This book traces and summarizes the author's theoretical insights and empirical findings in the field of foreign language education. The volume explores themes such as individual differences in L1 ability and their connection to L2 aptitude and L2 achievement, L2 anxiety as an affective or cognitive variable, and the relationship between L1 and L2…

This book traces and summarizes theoretical insights and empirical findings on the topic of whether or not anxiety for language learning could be a causal variable for individual differences in language learning. The author brings together three decades of research to show that first language (L1) skills and second language (L2) aptitude are…

This study examines Korean L2 learners' production of English phonological contrasts (e.g., consonant-final versus vowel-final forms) that are absent in their L1. Twenty university students divided into high- and low-proficiency groups participated in the study. Their productions were analyzed for segmental accuracy and error patterns. Results…

This study expands on previous research into filler-gap dependency processing in second language (L2) English, by means of a replication of Canales's (2012) self-paced reading study. Canales, among others, found that advanced L2-English speakers exhibited the same processing behavior that Stowe (1986) found for native English processing: On…

This longitudinal study with time-serial data examines for the first time whether different types of intraindividual variation in second language (L2) performance and cognitive functioning are related, and how and when they influence L2 development longitudinally in older adulthood. We analyzed the L2 development of 26 German-speaking adults aged…

This brief report presents the results of a re-analysis of data by Yi, Man, and Maie (2023), who investigated L1 and L2 intuitive knowledge of phrasal frequency and collocation strength in multiword sequences. We utilized an individual-differences approach and examined which participant variables (age of onset, length of residence, language use,…

The present study employs regulatory focus theory (Higgins, 1997) to investigate the effects of L2 speakers' chronic regulatory focus on their L2 pragmatic versus grammatical awareness. It involved the participation of 121 Chinese students, who are English language learners, at a university in the United States. Haws et al.'s (2010) questionnaire…

In this study, we propose a hypothesis that domain-general auditory processing, a perceptual anchor of L1 acquisition, can serve as the foundation of successful post-pubertal L2 learning. This hypothesis was tested with 139 post-pubertal L2 immersion learners by linking individual differences in auditory discrimination across multiple acoustic…

This study longitudinally examined the effects of cognitive and sociopsychological individual differences (aptitude, motivation, personality) and the quantity and quality of second language (L2) experience on L2 speech gains in naturalistic settings. We elicited L2 spontaneous speech from 50 Chinese learners of English at the beginning and the end…

Event-related potentials (ERPs) have become widespread in second language acquisition (SLA) research and a growing body of literature has been produced in recent years. We surveyed 61 SLA papers that use ERPs to study L2 sentence processing in healthy late learners. Our main aim was to provide a critical summary of findings from the decade…

In the present study, we used a scanpath approach to investigate reading processes and factors that can shape them in monolingual Russian-speaking adults, 8-year-old children, and bilingual Russian-speaking readers. We found that monolingual adults' eye movement patterns exhibited a fluent scanpath reading process, representing effortless…

Millions of public-school students in the United States are identified as English language learners (ELLs), whose academic success is tied to their second language (L2) English education. Previous research in adult populations indicates that L2 proficiency is related to the contextual variable of the prevalence of one's first language (L1) among…

Spanish-speaking students constitute the largest subgroup of emergent bilingual (EB) students in the United States. Using longitudinal data on a nationally representative sample of Spanish-English EBs, we explore profiles of English reading trajectories and how early individual differences (i.e., early Spanish reading and English oral proficiency)…

In this preregistered, longitudinal study of early code-switching, 34 US-born, Spanish-English bilingual children were recorded with a bilingual family member at 2;6 and 3;6, in Spanish-designated and English-designated interactions. Children's Spanish and English expressive vocabulary and their exposure to code-switching were measured through…

This project examines whether second-language (L2) learners can converge on a native-like pattern at the interface between syntax and discourse under low and high processing pressure, using Spanish clitic-doubled left dislocation (CLLD) as a test case. The original version of the Interface Hypothesis (IH) predicts that L2 competence on…