viernes, 11 de septiembre de 2020

 Great Barrier Reef 2050 plan no longer achievable due to climate change, experts say >>> Click here!

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USEFUL VOCABULARY

VERBS

Release  publicarlanzarse 

Echo  repetir 

Deliver  entregar 

 

EXPRESSIONS

Back-to-back – happening one after another, without interruption. 

In the cold light day – when considered calmly and dispassionately, without the charge of emotions felt at the time sth. happened. 

An elephant in the room – there is an obvious problem or difficult situation that people do not want to talk about. 

 

Advisory  consultivo 

Strenuous – agotador 

Outstanding – excepcional 

Bleaching  blanqueamiento/ de blanqueo 

Overall – en general/ total 

Reef – arrecife 

Spokesman – portavoz 

Currently 

Attainable 

Assessment 

Concern – preocupación 

Surrounding 

A wake-up call 

In-danger list 

Reassess 

Scrutiny 

Prior – previo 

Committed  comprometido 

jueves, 3 de septiembre de 2020

THE LAUGHTER CIRCUIT

 THE LAUGHTER CIRCUIT >>> Click here!

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USEFUL VOCABULARY

VERBS

Trail off – ir desapareciendo/ desvanecerse poco a poco

Bolster – reforzar

Zero sth – poner algo a cero

Utter – pronunciar/ proferir algo

 

EXPRESSIONS

Discern the nature

To crack a joke – to tell a joke

 

Laughter – la risa

Casket – ataúd

Outburst – la explosión

Muffled – amortiguado

Aneurysm

Hypothalamus

Adjacent

Punch line – chiste

Pseudonym

Treatise – tratado

Nip – pellizco

Chirp – chirrido

Tickle – cosquillas

Interbreed – cruzarse

Offspring – descendencia

Great-grandparents

Juxtaposition

Thankfully – agradecidamente

Mildly – levemente

Pun/ wordplay

Slapstick – payasadas

Tumbling dominoes

Nonverbal jokes

Frontal lobe

Clearinghouse – centro de coordinación

Self-awareness – conciencia de sí mismos

Inference

Track – rastrear

Light up

Hysteria

Follow-up – seguimiento

martes, 1 de septiembre de 2020

The modern matchmakers

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USEFUL VOCABULARY

VERBS

Enhance – aumentar

Pair sb off – to introduce two people to each other so that they will start a romantic relationship.

Engage – comprometerse

 

EXPRESSIONS

Draw on a study – en base a un studio

Luck out – tener mucha potra 

 

Unarguably – indiscutiblemente // arguably – posiblemente

Chance encounter – encuentro casual

Largely – en gran parte

Bureaucrats

Courtship/ flirtation

Blueprint – plan/ modelo

Traits – rasgos

Application form – formulario de solicitud

Oodles of choice – montones de opciones

High-handed – prepotente/ arbitrario

Punter – jugador/ cliente

Fraught – tensión

Allegedly – presuntamente

Glance

lunes, 31 de agosto de 2020

The Power of Simple Life Changes to Prevent Heart Disease

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USEFUL VOCABULARY

VERBS

Prevent

Enrol – inscribir

Endorse – avalar

Halved – reducido a la mitad

 

EXPRESSIONS

Outside of one’s control

To gather data – recopilar datos/ información

 

Risk factors

Recent research

Genes

Coronary artery disease – arteriopatía coronaria

Cumulative effect

Greater risk

Drugs (statins – estatinas)

Reductions in cholesterol

Pharmacological intervention

Low/ high risk

Lifestyle changes

Intensive therapy

Journal

A prospective cohort study – un estudio de cohorte prospectivo (futuro)

Outcome – resultado

Obese

BMI – Body Max Index

Criterion

Whole grain – grano integral

Processed meat

Sugar-sweetened beverages – bebidas azucaradas

Trans fats – grasas trans

Sodium

Across all studies

Bypass procedures – derivación vascular o resvascularización en el corazón usada para el tratamiento de obstrucciones en su irrigación o arterias coronarias.

