Psychologically complicated by nature, anxiety refers to feelings of worry, fear, or apprehension. Several research studies have been devoted to exploring anxiety's effects on language skills, including writing. Since foreign language anxiety directly influences a learner's motivation and determination to learn that language, it is imperative to study the findings and reasons behind these anxious feelings. One-third of foreign language learners have been experiencing at least a moderate level of anxiety. Researchers have attempted to investigate the causes of anxiety among foreign language pre-service teachers. The present study objectifies two goals to determine the extent of writing anxiety, followed by reasons and references to the role of gender. Seventy-two pre-service teachers of the English language training department from the University of Education, Multan, Pakistan, were selected for the study using convenience sampling. Second language writing anxiety inventory (SLWAI) and second language writing anxiety reasons inventory (SLWARI) were used to collect data, and semi-structured interviews were taken with students. The findings presented no difference in anxiety levels between genders, whereas cognitive anxiety type was distinctive in results. Most of the participants experienced high and medium levels of anxiety.

This study investigates the validity of syntactic priming as a measure of implicit language aptitude. Syntactic priming refers to the tendency to reproduce a linguistic structure due to a previous exposure to the structure. The validity of the construct was verified by collating evidence for divergent validity—whether it is dissociable from explicit aptitude; convergent validity—whether it is correlated with other measures of implicit aptitude; and predictive validity—whether it is predictive of learning attainment. One hundred sixty-six university EFL learners completed three tests of implicit aptitude: syntactic priming, sequence learning, and LLAMA_D; three tests of explicit aptitude: LLAMA_B, _E, and _F; and three tests of L2 proficiency: untimed grammaticality judgment, metalinguistic knowledge, and elicited imitation. The results showed that syntactic priming was dissociable from explicit aptitude, but it failed to converge with the other measures of implicit aptitude, and it also failed to predict L2 proficiency. The results also showed that priming was negatively correlated with sequence learning and that sequence learning was a negative predictor of learners’ metalinguistic knowledge. On the other hand, the construct validity of explicit aptitude was strong. The results suggest the multidimensionality of implicit aptitude and the need for more research into the construct validity of syntactic priming as a cognitive ability for implicit learning.

In the last few decades, written corrective feedback (WCF) in Second language acquisition(SLA) has held great importance for L2 researchers. Technically, WCF consists of different forms, scopes, and tones compared to oral feedback and types and strategies. Truscott’s claim (1996) about the practicality of grammatical corrections became the reason for many researchers to investigate the matter more in detail. As WCF is directly related to teachers and students, it is equally significant to consider the psychology of learners who adopt feedback that when, where, and how much feedback they can process according to their capability. All these aspects assisted researchers in broadening their range of research to plan vibrant research designs to cover all mechanisms involved in the feedback process. Not only the question of debate is teachers’ and students’ perception about WCF but also the effects of different WCF strategies. The present paper aims to bring forth the rational, systematic review of the recent studies from 2018 till 2022 conducted on written corrective feedback strategies, specifically direct and indirect feedback type followed by a metalinguistic explanation as to the most frequent way of providing feedback by teachers. The data displayed the learners’ inclination towards direct written corrective feedback as the preferred type over indirect WCF. This paper will assist new researchers planning to explore this varied domain to understand what learners perceive, prefer, and how any WCF type influences them.

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Written corrective feedback (WCF) in enhancing writing proficiency has been the subject of numerous studies, but few studies have examined students’ perceptions about the value of feedback on their written errors. Language teachers use global tools and techniques to give students feedback on their written work. How feedback is delivered and received by students is valued differently. The current study concentrated on how students interpret written corrective feedback and which WCF tactics they favor in writing classrooms. To examine these objectives empirically, the researchers employed a self-administered questionnaire to collect data from 180 participants from a high secondary school in Multan, Pakistan. At the same time, 40 participants were interviewed for their opinions about written corrective feedback (WCF). Some participants expressed concerns about ambiguous feedback that confuses them about their errors, whereas most participants favored the feedback process as beneficial. The most preferred strategies were meta-linguistic explanation and direct written corrective feedback that facilitated writing proficiency and language knowledge. Overall, WCF guides errors to avoid and how to adapt their writing style for composing compelling manuscripts.