Initial Proficiency and L2 Grammar Development During Short-Term Immersion Abroad

Abstract

The first goal of this study was to examine how individual differences in initial L2 proficiency help explain L2 grammar development in oral production during short-term immersion abroad. The second goal of the study was methodological, and evaluated challenges that can result from operationalizing learners’ initial L2 proficiency as pretest performance on outcome measures (as opposed to independent proficiency measures) in analyses of L2 change. L2 Spanish learners participating in summer study abroad completed an elicited imitation task and two oral production tasks. Production data were analyzed for changes in relevant grammatical complexity and accuracy dimensions. Results indicate that learners with higher initial L2 proficiency experience greater L2 grammar advancement from short-term immersion, and that pretest performance can be an unreliable operational estimate of initial proficiency when analyzing L2 gains. We discuss findings following cognitive accounts of SLA, and highlight methodological implications for further research in immersion contexts and beyond.

Grammatical and Lexical Development During Short‐Term Study Abroad: Exploring L2 Contact and Initial Proficiency

“…With regard to investigating the role of initial proficiency, our results highlight the importance of using an independent measure of proficiency and of accounting for initial/pre-test scores on measures of linguistic development (Zalbidea et al, 2020), which in our study predicted a large portion of the variance in gains on all the conditions of the AJT-morphosyntactic and lexical/semantic.…”

“…In order to address RQ2, we ran a series of hierarchical multiple linear regression analyses with L2 contact (average reported hours speaking, reading, and writing) and initial proficiency (week 1 score on the EIT) as predictor variables and change scores for measures of linguistic development (morphosyntactic or lexical) as the dependent variables. Given the demonstrated importance of controlling for pre‐test scores in regression analyses (Zalbidea et al., 2020), we first ran baseline regression models that included week 1 scores on the relevant measure of linguistic development as the sole predictor of d´ change for each condition. Subsequently, we added the variables of interest to the models to determine how much additional variance was explained by these factors.…”

“…3 This task was reported on in Zalbidea et al (2020). 4 The reported hours spent listening were excluded from analysis for three reasons: First, learner reports in this category often seemed inflated and highly variable in comparison with other language skills, and therefore we considered these reports to be potentially unreliable (e.g., from less than 2 hours/week average-which was less than the amount of class time in 1 day-up to 50.8 hours).…”

“…For example, some research has utilized standardized tests to estimate initial proficiency (e.g., Eurocentres Vocabulary Size Test: Milton & Meara, 1995; Oral Proficiency Interview [OPI] or SOPI: Baker–Smemoe et al., 2014; Vande Berg et al., 2009), whereas others have used nonstandardized measures (e.g., study‐specific written grammar tests: Davidson, 2010). Second, a number of studies have utilized the same task to measure both initial proficiency and linguistic development, resulting in potential interdependence between the independent and dependent variables (e.g., Llanes & Muñoz, 2009; Vande Berg et al., 2009; see discussion in Issa & Zalbidea, 2018; Zalbidea et al., 2020). Third, the (relatively) frequently employed SOPI is scored according to the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) proficiency guidelines and may lack the sensitivity to capture gains among more advanced learners.…”

Stages of Acquisition and the P/E Model of Working Memory: Complementary or contrasting approaches to foreign language aptitude?

“…WM (a version of EWM) did not show clear relationships with performance. Zalbidea et al (2020) used phonological and visual as well as EWM measures with beginners, also contrasting spoken and written modalities, focusing on grammatical salience. The phonological and visual measures correlated with speaking performance, while the executive measure did not.…”