Caveats – advertencias/ avisos

DNA

Recommendation

Constrictive – la causa de que alguien actúe en contra de su voluntad

Non-smoker

Overweight

Once-a-week exercise

martes, 4 de agosto de 2020

Multilingual learning

Multilingual learning

The topic of this composition is going to deal with is the process of multilingual learning. First, this essay is going to start by defining the term of multilingualism, using the definition of professor Franceschini. Secondly, it is going to be seen the relations between multiculturalism and multilingualism. Thirdly, it is going to be discussed the advantages and disadvantages of having multilingual learning and the benefits and issues that can be produced, if someone becomes multilingual. Finally, I will use my personal experience to show the influence that multilingual learning can have on an individual student.

The term multilingualism is usually addressed in many books, but nevertheless, it is difficult to define it. Professors Aroni and Hufeisen (Aroni and Hufeisen, 2009) use the definition of Franceschini to define it:

‘The capacity of societies, institutions, groups, and individuals to engage on a regular basis in space and time with more than one language in everyday life…  Multilingualism is a product of the fundamental human ability to communicate in a number of languages. Operational distinctions may then be drawn between social, institutional, discursive, and individual multilingualism. (Franceschini, 2009, p.33–34)’

In order to better understand Franceschini’s definition, both authors made a few necessary comments on it. The first one is that the term ‘language’ needs to be considered in a neutral way, this means that it can refer to our everyday language or to the standard language, as well as, regional languages or dialects. The second and third comment they make refers to the moment this term is already established in the society, institutions, and individuals, and it is related to the scientific analysis of multilingualism. In their second comment, they explain that this term cannot be applied to everyday interactions and treat two interlocutors as two separate individuals, they say that researchers must consider the context of the interaction and each example must receive specific consideration. In the third comment, they assert that multilingualism needs to be distinguished from bilingualism in order to do this type of analysis because they assert that there are some times in which researchers have only focused on the two languages they are analysing in question, but they do not ask the participants about the possibility of speaking more than two languages. (Aroni and Hufeisen, 2009)

Once having exposed the term of multilingualism, this essay will relate it to the concept of multiculturalism. According to Goral and Conner (Goral and Conner, 2013) individuals who speak or use more than one language usually, belong to–or are familiar with – more than one culture. As a consequence, they can be also considered multicultural. Moreover, cultural considerations can be determinant for the evaluation of multilingual individuals and they will be taken into account. It is, thus, obvious that the study subjects of these types of researchers are highly heterogeneous.

However, there are times in which multiculturalism and multilingualism do not go together, particularly in the case of language and cultural minorities. It is for this reason that in the 21st century, multilingual and multicultural competencies will be necessary to function completely. For the UNESCO International Commission on Education for the twenty-first century, quality education – including the multicultural and multilingual ones– cannot be fully achieved without understanding some previous tensions, such as the tension between the universal and the individual or the tension between the need for competition and the concern for equality of opportunity, among others (Alidou et al., 2011).

In environments where multilingualism and multiculturalism are well seen and represent education resources, the tensions are reinterpreted, different languages and cultures do not represent an obstacle and they can be related to each other. Thus someone starts by learning one’s own language within a particular cultural setting, such as family and community, and in the case, one continues to learn other languages, he or she will be learning other cultures at the same time. Furthermore, by doing this, one expands one’s capacity to learn and understand the connections between global and local knowledge and communities, changing the world's point of view through communication and multilingual competence (Alidou et al., 2011).

Consequently, there should be a general awareness of the language aspects of learning. To do that, there must be a definition of a multilingual country and plurilingual student in order to see the different perspectives that can be taken. With this, the aim is to remember facts that teachers are familiar with and begin with representations that they have already experienced themselves. The dimensions they should later include in these experiences are, for instance, the levels of language competence, or a comparative approach to language and linguistic aspects, among others (Hansen-Pauly, 2012).

The next stage in this process is to create challenging situations that teachers will have to cope with. This can be performed by analysing different views on multilingual learning and find the possible difficulties they may confront, such as considering that foreign languages for subject learning can involve extra effort and require more time for learning. Another fact to take into account is that the acquisition of a multilingual learning is equally successful than a monolingual one, so there must be an option for those who want multilingual learning and another for those who do not want one.  It is also required for this multilingual learning, an additional concentration on the learner’s parts, having an active involvement in the subject, because teachers generally do not have time to focus on a deeper analysis of learning materials due to the shortness of the school year, so it is a learner’s task to make this deeper and closer analysis. Finally, motivation is also essential: teachers, parents and learners must be aware of the advantages of language development in subject learning (Hansen-Pauly, 2012).

