This study examined the influence of linguistic input on the development of productive and receptive skills across three fundamental language domains: lexico-semantics, syntax, and phonology. Seventy-one (35 female) Basque-Spanish bilingual children were assessed at three time points (Fall 2018, Summer 2019, Winter 2021), between 4 and 6 years of…

This chapter examines the lexical availability of students of Spanish as a foreign language (SFL) and observes how their semantic networks change as their proficiency in Spanish increases. The analysis focuses on 150 students with different levels of proficiency and the two centres of interest: "acciones y actividades habituales"…

Nonverbal behavior can impact language proficiency scores in speaking tests, but there is little empirical information of the size or consistency of its effects or whether language proficiency may be a moderating variable. In this study, 100 novice raters watched and scored 30 recordings of test takers taking an international, high stakes…

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is believed to impact the language patterns, particularly the lexico-semantic abilities among children which retards their communicative abilities. This study aims to evaluate the lexical-semantic aspects of spoken language in preschool-aged children with ASD. The methodology involved assessing both expressive and…

Effective writing requires important features and one of them is cohesion which is necessary to bind a text. Halliday and Hasan (1976) state that grammatical and lexical devices which are called cohesive devices (CDs) create texture. To make a text coherent and understandable, CDs should be used frequently and skilfully. The present study aims to…

Spelling remains a fundamental skill to acquire because it is foundational for successful literacy attainment, even with the advancement of technological writing tools. Nevertheless, it is an understudied skill in research, especially among language learners. This literature review aims to shed light on the English spelling skills of Arabic L1…

Knowledge of derivational affixes makes an important contribution to second language learners' success when reading. Yet while the effects of some learner variables (L2 proficiency, L1 background) have been investigated, there has been little research addressing the effects of varying characteristics of affixes on their acquisition. The goal of…

The study investigates whether comprehension of derived words in text context requires a complete understanding of word parts. It explores comprehension of derived words as a function of learner proficiency and contextual clues. Ninety English-as-a-foreign-language learners at three proficiency levels participated in three successive tests…

This study examines the referential context effect on second-language relative clause ambiguity resolution by proficient L1 Chinese learners who learn English as a foreign language (EFL) and investigates whether the ambiguity resolution process is constrained by individuals' working memory capacity (WMC). It presents a self-paced reading study and…

In semantic fluency tasks, participants employ semantic search strategies (clustering and switching) to facilitate word retrieval. Clustering involves producing sequences of related words, while switching refers to shifting between different semantic categories. Analyzing these strategies provides insights into the structure of the mental lexicon…

Lexical frequency benchmarks have been extensively used to investigate second language (L2) lexical sophistication, especially in language assessment studies. However, indices based on semantic co-occurrence, which may be a better representation of the experience language users have with lexical items, have not been sufficiently tested as…

This study investigates the use of formulaic sequences (FS) in academic writings of Chinese learners of English as a foreign language across different levels of studies at a public university in China. Frequency-based formulas were retrieved from a corpus of student academic texts written at five time points between Year 1 and Year 3. The…

It has been proposed that an implicit learning deficit explains the difficulties with grammar commonly observed in children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). The present study further investigates this link in two ways. Firstly, we investigate whether kindergartners with DLD have more difficulties with preposition understanding and…

This study investigated the relationship between working memory (WM), semantic-encoding (SE) ability, and reading comprehension (RC) within the domain of second language acquisition (L2). 120 L1-Persian EFL learners were placed in three proficiency groups (beginning, intermediate, and advanced) based on their scores on the IELTS test. The…

This study examined how Mandarin-speaking preschoolers with and without a history of late talking (LT) process familiar monosyllabic words with unexpected lexical tones, focusing on both phonological and semantic violations. This study initially enrolled 64 Mandarin-speaking toddlers: 31 with a history of LT (mean age: 27.67 months) and 33 without…