Individual Differences in Second Language Learning

Samira Bakeer

Schedule Change

NO LANGUAGE ACQUISITION CLASSES FOR NEXT WEEK (29th & 30th of April (good news isn’t it?)

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The “Good Language Learner”

Are there personal characteristics that make one learner more successful than another?

In your experience, as an English learner, which

characteristics seem to you most likely to be

associated with success in L2 acquisition?

share your opinion with your group members. Find

three most important and three least important learner

characteristics.

Types of variation

There are a number of personality characteristics that may affect L2 learning, such as

- Empathy - Extroversion

- Self –esteem- Inhibition- Risk-taking- Anxiety

- attitudes - egocentricity (self image)

Empathy

Group A

Arwa

Hawa Hanga

Muna

Aesha

Group B

Ghazala

Najla

Amani

Nwwara

Empathyempathy is the process of reaching beyond the self and understanding and feeling what other person understands or feels.

It is usually described as the projection of ones' own personality into the personality of another in order to understand him better. In other words, it is the compassion one can render for another person.

Empathy Empathy refers to an individual's ability to imagine

what another person is feeling or thinking based on his or her own experiences--to put him/herself in the other's shoes.

When a learner is acquiring a second language, he or she is also acquiring, in a sense, a new personality, and a new culture.

The ability of a learner to open him or herself to new cultural experiences and adopt these experiences as their own is essential in the language acquisition process.

Extroversion vs. Introversion

Group A

????

Group B

Huda

Hanan

Rogia

Extroversion vs. Introversion

Are you more extroverted or introverted?

It is often argued that an extroverted person is well suited to language learning. However, research does not always support this conclusion.

Some studies have found that learners’ success in language learning is associated with extroversion such as assertiveness and adventurousness, while others have found that many successful language learners do not get high scores on measures of extroversion.

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Self-esteem

Group A

Mohammed

Muad

Group B

Sondos

Ferdous

Ahmed

Baset

Self-esteem

Self-esteem refers to a personal evaluation and judgment of worthiness that is expressed in the individual's attitude toward him or herself or toward his or her capabilities. Although several studies have shown that those who have high self- esteem are also good language learners, it is difficult to say whether successful language learning is because of high self- esteem, or if high self-esteem is a result of successful language learning.

We do know that teachers who pay attention to their students' emotional well-being in addition to their language performance will have more successful and happier students.

Inhibition

Group A

Fawzia

Aesha Hamza

Group B

Esraa

Entisar

Inhibition

All human beings build sets of defences to protect the ego (concept of one’s self)

Inhibition in a person arises as he/she tries to defend or protect their self-image.

If the learner perceives the mistakes that he/she makes in the second language as a threat to their emotional well-being and self perception, then acquisition will not occur or will occur much more slowly.

Risk-Taking

Group A

Aesha

Hanan

Areej

Group B

Sofia

Raja

Khairia

Risk-TakingOne of the characteristics that has been found to exist in "good" language learners is the willingness to guess. If the learner is less inhibited, he/she is more willing to take a chance on producing a "correct" utterance in the second language.

They are willing to guess about the possible word in the second language, even when their guesses often bring comical results. They do not worry about the possible consequence-- of looking or feeling foolish-- if they guess incorrectly

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Inhibition vs. risk-taking

It has been suggested that inhibition discourages risk-taking, which is necessary for progress in language learning.

Inhibition is often considered to be a particular problem for adolescents, who are more self-conscious than younger learners.

Inhibition is a negative force, at least for second language pronunciation performance.

Be aware that inhibition may have more influence in language performance than in language learning.

Anxiety

Group A

Hajer

Asma

Group B

Hawa

Amal

Nouria

Amna

Anxiety (I)

Trait Anxiety vs. State Anxiety:

a) Trait anxiety: a more permanent predisposition to be anxious

b) State anxiety: a type of anxiety experienced in relation to some particular event or act; temporary and context-specific

More recent research acknowledges that anxiety is more likely to be dynamic and dependent on particular situations and circumstances.

Anxiety can play an important role in L2 learning if it interferes with the learning process.

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Anxiety (II)

Debilitative (harmful) Anxiety vs. Facilitative (helpful) Anxiety: Not all anxiety is bad and a certain amount of tension can have a positive effect and facilitate learning.

A learner’s willingness to communicate has also been related to anxiety. It is often affected by the number of people present, the topic of conversation, and the formality of the circumstances.

Willingness to communicate or state anxiety can also be affected by learners’ prior language learning & use experience, self-confidence, and communicative competence.

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Attitude

Group A

Fatema Alfughi

Asma

Israa Attwair

Zainab

Group B

Aesha Omar

Radia

Ghada (A)

Fatima Bashir

Attitude When looking at students’ attitudes towards

language, we need to consider that their attitudes might be in relation to the language they are learning, towards the speakers of this language or towards the language learning environment – including the teacher and/or classroom. Many attitudinal factors are related to the learner’s personality including their self image, inhibitions and risk-taking characteristics.

Other characteristics such as language ego and tolerance for ambiguity, also related to personality, have to do with a learner’s view of him or herself in relation to the language and culture environment.