Once the multilingual learning process works and students become bilingual and subsequently multilingual, it is important to know the new challenges these individuals are going to deal with. In the case of multilingual people, they have a special challenge when they hear a new word, this means that if a monolingual person hears a word, he will only need to compare it with a single stock of arbitrary phonemes and meaning rules and if this person wants to utter, he will draw it from that single stock. Nevertheless, if the subject is multilingual, he or she will need several stocks separate. The example that the author shows us is the following one, if a Spanish/Italian bilingual person hears the phonemes b-u-rr-o, he or she will instantly interpret to be either “donkey”, if the context is Spanish, or “butter”, if it is Italian. Multilingual people participating in a multilingual conversation will switch frequently and unpredictably between the stocks they have. As a result, they are constantly and unconsciously practicing in the use of the executive function system (Diamond, 2010).

Moreover, far from being a problem, scientific researchers have shown that multilingualism provides benefits to individuals along with all their lives, from their childhood to adulthood and even in adults whose cognitive capacities are declining. Young babies who are in bilingual or multilingual circumstances are not confused by this, but they develop the ability to discriminate among the languages they hear and they more open to learning new languages than their counterparts that are exposed to only one language. It has also been proved that adult learners are able to acquire sensitivity to the grammar of a second language despite the age. Furthermore, the fact of having code-switching reflects a sophisticated cognitive strategy that enables bilingual and multilingual learners to exploit their multilingual speech in all the languages they can speak. In the last two decades, it has been revered all the older false believes about multilingualism, and now for language scientists, multilingual speakers are seen as the best way for understanding the way that language experience shapes the mind and brain (Diamond, 2010).

From personal experience, I am going to explain my multilingual learning experience. Although I am able to speak three languages and I am learning a fourth one, I do not consider a multilingual speaker and I will later explain why. My native language is Spanish and the second language I started to learn was English. Like most of my classmates, I started at school, but the difference was that my father was an English teacher, so he started to teach me English at home. He didn’t exactly teach what I was learning at school, instead of this, he gave me further material, such as other books or English films. When I was a little older (still at school) he started teaching me French, because his idea was that I entered a French Lyceum, but this was not possible, so at the age of fourteen I continued studying it in the official language school of my city. Apart from learning both languages at school and at home, I also travelled to France and to the British Isles. First, I started by going to summer camps in France, and then I went to an international language school in both places. I have to point out that this was and still is on holiday, so it was not for so much time. Finally, three years ago I started to learn German at the official language school, and even if this year I have not had the opportunity to continue learning it due to my Erasmus, I will continue to learn it once the Erasmus has finished.

Having already explained my multilingual experience I will give my opinion on what I consider a multilingual speaker should be. My understanding of what a multilingual speaker should be is that person who is able to speak and think in more than two languages. The reason why I say this is because if a person who can only speak a foreign language by constructing her sentences or forming his ideas from its own native language, he or she is only translating his native language into a different one, but not thinking in two different languages, thus he wouldn’t be a bilingual or multilingual speaker. It is therefore why I do not consider myself a bilingual speaker. Some teachers I have had also told me that you become bilingual or multilingual once you have dreamt in that foreign language you are studying for and another teacher told me once that you are able to speak in another language, once you can get angry speaking it, so in my view, everybody has its own opinion of what bilingual and multilingual is.

Summing up, in this essay it has been discussed what multilingualism is and how it is related to the notion of multiculturalism. It has also been analysed the several processes of multilingual learning education and how teachers and learners should deal with it at school in order to have a better result. Moreover, it has been exposed the several benefits and issues that a multilingual education can contribute to us. Finally, I have explained my multilingual learning education and I have given my own definition of a multilingual speaker.

 

References

Alidou, H., Glanz, C. & Nikièma, N. (2011) “Quality multilingual and multicultural education for lifelong learning”, International Review of Education Vol. 57, p. 530–531

Aronin, Larissa & Hufeisen, Britta (eds.), The exploration of multilingualism: Development of research on L3, multilingualism and multiple language acquisition. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2009.

Diamond, J. (2010). The benefits of multilingualism. Science 330, 332–333.

