Research Summary Assignment
The article titled “The Development of L2 Fluency During Study Abroad: A Cross-Language Study”, reports on a study conducted by Francesca Di Silvio, Wenhao Diao, and Anne Donovan. Published in The Modern Language Journal in 2016, this quantitative research investigated on different aspects regarding learners’ improvement in fluency and holistic proficiency after a semester abroad.
Research Questions
In this study, the authors addressed three research questions regarding L2 fluency. The first research question was: “Do learners of Mandarin, Russian, and Spanish improve their L2 fluency after a semester of language study abroad?” The second research question was: “Is there a difference in gains made by learners of …show more content…
Researchers (Dubiner et al., 2006; Freed, 1995; Ullakonoja, 2008) concluded that L2 learners’ fluency increased after their stay abroad. To evaluate this statement, they asked native speakers to evaluate speech samples and rate the students’ fluency. The ratings were found to be higher at the end of the sojourn than at the beginning. Through different studies, fluency measures have been proven to significantly increase after a sojourn abroad, and are utilized in this study. These include “speech rate (D’Amico, 2012; Du, 2013; Llanes & Muñoz, 2009; Segalowitz & Freed, 2004; Towell et al., 1996), longest run without unfilled or filled pauses (Llanes & Muñoz, 2009; …show more content…
The participants were classified into two categories, the “gainers” (50 participants) and the “nongainers” (25 participants). Regarding the first research question, the participants significantly improved in two fluency measures, speech rate and mean length of run. For the second research question, results have shown that speech rate has been increased by all participants. Mandarin learners increased their mean length of run and their longest run. Spanish learners considerably improved their mean length of run. Furthermore, Spanish learners reduced their rate of unfilled and filled pauses, which was not observed in the two other language groups. As for Russian learners, they increased their rate of unfilled and filled pauses, the opposite result obtained by the Spanish learners. They also decreased their rate of repair, whereas Spanish and Mandarin learners increased it. Overall, Russian learners presented the least change, and Mandarin learners the most change on all tasks except for the picture narration task. As for the third question, analyses of covariance (ANCOVA) were run with pretests as a covariate. The results from the ANCOVAs presented limited connections between students’ increases in SOPI ratings and increases in specific fluency measures, as observed through significant improvements in speech rate, repair rate, and mean length of
The article titled “The Development of L2 Fluency During Study Abroad: A Cross-Language Study”, reports on a study conducted by Francesca Di Silvio, Wenhao Diao, and Anne Donovan. Published in The Modern Language Journal in 2016, this quantitative research investigated on different aspects regarding learners’ improvement in fluency and holistic proficiency after a semester abroad.
Research Questions
In this study, the authors addressed three research questions regarding L2 fluency. The first research question was: “Do learners of Mandarin, Russian, and Spanish improve their L2 fluency after a semester of language study abroad?” The second research question was: “Is there a difference in gains made by learners of …show more content…
Researchers (Dubiner et al., 2006; Freed, 1995; Ullakonoja, 2008) concluded that L2 learners’ fluency increased after their stay abroad. To evaluate this statement, they asked native speakers to evaluate speech samples and rate the students’ fluency. The ratings were found to be higher at the end of the sojourn than at the beginning. Through different studies, fluency measures have been proven to significantly increase after a sojourn abroad, and are utilized in this study. These include “speech rate (D’Amico, 2012; Du, 2013; Llanes & Muñoz, 2009; Segalowitz & Freed, 2004; Towell et al., 1996), longest run without unfilled or filled pauses (Llanes & Muñoz, 2009; …show more content…
The participants were classified into two categories, the “gainers” (50 participants) and the “nongainers” (25 participants). Regarding the first research question, the participants significantly improved in two fluency measures, speech rate and mean length of run. For the second research question, results have shown that speech rate has been increased by all participants. Mandarin learners increased their mean length of run and their longest run. Spanish learners considerably improved their mean length of run. Furthermore, Spanish learners reduced their rate of unfilled and filled pauses, which was not observed in the two other language groups. As for Russian learners, they increased their rate of unfilled and filled pauses, the opposite result obtained by the Spanish learners. They also decreased their rate of repair, whereas Spanish and Mandarin learners increased it. Overall, Russian learners presented the least change, and Mandarin learners the most change on all tasks except for the picture narration task. As for the third question, analyses of covariance (ANCOVA) were run with pretests as a covariate. The results from the ANCOVAs presented limited connections between students’ increases in SOPI ratings and increases in specific fluency measures, as observed through significant improvements in speech rate, repair rate, and mean length of