Egocentricity

Group A

Aya

Sondos

Basma

Laila

Group B

Salma

Intihaj

Asia

Esraa Ismail

Noor-Alhuda

Egocentricity

The term ―ego refers to a person’s awareness of his or herself in relation to the rest of the world, and how distinct the person is in relation to others.

Language Ego is a person’s awareness of the language he or she speaks and that it differs from languages spoken by others.

This awareness of the use of one language to speak with a certain group of people, while it cannot be used to speak with others is known as ―language boundaries.

Self Image

A learners self-images are determined by how they see themselves in relation to other second language learners (Are other students faster, smarter, etc. than I am?) and in relation to native speakers of the second language (Will they understand me? Will they think I am less intelligent because I don’t speak the language as well as they do?).

Young children are not developed cognitively enough to have ego or attitude in the formative years; therefore language boundaries are more flexible. Young children often do not realize that they are using two or more languages. For them, it is one big communication system. There is no distinction between one language and another.

Language Ego Permeability refers to the ability to move back and forth between languages and the different ―language personalities‖ that develop as the result of learning additional languages. People who have highly permeable language egos do not feel that their native language or native identity is threatened by the learning of an additional language or languages.

To have permeable ego boundaries, you must have a well-defined, secure, integrated ego or sense of self in the first language (Guiora, 1972).

Motivation

Group B

Khawla

Warda

Salma

Motivation

Motivation has been widely accepted as the stimulant that drives people to learn a language, directs and encourages them to expend some effort, and enables them to sustain that effort in order to reach their goals (Gardner, 2001;).

1.Integrative motivation: aim of learning is to learn about the language group, or to meet more and different people from the target language community, to the point of eventually being accepted as a member of that group.

1.Integrative motivation: aim of learning is to learn about the language group, or to meet more and different people from the target language community, to the point of eventually being accepted as a member of that group.

Integrative and instrumental motivation

Gardner and Lambert proposed integrative motivation and instrumental motivation from a social psychological point of view. (Gardner and Lambert 1959, 1972)

2. Instrumental motivation: reasons of L2 learning reflect the more utilitarian value of linguistic achievement, such as benefiting in an occupation.

2. Instrumental motivation: reasons of L2 learning reflect the more utilitarian value of linguistic achievement, such as benefiting in an occupation.

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Thought provoking question

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Identity & Ethnic Affiliation

The social dynamic or power relationship between L1 and L2:

Minority group members learning the language of a majority groups may have different attitudes and motivation from those of majority group members learning a minority language.

Think of why an ESL learner’s and an EFL learner’s attitude may differ in motivation and attitudes.

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An imbalanced power relationship between L1 and L2 may limit the opportunities learners have to practice and to continue to develop the L2.

Identities are not static and can change over time. Learners’ identities will impact on what they can do and how they can participate in classrooms, which affects how much they can learn.

The relationship between feelings of ethnic affiliation and L2 learners’ mastery of pronunciation can be complex. Learners may want to speak with a strong “foreign accent” to maintain their L1 identity.

Identity & Ethnic AffiliationIdentity & Ethnic Affiliation

“The process of becoming adapted to a new culture”

4 stages

• Initial excitement and euphoria

• Culture shock Estrangement and hostility

• Culture stress Recovery

• Assimilation or adaptation to the new culture

Schumann’s Acculturation Model

Schumann’s Acculturation Model

Its relation to SLA

• The degree to which a learner acculturates to the target language group will control the degree to which he acquires the second language

• Learner group vs. Reference group (or Target language group)

• Social and psychological factors determine the amount of contact with the TL and the degree to which the learner is open to that input which is available

Schumann’s Acculturation Model

As a result his/her target language will stay pidginized. Pidginization is characterized by simplifications and reductions occurring in the learner’s interlanguage which lead to fossilization when the learner’s interlanguage system does not progress in the direction of the target language (for a review see McLaughlin, 1987:110-112)

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If the social and/or psychological distance is great then acculturation is impeded and the learner does not progress beyond the early stages of language acquisition.

Pidginization

when social and/or psychological distances are great, the learner fails to progress beyond the early stages (Schumann, 1976)

Pidginization hypothesis

Alberto (33, Costa Rican)

a reduced and simplified form of English • use of no e.g. I no use television• lack of inversion e.g. What you study?• lack of auxiliaries• lack of possessive "-s"• unmarked forms of the verb (-ed)• lack of subject pronouns

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Conclusions for Personality

In general, the research does not show a single clearly-defined relationship between personality traits and SLA.

1. The major difficulty is that of identification and measurement of personality characteristics.

2. Personality variables may be a major factor only in the acquisition of conversational skills, not in the acquisition of literacy or academic skills.

3. Most research on personality traits has been carried out within a quantitative research paradigm (i.e., an approach that relies on measuring learners’ scores on personality surveys and relating these to language test performance). More qualitative research is needed to adequately capture the depth and complexity of the relationship.

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Summary1. The research on individual differences is complex and the

results of the research are not easy to interpret. This is because of

a) the lack of clear definitions and methods for measuring individual characteristics

b) The fact that the characteristics are not independent of one another: learner variables interact in complex ways.

2. It remains difficult to predict how a particular individual’s characteristics will influence his or her success as a language learner.

3. Teachers should take learners’ individual differences into account and to create a learning environment in which more learners can be successful in learning an L2.

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LA Groups 2013