Franceschini, R. 2009. Genesis & development of research in multilingualism: perspectives for future research. In the Exploration of Multilingualism: Development of Research on L3, Multilingualism and Multiple Language Acquistion. Aka Applied Linguistics series 6, L. Aronin & B. Hufeisen (eds), 27-61. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Hansen-Pauly, M. A. (2012). Teacher education: Language issues in multilingual educational contexts: Sensitizing subject student teachers for language issues and cultural perspectives. 13-14. Luxembourg: Council of Europe.


viernes, 31 de julio de 2020

THE CRITICAL PERIOD HYPOTHESIS

THE CRITICAL PERIOD HYPOTHESIS

Second language acquisition (SLA) is affected by many different factors in its process of acquiring a foreign language. Some of them are considered common to every non-native speaker and they can affect in a different manner each individual. The element that will be analysed in this paper will be the age of onset (AO), a biological factor that is considered a strong predictor of success in SLA. According to Granena (2013), whilst L2 morphology and syntax is often proceeded faster by adolescents or adults through early stages, which is a rate advantage, the expected level of ultimate L2 attainment generally diminishes with the increase of AO. With regard to the age effects, there is less agreement between researchers: variation in the quantity or quality of input to younger and older learners, differences in their affective profiles or cognitive maturity are some of these effects discussed by experts.

One of the most known hypotheses that supporting this is the Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH). This theory is used with two different meanings explained by Pallier (2007). The first explanation is based on an empirical hypothesis denoting that humans are more efficient at language learning in the first years of life (it can also be applied to L1 acquisition). Moreover, it is an important predictor of ultimate proficiency, because the older an individual starts to learn a language the smaller the possibilities of reaching a native-like competence this person will have. The second argument stands on the conviction that an age-related decline in neural plasticity is the cause of increasing difficulties in language learning. These two meanings must be distinguished because, according to the first meaning, the reason for not achieving a native-like proficiency can be due to other causes different from irreversible neural plasticity changes, whilst the supporters of the second meaning believe that this loss of plasticity is because of maturational factors.

However, other researchers suggested that it could also be due to the outcome of language acquisition itself. Penfield (1965) advocated that before the child begins to speak, the cortex is blank and nothing is written on it. Over time, this begins to be written and normally not erased. For the author, at the age of ten or twelve connections produced within the cortex have now been established and fixed in the speech of the individual. An alternative theory supported by Pinker (1994) asserted that once the circuitry of language acquisition has been used, it should be removed if it becomes an issue for keeping it. All neural tissue used beyond its point of usefulness is a good starting point for being recycled.  Therefore, both theories had a point in common: once the young learner has acquired the language or languages around him or her, the neural modifications are impossible to reverse.

Pallier (2007) asserts that there have been many studies carried out for the CPH. Some of these studies were performed with animals that required depriving them from some relevant stimulus during a period of time. On the other side, experimentation with humans for the L1 acquisition has not been accomplished for understandable reasons, as it would not be ethical, because it would signify the denial of language exposure for children. Notwithstanding, some studies have been performed with abandoned children who had little language exposure at first, and observations suggested that their language skills were limited even after language instruction. Other human studies performed in this area have been accomplished with groups of deaf people who learned sign language as an L1 at different ages. The results showed that those people who were exposed to sign language in their first years of life had a better control of the language than those later exposed. Eventually, those who later started (in mid-childhood) performed better than those who were exposed first when they were ten or more.

Although it could be asserted that critical neural changes take place during the puberty period, it seems that it can occur much earlier. Studies conducted with deaf children who received cochlear implants (an auditory technological device surgically implanted to stimulate the auditory nerve in order to transmit acoustic information to the central auditory system) displayed that there are beneficial effect of earlier implementation in children when they are already 1 to 3 years old (McConkey Robbins, Burton Koch, Osberger, Zimmerman-Philips & Kishon-Rabin, 2004).

Another domain for collecting data connected to the CPH is SLA. As stated by Snow (1978), there are two types of research designs that can be expected from this sort of research. The first one is by comparing second language acquisition to first language acquisition. The second one involves comparing SLA across a wide age range. Diverse studies have shown that second language acquisition is similar to first language acquisition, with regard to the order in which rules and structures are acquired (Dulay & Burt, 1974), of the learning strategies employed (Cook, 1973) and of the errors made (Taylor, 1975).

