The current study examined second language (L2) learners' social networks during study abroad and how they changed over time. Participants were 29 British undergraduates majoring in French who were spending an academic year abroad in France. Social network data were collected three times during study abroad (beginning, middle, and end of a…

This article reviews the empirical research on incidental vocabulary acquisition in English reading in the latest twenty years from three aspects: its comparison with intentional vocabulary acquisition, its affecting factors and previous studies of its problems. Teaching implications have also been provided.

Developing intelligible pronunciation is an important goal for language learners. Although it can be fostered through explicit instruction in communicative-based courses, instructors need practical solutions to address their learners' pronunciation individually. This one-semester quasi-experimental mixed methods study of 60 Generation Z novice…

Due to the worldwide spread and diversification of English, there is far more variety in English accents than ever before. Nonetheless, most Japanese English language learners have continuously been only exposed to "native" English accents, particularly Received Pronunciation (RP) and General American (GA), in their English language…

Linguistically and cognitively speaking, functional (extended) projections are more abstract and structurally more complicated than lexical projections. Acquiring functional projections could be problematic for second language learners and thus a crucial issue to be considered by language instructors and curriculum developers. The present study…

Extensive reading (ER) has been implemented in various second language (L2) teaching and learning contexts, and studies in the field have provided a wealth of empirical evidence that a large amount of L2 reading over an extended time improves students' reading ability and benefits other areas of language learning (Nakanishi 2015; Jeon and Day…

This study is designed to explore the role of second language (L2) English learners' working memory (WM), language proficiency, and age in the processing and comprehension of English anaphoric sentences. To this end, 40 EFL learners participated in the study. The proficiency levels of the participants varied from elementary to high-intermediate,…

The present study was motivated to introduce a new concept named "language learner immunity". In doing so, we defined the concept of immunity in the language learning context by paralleling the biological tendency of humans to be immune to the immune system of language learners. The psychological aspects of this study relied heavily on…

This study examined the use of reading strategies amongst Saudi EFL university students, exploring which strategies are perceived to be the most frequently used. Additionally, this study also aimed to explore gender differences in Saudi EFL university students' adoption of reading strategies. The total number of the participants in this study was…

Recent development in L2 pragmatics research in a study abroad context has witnessed an emerging line of studies investigating the joint influences of contextual and individual learner factors on second language (L2) pragmatic development. This paper argues for the replication of two representative quantitative studies in this new research…

Various aspects of second language learning such as motivation, social contexts, personality, learning styles or learning strategies should be taken into consideration when it comes to teaching and learning a new language. in this respect, one of the most overlooked factors is a language learning strategy. Language learners should be aware of…

This study explores undergraduate college students' difficulties in translating English and Arabic plurals. Results of an English and Arabic plural translation test showed that cases where Arabic plurals match those of English in English were translated correctly. However, the students had difficulty translating the following: (i) Arabic plurals…

The present study examined the impact of pedagogical intervention on students' request performance during short-term study abroad (SA). Prior to departure, students received explicit instruction about requests. During their time abroad, they were given tasks to strategically develop their pragmatic competence. Requests were assessed with a…

There are a large number of factors contributing to the reading outcome diversity. Individual differences in cognition are possibly regarded as one of the most significant causes and have a predominated impact on the reading development. Individual differences, like meta-cognition and working memory, are found to have a positive correlation with…

It is argued that positive yet realistic beliefs are source of success as language learners whereas negative or unrealistic beliefs can be an impediment to successful language learning. This empirical survey identifies Saudi English as a foreign language (EFL) learners' beliefs through Beliefs About Language Learning Inventory (BALLI) developed by…