Exploring the Relationship between Stay-abroad Experiences, Frequency Effects, and Context Use in L2 Idiom Comprehension

Suñer, Ferran

doi:10.17507/jltr.1001.04

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…De Cock and Suñer (2018) found that a stay abroad does influence the comprehension of metaphors associated with sexual taboo, highlighting the role of cultural exposure in understanding sensitive linguistic nuances. However, this effect was not observed in the comprehension of expressions from other (more general) topic domains, as reported by Suñer (2019), which suggests that learners mobilize different knowledge resources and deploy qualitatively different strategies for processing taboo language when compared to more formal registers.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 66%

“…Moreover, we did not find a significant effect of students' proficiency in Spanish or the experience gained through a stay abroad on the responses (Hypothesis 2), even though both variables did increase the proportion of correct results. The lack of significance might push further a reflection that was brought up in the introduction: in previous studies, a stay abroad had significant effects on the interpretation of sexual metaphors (De Cock and Suñer 2018), but not on other, more formal registers (Suñer 2019), which was interpreted as a difference in the knowledge resources and strategies that students mobilize for processing taboo language as compared to more formal registers. Here, although we found that the stay-abroad experience helps, it does not reach significance when interpreting taboo language.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

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Beyond Bleeps and Bounds: The Role of Individual Differences in Understanding Taboo Language from TV Series in the L2

Pizarro Pedraza,

Suñer,

De Cock

2024

Languages

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Streaming platforms have transformed series distribution and accessibility, with Spanish-language shows gaining immense popularity, notably “La casa de papel” (Money Heist). This series features a diverse cast of characters whose linguistic diversity extends to the use of taboo language. Previous studies have shown that linguistic immersion, such as staying abroad, significantly impacts knowledge of this kind of language. This paper aims to explore to what extent these and other individual differences affect the comprehension of swear words in TV series. To this end, 33 learners of Spanish at B2 level were asked to translate 14 taboo expressions from the series. They also completed a questionnaire on the exposure to authentic language use through extended stays abroad and TV series as well as their attitudes towards the use of taboo words. The results show that students’ positive attitudes towards taboo expressions and their multilingual status were associated with significantly better comprehension of taboo expressions. Furthermore, students with stay-abroad experience, watching the series in Spanish (with or without captions) and with higher proficiency levels in Spanish were found to perform better on the comprehension test, although no significant effects were found. Pedagogical implications and further directions for research are discussed in light of these findings.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 66%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 95%

Beyond Bleeps and Bounds: The Role of Individual Differences in Understanding Taboo Language from TV Series in the L2

Pizarro Pedraza,

Suñer,

De Cock

2024

Languages

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“…For example, Suñer (2018) found out that L2 idiom comprehension was positively correlated with the general proficiency level of learners, rather than with stay‐abroad experience (see also Galantomos, 2018). A follow‐up study by Suñer (2019) showed that participants with a stay‐abroad experience neither outperformed those without such an experience nor benefited from frequency effects and the presence of context. However, it must be noted that both studies did not include any taboo expressions, but metaphorical expressions from more general topic domains.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of reticence in the comprehension of metaphorical taboo expressions in the foreign language

Suñer,

De Cock

2023

Int J App Linguistics

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The present study focuses on the influence of L2 learners’ attitudes toward and perception of sexual taboos on their comprehension of metaphorical taboo expressions. Other aspects such as the presence of contextual information and the L2 learners’ stay‐abroad experience were also included in the study design. A total of 53 students of Spanish as a foreign language were presented with metaphorical taboo expressions from the MadSex corpus. They also were asked to rate their reticence to talk about sex and to use sexual taboo expressions. The results show that a higher degree of reticence to talk about sex is associated with a worse performance on the metaphor comprehension test. Furthermore, learners with a stay‐abroad experience outperformed their counterparts on the comprehension test, but they did not guess the meaning from the context more successfully. Finally, participants with stay‐abroad experience found it more acceptable to use sexual taboo expressions.