Moreover, other studies contemplated by Ervin-Tripp (1974) and Fathman (1975) that used the second strategy displayed that older children (even adults) proceeded faster L2 morphology and syntax. There were even other studies accomplished by Asher & Price (1967) showed a faster listening comprehension by older children. However, rather than showing an agreement in the obtained results, they revealed wide discrepancies in some aspects. For instance, in pronunciation, there were some studies that displayed a better pronunciation in older subjects, whereas others showed a negative effect of age. There were even other studies in which there were found cases where there were older learners without accent in their L2, as well as cases who maintained their native accent.

Although the studies observed so far do not endorse the predictions established by the CPH, for Snow (1978) this hypothesis cannot still be rejected due to the problems that will be explained. The first issue that these studies contained was that they have only looked to a restricted age range. For example, in Fathman’s study the ages were between 6 and 15, in the case of Ervin-Tripp the ages were from 4 to 9, and with respect to the case of Asher and Prise, they only took 8 adults. The second problem they presented was that age differences were not assessed longitudinally, since all the age differences found were given at a random point after the beginning of SLA, rather than having constant differences in the rate of acquisition. Therefore, the only type of study that can provide a general idea of the age differences in rate acquisition or in ultimate achievement is a longitudinal one. In addition to this, a fairly limited range of second language abilities were tested in most studies and the CPH seeks to test different language abilities separately, since the acquisition of each ability may affect differently on brain plasticity. By doing this, contradictory findings could be explained and results would be more accurate.

Another sort of studies concerning the CPH in SLA have been those who have investigated the possible effects of age at immigration. According to Stevens (2006), these researches were made due to the high interest in the possibility of finding critical periods in language learning.  However, the process of learning a language takes some time, thus scholars had to take into consideration the effect of immigrants’ length of residence in the destination country with the purpose of isolating the effects of age at onset of L2 learning. For doing these kinds of studies, researchers took into account three variables, “age at immigration”, “length of residence”, and “age at testing”. Nevertheless, these three variables are linearly interconnected, so investigators had to ignore one or two variables in their respective studies in order to solve this problem.

The results provided by these researches showed for instance that length of residence in the host country hugely affected immigrants’ levels of proficiency in their L2 (at least in the first several years after their arrival to the receiving country). According to researchers, this was due to the fact that there were processes related to senescence and life-cycle stages. Immigrants’ ages at the time observations also took an important role in their investigations. Nonetheless, as they expected before doing researches, the three variables were impossible to consider simultaneously, and unfortunately, there are no easy statistical techniques that can disentangle the linear dependency among them. Chronological age was the variable that was most often omitted in the analysis, because of its difficulty for being followed (Stevens, 2006).

To sum up, it can be asserted that the age of onset has an important role to play in SLA. Moreover, it has also been observed that for learning a language the younger is usually the better. Although research will be better performed in the future, thanks to technology improvements and the correction of previous research errors, in this moment, it cannot be stated the exact age where individuals will not be able to learn a language or acquire a high proficiency language level, but instead of this, we could assert that there is a sensitive period for learning a second language around puberty, which will not be the same afterwards.

REFERENCES

Asher, J., & Price, B. (1967) The learning strategy of the total physical response: some age differences. Child Development, 1219-1227.

Cook, V. J. (1973) The comparison of language development in native children and foreign adults. International Review of Applied Linguistics, 13-28.

Dulay, H., & Burt, M. (1974) Natural sequences in child second language acquisition. Working Papers in Bilingualism, 71-98.

Ervin-Tripp, S. (1974) Is second language learning like the first? TESOL Quarterly, 111-127.

Fathman, A. (1975) The relationship between age and second language productive ability. Language Learning, 245-253.

Granena, G., & Long, M. (2013) Age of onset, length of residence, language aptitude, and ultimate L2 attainment in three linguistic domains. Second Language Research, 29(3), 311-343. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/43103927.

McConkey Robbins, 4., Burton Koch, D., Osberger, M. J., Zimmerman-Philips, S. & Kishon-Rabin, L.(2004). "Effect of age at cochlear implantation on auditory skill development in infants and toddler”. Archives of Otolaryngology Head & Neck Surgery, 130, 570-574.

Pallier, C. (2007) Critical periods in language acquisition and language attrition. In Language Attrition: Theoretical Perspectives, 155–168.

Penfield, W. (1965) “Conditioning the uncommitted cortex for Language learning”. Brain, 88,787-798.

Pinker, S. (1994). The Language Instinct. New York, NY: W. Morrow and Co.

