Writing in French in secondary schools in England and Germany: are the British really 'bad language learners’?

It is widely assumed that the British are poorer modern foreign language (MFL) learners than their fellow Europeans. Motivation has often been seen as the main cause of this perceived disparity in language learning success. However, there have also been suggestions that curricular and pedagogical factors may play a part. This article reports a research project investigating how German and English 14- to 16-year-old learners of French as a first foreign language compare to one another in their vocabulary knowledge and in the lexical diversity, accuracy and syntactic complexity of their writing. Students from comparable schools in Germany and England were set two writing tasks which were marked by three French native speakers using standardised criteria aligned to the Common European Framework of Reference (CEF). Receptive vocabulary size and lexical diversity were established by the X_lex test and a verb types measure respectively. Syntactic complexity and formal accuracy were respectively assessed using the mean length of T-units (MLTU) and words/error metrics. Students' and teachers' questionnaires and semi-structured interviews were used to provide information and participants' views on classroom practices, while typical textbooks and feedback samples were analysed to establish differences in materials-related input and feedback in the two countries. The German groups were found to be superior in vocabulary size, and in the accuracy, lexical diversity and overall quality – but not the syntactic complexity – of their writing. The differences in performance outcomes are analysed and discussed with regard to variables related to the educational contexts (e.g. curriculum design and methodology).

Teacher beliefs about listening in a foreign language

This study investigated, through a questionnaire, the stated beliefs and stated practices of 115 foreign language teachers in England regarding listening pedagogy: whether such beliefs and practices reflect the literature on listening, whether beliefs and stated practices converged, and what factors might underpin them. Responses indicated a mismatch between teachers’ stated belief in the importance of teaching learners how to listen more effectively, and the lack of evidence in their stated practice of such teaching, with a focus instead on task completion. Findings are discussed against the accountability agenda of the study’s context, and its implications for teacher development highlighted.

Foreign executive appointments: a multilevel examination

As multinational enterprises (MNE) expand, their attachment to the country of origin is challenged by the need to adapt to an increasingly diverse geographical posture. We examine how these countervailing forces affect top management team (TMT) composition and test a model that associates foreign executive appointments with individual- and firm-level antecedents. Using multilevel data comprising 1,446 TMT appointments at 360 large European firms between 2001 and 2005, we show that individual experiential characteristics, the type of TMT function, prior performance of the MNE, and the MNE’s overall degree of internationalization are associated with foreign TMT appointments. We discuss how our findings contribute to the international business literature and complement recent research on the internationalization of TMTs.

The impact of social and relational contexts on innovation transfer in foreign subsidiaries

It is widely acknowledged that innovation is one of the pillars of multinational enterprises (MNEs) and that technological knowledge from different host locations is a key factor to the MNEs’ competitive advantages development. Concerning these assumptions, in this paper we aim to understand how the social and the relational contexts affect the conventional and reverse transfer of innovation from MNEs’ subsidiaries hosted in emerging markets. We analyzed the social context through the institutional profile (CIP) level and the relational context through trust and integration levels utilizing a survey sent to 172 foreign subsidiaries located in Brazil, as well as secondary data. Through an ordinary least squares regression (OLS) analysis we found that the relational context affects the conventional and reverse innovation transfer in subsidiaries hosted in emerging markets. We however did not find support for the social context effect.

Foreign direct investment through acquisitions and implications for technological upgrading: case evidence from Tanzania

Using a case study approach, this paper examines the role of privatisation on the industrial landscape of Tanzania. We examine the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) through acquisitions on technology transfer within the acquired firm as well as the development of linkages to other firms based in the host country. Our results suggest that technological upgrading has occurred following FDI, the intensity of which reflects the type of firm-specific assets of the parent multinational enterprise (MNE), as well as the pre-acquisition state of these industrial activities. Improved backward linkages are also evident with local economic agents, but their type and extent – reflecting Tanzania's comparative advantage in the primary sector – confirm that capabilities both within the acquired firms and also in the industrial base of the host country greatly influence the magnitude and intensity of technological upgrading. 'Narrower' technology gaps between the MNE affiliate and the domestic sector are more likely to result in backward linkages and determine the type of technological content of inputs sourced locally rather than within the MNE.

National interest to global reform: patterns of reasoning in British foreign policy discourse

Discussion of the national interest often focuses on how Britain's influence can be maximized, rather than on the goals that influence serves. Yet what gives content to claims about the national interest is the means-ends reasoning which links interests to deeper goals. In ideal-typical terms, this can take two forms. The first, and more common, approach is conservative: it infers national interests and the goals they advance from existing policies and commitments. The second is reformist: it starts by specifying national goals and then asks how they are best advanced under particular conditions. New Labour's foreign policy discourse is notable for its explicit use of a reformist approach. Indeed, Gordon Brown's vision of a 'new global society' not only identifies global reform as a key means of fulfilling national goals, but also thereby extends the concept of the national interest well beyond a narrow concern with national security.

