L3 acquisition: a focus on cognitive approaches

Interest in third language (L3) acquisition has increased exponentially in recent years, due to its potential to inform long-lasting debates in theoretical linguistics, language acquisition and psycholinguistics. Researchers investigating child and adult L3 acquisition have, from the very beginning, considered the many different cognitive factors that constrain and condition the initial state and development of newly acquired languages, and their models have duly evolved to incorporate insights from the most recent findings in psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics and cognitive psychology. The articles in this Special Issue of Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, in dealing with issues such as age of acquisition, attrition, relearning, cognitive economy or the reliance on different memory systems –to name a few–, provide an accurate portrayal of current inquiry in the field, and are a particularly fine example of how instrumental research in language acquisition and other cognitive domains can be to one another.

Providing extrinsic reward for test performance undermines long-term memory acquisition

Based on numerous studies showing that testing studied material can improve long-term retention more than restudying the same material, it is often suggested that the number of tests in education should be increased to enhance knowledge acquisition. However, testing in real-life educational settings often entails a high degree of extrinsic motivation of learners due to the common practice of placing important consequences on the outcome of a test. Such an effect on the motivation of learners may undermine the beneficial effects of testing on long-term memory because it has been shown that extrinsic motivation can reduce the quality of learning. To examine this issue, participants learned foreign language vocabulary words, followed by an immediate test in which one-third of the words were tested and one-third restudied. To manipulate extrinsic motivation during immediate testing, participants received either monetary reward contingent on test performance or no reward. After 1 week, memory for all words was tested. In the immediate test, reward reduced correct recall and increased commission errors, indicating that reward reduced the number of items that can benefit from successful retrieval. The results in the delayed test revealed that reward additionally reduced the gain received from successful retrieval because memory for initially successfully retrieved words was lower in the reward condition. However, testing was still more effective than restudying under reward conditions because reward undermined long-term memory for concurrently restudied material as well. These findings indicate that providing performance–contingent reward in a test can undermine long-term knowledge acquisition.

Evidence from neurolinguistic methodologies: can it actually inform linguistic/ language acquisition theories and translate to evidence-based applications?

This special issue is a testament to the recent burgeoning interest by theoretical linguists, language acquisitionists and teaching practitioners in the neuroscience of language. It offers a highly valuable, state-of-the-art overview of the neurophysiological methods that are currently being applied to questions in the field of second language (L2) acquisition, teaching and processing. Research in the area of neurolinguistics has developed dramatically in the past twenty years, providing a wealth of exciting findings, many of which are discussed in the papers in this volume. The goal of this commentary is twofold. The first is to critically assess the current state of neurolinguistic data from the point of view of language acquisition and processing—informed by the papers that comprise this special issue and the literature as a whole—pondering how the neuroscience of language/processing might inform us with respect to linguistic and language acquisition theories. The second goal is to offer some links from implications of exploring the first goal towards informing language teachers and the creation of linguistically and neurolinguistically-informed evidence-based pedagogies for non-native language teaching.

Interfaces in the acquisition of syntax

We introduce empirical work on Romance language acquisition with respect to the interfaces of syntax with other modules of grammar (internal interfaces) and other domains of cognition (external interfaces). We do so by choosing specific phenomena within the following interfaces: syntax-morphology, syntax-semantics and syn-tax-pragmatics. In the domain of syntax-morphology we focus on grammatical gender, with respect to the syntax-semantics interface we focus on adjectival placement (pre- and post-nominal) and with regard to the syntax-discourse/pragmatics interface we review work on the null/overt subject distribution. Finally, we summarize research on articles, suggesting that articles represent a multiple interface. We provide examples from different types of learners and across the four major Romance languages French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. While our central goal is to summarize and generalize across major findings, we will also point to potential problems concerning the interface approach, e.g. the association of particular phenomena with a specific interface and the assumption that internal interfaces are less problematic than external ones.

Formal linguistic approaches to heritage language acquisition: bridges for pedagogically oriented research

The goal of this chapter is to lay out the central themes of heritage language acquisition research adopting a formal/theoretical linguistic perspective.  Specifically, we aim to provide a detailed discussion of the nature of heritage language grammars. In doing so, we will address the debates on how to explain heritage speaker competence differences from monolingual baselines and more. This chapter will not be limited to discussions of Spanish as a heritage language, but rather will highlight the important role that Spanish has played and will continue to play in the development of heritage language acquisition studies. Finally, we will offer some comments/insights on how the information covered regarding the formal linguistic properties of heritage speaker knowledge should be considered for and implemented in heritage language pedagogies and thus dealing with heritage speakers in the classroom setting.