methods to examine one teacher’s oral corrective feedback (OCF) practices involving two Latina students in the context of a Spanish-immersion program in Cuzco, Peru. Our analysis identifies how OCF can be imbued with deficit-based language ideologies and limit the Spanish language input that heritage learners receive during study abroad. We describe how particular OCF practices validated the school’s curricular focus on prescriptive grammar, involved the exclusionary use of grammar terms, and stigmatized heritage learners’ knowledge and abilities in Spanish. Our findings demonstrate a need for critical approaches to language pedagogy, teacher training, and program design that meet the educational needs of this growing population of study abroad students.