Exploration of relational factors: Sino-foreign joint-venture partnering

Purpose – Despite recent threats of economic contraction, China still offers attractive opportunities for foreign companies seeking to expand their business activities through joint venturing (JV) partnering entry strategies. Recent research has indicated a growing recognition of the importance of relational factors in JV partnering. The purpose of this paper is to build on recent research findings that identify critical relation success factors in JVs and explores these in the context of a Hong Kong-based civil aviation services company seeking to expand business activities in Greater China. Design/methodology/approach – While the extant management literature focuses primarily on factors relevant to the inter-partner relationship between partners in the formation stage of a joint venture, this research takes a dynamic stakeholder perspective in respect of the relevant relational factors over the evolution of a partnership. The research described in this paper is based on a case-based study that identifies and examines the relevance and importance of uniquely Chinese factors such as guanxi, renqing and mianzi in the specific context of a strategic partnering relationship. Findings – This phenomenological study provides empirical evidence of critical linkages of these to intrinsically Chinese notions of guanxi, mianzi and renqing – it links these to key strategic partnering success factors identified to be trust, conflict resolution, commitment and cooperation. This study thereby reinforces the importance of the uniquely Chinese relational context in cross-border JVs. Moreover, the research findings suggest that these factors underpin the dynamic bi-directional stakeholder relationship in a Sino-foreign strategic partnership. Originality/value – This study conceptually links the uniquely Chinese relational factors (guanxi, mianzi and renqing) to key success factors supporting the establishment of a strategic partnership in a Sino-foreign context; moreover, it contributes empirical evidence substantiating the proposed conceptual linkage.

Adaptive communication: languages with more non-native speakers tend to have fewer word forms

Explaining the diversity of languages across the world is one of the central aims of typological, historical, and evolutionary linguistics. We consider the effect of language contact-the number of non-native speakers a language has-on the way languages change and evolve. By analysing hundreds of languages within and across language families, regions, and text types, we show that languages with greater levels of contact typically employ fewer word forms to encode the same information content (a property we refer to as lexical diversity). Based on three types of statistical analyses, we demonstrate that this variance can in part be explained by the impact of non-native speakers on information encoding strategies. Finally, we argue that languages are information encoding systems shaped by the varying needs of their speakers. Language evolution and change should be modeled as the co-evolution of multiple intertwined adaptive systems: On one hand, the structure of human societies and human learning capabilities, and on the other, the structure of language.

Does foreign investment affect US office real estate prices?

his article examines the impact of foreign real estate investment on U.S. office market capitalization rates. The geographic unit of analysis is MSA and the time period is 2001–2013. Drawing upon a database of commercial real estate transactions, the authors model the determinants of market capitalization rates with a particular focus on the significance of the proportion of market transactions involving foreign investors. Employing several econometric techniques to analyze the data, the results suggest statistically significant effects of foreign investment across 38 U.S. metro areas. It is estimated that, all else equal, a 100 basis point increase in foreign share of total investment in a U.S. metropolitan office market causes about an 8 basis point decrease in the market cap rate.

Ultimate attainment in the use of collocations among heritage speakers of Turkish in Germany and Turkish–German returnees

In this paper we show that heritage speakers and returnees are fundamentally different from the majority of adult second language learners with respect to their use of collocations (Laufer & Waldman, 2011). We compare the use of lexical collocations involving yap- “do” and et- “do” among heritage speakers of Turkish in Germany (n = 45) with those found among Turkish returnees (n = 65) and Turkish monolinguals (n = 69). Language use by returnees is an understudied resource although this group can provide crucial insights into the specific language ability of heritage speakers. Results show that returnees who had been back for one year avoid collocations with yap- and use some hypercorrect forms in et-, whilst returnees who had been back for seven years at the time of recording produce collocations that are quantitatively and qualitatively similar to those of monolingual speakers of Turkish. We discuss implications for theories of ultimate attainment and incomplete acquisition in heritage speakers.

A rare structure at the syntax-discourse interface: heritage and Spanish-dominant native speakers weigh in

The present study examines knowledge of the discourse-appropriateness of Clitic Right Dislocation (CLRD) in a population of Heritage (HS) and Spanish-dominant Native Speakers in order to test the predictions of the Interface Hypothesis (IH; Sorace 2011). The IH predicts that speakers in language contact situations will experience difficulties with integrating information involving the interface of syntax and discourse modules. CLRD relates a dislocated constituent to a discourse antecedent, requiring integration of syntax and pragmatics. Results from an acceptability judgment task did not support the predictions of the IH. No statistical differences between the HSs’ performance and that of L1-dominant native speakers were evidenced when participants were presented with an offline task. Thus, our study did not find any evidence of “incomplete acquisition” (Montrul 2008) as it pertains to this specific linguistic structure.