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“…However, it seems of relatively less direct impact on L2 idiom learning (see e.g., Suñer, 2019 with a plea for increasing enhanced input and explicit knowledge of idioms for L2 learners even in the stay-abroad learning context). First, research evidence shows that item frequency based on the British National Corpus (BNC) and Collins Cobuild Idioms Dictionary (2002) does not seem to predict whether an L2 learner (and also a L1 speaker) will know the meaning of an idiom (Karlsson, 2013).…”

Section: Other Factors and Considerations For This Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Applying cognitive linguistics to second language idiom learning

Wang¹

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<p>Idioms are known to cause great difficulty for second language (L2) learners, who may understand the literal meanings of the constituent words of idioms like (be) waiting in the wings, but often fail to interpret the idiomatic, figurative meaning of the expression. Proponents of Cognitive Linguistics (CL) claim that CL provides a pathway to more systematic and insightful learning of figurative expressions like idioms. They advocate that learners should be informed of the literal underpinning of idiomatic expressions and their relationship to the figurative meaning. This is supported by the results of several experimental studies employing ‘etymological elaboration’. However, little is known about how learners actually experience the CL-style explanations, or about how the learning is affected by other factors such as learners’ perceived transparency of the connection between the literal underpinnings and the idiomatic meanings, and their L1. The research reported in this thesis therefore (1) investigates the effectiveness of etymological elaboration in facilitating idiom comprehension and retention; (2) examines the problems that L2 learners, i.e., native-Chinese EFL learners in this study, experience when they encounter English figurative idioms, and identifies the factors influencing success in learning the meanings of idioms. To achieve these objectives, a mixed methods design was employed. Etymological elaboration was implemented in a teaching experiment involving one-on-one interviews, in which 25 Chinese learners of English were presented with idioms whose meaning they were asked to guess first without and then with the aid of information about their literal underpinnings. After the correct figurative meaning was established, participants rated the transparency of the connection between the literal underpinning and the figurative meaning. One week later, the learners were presented with the same idioms and asked to recall their meaning. Follow-up interviews were also conducted to survey the learners’ experience with and awareness of idioms, and their general attitudes and strategies towards idiom learning. Participants’ responses and their recall of idiomatic meanings were scored by three raters. A combination of quantitative and qualitative analyses of the interview data investigated the learning process and the outcomes of the teaching experiment. The major findings are: (1) Etymological elaboration can facilitate the interpretation and meaning retention of L2 idioms to a substantial degree; and the L2 idiom learning involves the interplay of multiple factors, including the transparency of the idioms, L1 transfer and cross-cultural differences, learners’ prior L2 lexical knowledge, and their proficiency levels. (2) The degree of transparency of the literal-figurative connection influences meaning retention, especially for the low proficiency learners. However, the mnemonic effect is not confined to idioms that learners find most transparent, but also affects those that are “far-fetched”. (3) The accuracy of meaning inference during the learning phase has a significant impact on memory for the idioms; many errors can be traced back to wrong guesses made in the prior learning phase, and some relate to false equivalents and partial equivalents in the L1. This suggests that trial-and-error learning potentially induces wrong memory traces and that teaching practices should therefore promote more accurate comprehension from the start, in order to facilitate better long-term memory for idioms. (4) More exposure to and better awareness of idioms help EFL learners foster positive attitudes towards idiom learning, which may facilitate the integration and automatization of figurative multiword expressions like idioms in their bilingual mental lexicon, and in turn lead to higher L2 proficiency. The findings of this study have implications for second language teaching and learning. The innovative research design and advanced statistical analyses contribute to the development of language teaching research methodology.</p>

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Exploring the Relationship between Stay-abroad Experiences, Frequency Effects, and Context Use in L2 Idiom Comprehension

Cited by 4 publications

References 34 publications

Beyond Bleeps and Bounds: The Role of Individual Differences in Understanding Taboo Language from TV Series in the L2

Beyond Bleeps and Bounds: The Role of Individual Differences in Understanding Taboo Language from TV Series in the L2

The role of reticence in the comprehension of metaphorical taboo expressions in the foreign language

Applying cognitive linguistics to second language idiom learning

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