Significant departure from reliance upon print texts is requiring teachers and researchers to redefine online reading processes for diverse contexts, and participants. To bring the significant role of the participants into the reading research limelight, the present study explores the processes involved in the online reading strategy use of…

This article reports key findings of a study which investigated the use of technology by 569 "digital natives" students for English Language learning and recreational purposes. Their views on the applicability of technological tools such as Facebook, blogging and Skype for English Language teaching and learning were also investigated.…

Using the principles of positive psychology and the tools of narrative research, this article focuses on the psychology of five language learners who crossed cultural and linguistic borders. All five were university students learning Chinese in Mexico, and two of them also studied Chinese in China. The grounded theory approach was used to analyze…

Inherently concerned with the personal and cultural development of individuals, intercultural competence can be regarded as an inseparable aspect of "Bildung". However, while scholars have acknowledged the affiliation between these two concepts, what remains to be investigated is the extent to which notions of "Bildung" are…

Although many fields of study are increasingly promoting awareness of the need to protect the ecosystem by thinking and acting "green," the concept of environmental education actually has a long history; for example, concerns about global environmental problems were discussed at a 1972 United Nations Conference (Nkwetisama 2011), which…

Meta-analytic methods are often used to determine the effectiveness of certain treatments across studies. However, we are often unaware of how a meta-analysis can provide value to researchers and practitioners. This paper offers a brief commentary on a meta-analysis conducted by Lin, Huang and Liou (2013) in LLT, providing further statistical…

Learning English as a foreign language (EFL) has long been regarded a challenging task. Said challenge is clearly evident in the many studies attempting to delineate some of the major problems faced by EFL learners while trying to uncover both the sources and the solutions. This paper turns to the Vygotskian approach to language learning, in…

Anxiety is an important personality factor that has been a major concern for foreign language (FL) researchers. Although the influence of anxiety on FL speaking has received considerable attention in research, only a few studies to date have focused on affect and FL reading. Clearly, there is need to use think aloud protocols and learner…

This study investigated a reliable and valid method for measuring cognitive load during learning through comparing various types of cognitive load measurements: electroencephalography (EEG), self-reporting, and learning outcome. A total of 43 college-level students underwent watching a documentary delivered in English or in Korean. EEG was…

We report three experiments that explore the effect of prior linguistic knowledge on implicit language learning. Native speakers of English from the United Kingdom and native speakers of Cantonese from Hong Kong participated in experiments that involved different learning materials. In Experiment 1, both participant groups showed evidence of…

Participants learned foreign vocabulary by means of the paired-associates learning procedure in three conditions: (a) in silence, (b) with vocal music with lyrics in a familiar language playing in the background, or (c) with vocal music with lyrics in an unfamiliar language playing in the background. The vocabulary to learn varied in concreteness…

Even after years of study, many second language (L2) learners have difficulty comprehending proficient speakers in real-world settings. This difficulty stems partly from the inauthentic nature of the spoken texts learners are exposed to in foreign language (FL) classrooms--scripted, simplified, and overenunciated "textbook texts." This…

Pedagogical norms for Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) shared by teachers, curriculum writers, and resource designers inside and outside of Chinese societies are yet to be established. To initiate and inform dialogue within the CFL community over shared expectations of learners, this study compared the judgments of students' oral presentations…

It has been observed in Japanese children learning to read that there is an early and rapid shift from exclusive reading of hiragana as syllabograms to the dual-use convention in which some hiragana also represent phonemic elements. Such rapid initial learning appears contrary to the standard theories of reading acquisition that require…

This paper explores language policy and planning from the perspectives of global ideologies, national agendas, and local transformation in two Asian countries, Vietnam and Nepal. Through engaged ethnography, we not only unravel complex ideological contestations of neoliberal and nationalistic agendas, but also portray language policy resistance…