Snow, C., & Hoefnagel-Höhle, M. (1978) The Critical Period for Language Acquisition: Evidence from Second Language Learning. Child Development, 1114-1128. Retrieved from: http://dx.doi.org/10.2307/1128751.

Stevens, Gillian. (2006) The AgeLengthOnset Problem in Research on Second Language Acquisition Among Immigrants. Language Learning, 671 - 692. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9922.2006.00392.x.

Taylor, B. P. (1975). The use of overgeneralisation and transfer learning strategies by elementary and intermediate students of ESL. Language Learning, 73-107.


jueves, 30 de julio de 2020

Introversion and Extroversion in SLA

Introversion and Extroversion in SLA

The purpose of this essay is the extroversion and introversion in the acquisition of a second language. To begin it must be known what is meant by the extroverted and introverted concept, so it will be discussed some different definitions to contrast and understand them Afterwards, it has been defined the ‘Affective filter hypothesis’ so as to understand the examples that we are going to comment later. Finally to support the extroversion and introversion idea we have collected different examples of studies in which the results reflect the importance of the personality of the participants with respect to their academic performance.

Many people tend to confuse the fact of being an introverted person with shyness. Philip Zimbardo and Bernardo Carducci, psychologists who study shyness, state that introverts refer to those people who have both social skills and self-esteem even though they tend to prefer loneliness instead of being surrounded by a big group of people. In the case of shy people, they lack social skills and self-esteem, what makes it more difficult for them than for the rest of the community, to interact with people they do not know. In fact, they want to socialise but their low or not even present self-esteem makes it difficult to meet new people.

According to Myers (2003), extrovert people are those who prefer to receive stimulation from the outside world. Eysenck (1967) describes extroverts as sociable, expressive, interactive, outgoing, that they act first, and then think about it, they do not like being alone, they prefer being in company all the time; introverts, on the contrary, are described as reserved, quiet, sensitive, they tend to think what they are going to do before acting, and get tired of groups.

Eysenck (1991) continues by saying that extroverts and introverts sometimes show differences in the accuracy and speed of interchange when they speak, particularly performing in an L2. He proposes that extroverts are better than introverts when they have to perform under stress, they are better at lowering their anxiety levels.

According to Matthews (1992), extroverts are more successful in depositing the several spoken inputs they receive than introverts. Eysenck (1981) claims that introverts feel the necessity for more time to recover the information they store in their long term memory. Eysenk (1981) sustains that the contrast between introverts and extroverts memory processing may be caused by the considerable stimuli that introverts perceive. Hence, as introverts are in more tension, difficult for them to tolerate, when they are producing output, their performance lacks eloquence. This incentive provokes the advantage of extroverts who surpass introverts under pressure.

Introverts are inclined to feel that their personality is not good, or that there is something bad with them because extroverts sometimes do not understand their preference to stay alone for some time or their rejection to socialise. This leads to the assumption by introverts that they have to look or act like extroverts so they are not considered to be awkward people. Some extrovert famous people that all of us know are Jim Carrey, Will Smith or Margaret Thatcher, in the opposite we find introvert people as Bill Gates, JK Rowling or Steven Spielberg, and shy people like Lady Gaga.

According to Ni (2012) affective factors are important aspects to take into consideration when dealing with L2 acquisition. These factors include among other aspects: motivation, attitude, self-confidence, anxiety… and, they are ones of the biggest influences in the input and output of the second language. In the cases where they are taken into account by teachers, they are clearly helpful for teachers to improve their own teaching quality and for the students’ integral development in the language.

In the early 1870’s, Dulay and Burt proposed the Affective Filter Hypothesis and explained its influence on the FL learning process. Later, Krashen (1981) would develop and perfect this hypothesis, dividing it into five sub-hypothesis: the Acquisition-learning hypothesis, the Natural order hypothesis; the Monitor hypothesis; the Input hypothesis and the Affective Filter Hypothesis, and this last sub-hypothesis is the one that it is going to be developed in order to explain the extroversion and introversion in students.

Krashen argued that the affective filter is a psychological obstacle that prevents language learners from taking comprehensible input. He asserted that this filter reduces the amount of input that the learner is able to understand, and this is related with the difference between input and intake (being input all the knowledge available for the learner and intake the knowledge internalised by the student) because affective factors determine their proportions. For this reason, negative affective factors or emotions will often be more likely to prevent this internalisation of the language input, and on the contrary, positive emotions will usually be in favour to promote the efficiency of the process.

When language learners have, for instance, a higher motivation, much self-confidence, and lower levels of anxiety, they will have low affective filters and thus, they will receive and take more input. On the other hand, learners with lower motivation, little self-confidence, and a higher level of anxiety will have high affective filters and therefore, they will obtain little input. This theory shows that emotional factors strongly affect learners in the form they acquire a language and that attempts should be made in order to have lower affective filters and the students feel less stressed and confident in a comfortable learning atmosphere.

Historically, two main reasons have been given to show the importance of focusing on the affective filter in education. According to Arnold (2002), the first main reason is that if teachers focus their attention on affective aspects, it could lead to a more effective language learning and secondly, he asserts that it could also contribute to the whole-person development, which is beyond of just teaching a language, because it also influences student’s personality. And this is the moment when it can be seen its influence in extroverted and introverted students, being extroverted students the ones that have lower affective filters and introverted students the ones that have higher affective filter.

Carrell, Prince and Astika (1996) did research on the relationship between them and their academic performance during a semester with a group of 76 students. The results of the MBTI come from some tests of vocabulary, reading comprehension, writing, and grammar. Thus, they saw that the students were divided into introverts and extroverts almost equally. It is important to know that just a little relationship was found between E-I and their performance in the tests. The authors gave two reasons to explain the weak relationship between personality and the measure of language performance. The first reason is that the maturity and the cognitive levels of the students are not indicated with their personality, being related to the effectiveness of the students at the time of applying the cognitive resources. The second reason is that personality is not such a reliable indicator in the relationships between language learning variables as a more reliable indicator like language aptitude.

Wakamoto (2000) analyses the relationship between introverts and extroverts with respect to language acquisition in a study with 254 Japanese university women specialised in English. He employed the MBTI and the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL) to see what Language Learning Strategies (LLS) the students used. His objective with this study was to demonstrate the importance of introversion and extroversion in learning English within Japanese secondary classrooms. Wakamoto said that groups of 40 students per teacher it is difficult to identify the individual learner differences (ID) and LLS. Wakamoto finds a relationship between some strategies and extroversion: “functional practice strategies” focused on the real use of language and not the form,and “social-affective strategies” with extraverted students’’, the self-control of the affective domain. About introverted students, he found no correlation with the LLS.

With regard to how students receive input, an Indonesian research by Hasan and Yulianti (2018) analyses the differences between extroversion and introversion in receptive skills, particularly reading. In the study, 95 secondary school students were examined and, all them were eleventh-grade students and have been studying English for four years. Additionally, they categorised the students into highly, average or poorly introverted. So as to classify the students into different categories, they used the method suggested by Carter (2005). Nevertheless, the majority of well-known methods were designed in relation to Western cultures, which are very different to Asian cultures. Hasan and Yulianti seemed to be aware of this cultural aspect and modified Carter’s questionnaire in order to adapt it to Indonesian culture. Moreover, in order to make the reading test as valid and reliable as possible, they selected a multiple choice activity to evaluate their reading comprehension. The mean score of highly introverted students was 77’41% whereas poorly introverted students’ mean score was 36’67%. Furthermore, the Serial Correlation Coefficient (r) was calculated (r=0.88) and showed that the higher the introversion, the higher the score for reading comprehension (Hasan and Yulianti 2018, 226-227). The result of this study can be connected with the superiority of logical thinking that introverted people have. Indeed, they usually overuse their cognitive resources so that they have slower but deeper processing capacities.

Taking into consideration oral production, Thorne (1987) observed the impact between extroverts and introverts in the conversation style. Her research was based on 52 women who took the MBTI (Myers Briggs Type Indicator), which is a self-help assessment test which helps people gain insights about how they work and learn. It is a framework for relationship-building, developing positivism, and achieving excellence) distinguishing between extroverts and introverts groups: 26 E, 26 I. These groups formed pairs to talk and have conversations about them in order to know each other (somehow). Thus, three different types of couples were created: similar pairs were made up of introverts with introverts (I/I), or extroverts with extroverts (E/E). The third group consisted of introverts and extroverts pairs (I/E). The intention of the investigation was that all the participants arrive at the same session for not to know or interact each other before. The pairs were organised so that each member had a conversation with a similar and different partner. They are analysed and compared with each other, resulting in 52 conversations: (13 E/E,13 I/I ,and 26 I/E). As a result, extrovert couples treated many different topics and found more in common between each other during the conversation, being more positive and broad. However, the topics that were discussed in the conversations between introverts were serious, focusing on their problems. It is hard to establish a good conversation when one person is optimistic and the other is serious or pessimist.

Years later, a research conducted in the University College London by Dewaele and Furnham (2000) studied the extent to which introversion and extroversion have an effect on spontaneous oral production. The subjects of the study were 25 Flemish students between 18 and 21 years old who were studying French as a foreign language for 6-8 years. In order to measure the degree of introversion/extroversion, researchers used the Eysenck Personality Inventory. The participants were recorded talking about everyday topics for 10 min and then, the errors were analysed and classified according to different variables in both informal and formal situations as it can be seen in (Dewaele and Furnham 2000, Table.1). The results illustrated that extroverted students were better at implicit speech style and speech rates, which result in a more fluent speech. On the other hand, introverted students showed a high proportion of ‘er’, which demonstrates hesitation, particularly in formal situations. Moreover, the results illustrated that introverted students used a wider range of lexicon in formal situations and, their tendency to use longer and complex utterances even in an informal situation. The lexical richness can be explained, as the researchers point out, due to ‘the introverts’ better long term memory where the mental lexicon is stored’ (Dewaele and Furnham 2000, 361). Moreover, Dewaele and Furnham suggest that the use of complex utterances in informal situations is a reflection of the cognitive efforts introverts make when they are not under pressure. However, when they are stressed, i.e. during formal situations, introverts have ‘less cognitive resources at their disposal, their utterances become shorter, their speech is less fluent and there are more unintended pauses’ (Dewaele and Furnham 2000, 362). That is the reason why they conclude in their study that the aspects that affect introverted people in a negative way are the formality of the situation and the interpersonal stress (Dewaele and Furnham, 2000, 362).

A more recent research by Cheng, Jiang and Mu (2015) analyses the differences in speaking between introverted and extroverted students. In fact, 117 students were tested between 18 and 21 years old who were studying English for at least 7 years. In order to have more reliable and valid data when measuring personality, the researchers opted to take into consideration both an adaptation of the Eysenck Personality Scale to Chinese culture and a self-report questionnaire. So as to test their proficiency in spoken production, researchers chose the CET format to measure their level of English. The researchers found interesting the fact that all introverted students considered their personality not to be an advantage for L2 oral production whereas 31% extroverted students found themselves in an advantageous position (Cheng et al. 2015, 583). However, the results they obtained do not correspond to their expectations because Spearman’s Correlation Coefficient is -0.002, which demonstrates that the correlation between L2 oral production and personality is not significant (Cheng et al. 2015, 584). That is the reason why, these researchers claim that ‘the possible explanation is that the subjects chosen for the study, who are all English majors, are strongly motivated to study oral English well. And motivation propels them to find appropriate ways to improve their oral English’ (Cheng et al. 2015, 584). Therefore, they regard motivation as a relevant factor for L2 acquisition to overcome the difficulties of learners’ personalities.

Robson (1994) conducted a study with female university students in Japan, measuring their personalities with the Japan-specific Yatabe/Guilford Personality Inventory and comparing with the TOEFL scores. Robson also used voluntary participation in recorded oral English classes, which were analysed. Thus he discovered that extroverted students who showed active social relationships were much more likely to participate in oral English classes than introverted students.

As it has been demonstrated, it is important that learners realise their abilities and their skills when acquiring a language. Being an introvert or an extrovert should not be an aspect to worry about. If learners work on improving their ‘weaknesses’, they will be able to develop language skills regardless of their personalities. Indeed, the most important aspect is motivation. If their motivation is low, they will not make enough effort in order to be successful in their objective. In addition, it can be said that extroverts have more advantages than introverts when it comes to second language acquisition. Their social skills and abilities to control the pressure and anxiety when they practice the L2 makes it easier to process the input they receive and to produce a decent and smooth output. Obviously, it is clear that the affective filter plays a major role when people are learning a second language. It depends on their self-esteem, for instance, when they are learning a language. If students have low self-esteem they would try to avoid practicing or using the L2 in order to not feel they are not making a fool of themselves.

 

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