Age & Language Learning PDF

Age 2 To Get You Thinking Before You Read 1. Language learning is often considered according to learners’ ages: young learner, adolescent, adult. How do you think these groups should be defi...

Age 2 To Get You Thinking Before You Read 1. Language learning is often considered according to learners’ ages: young learner, adolescent, adult. How do you think these groups should be defined? 2. In your opinion, how important is the age factor in language learning? Can you think of any examples? 3. When it comes to learning language, do you think is age related to other learner variables? If so, which ones? 4. How should age differences be managed in a classroom? Do you have any experience of this from a learner’s or a teacher’s point of view? If so, please describe your experience and what you did about it. Background Of all the many learner variables which have the potential to affect language learning, none is less malleable than age. Motivation, autonomy, style, strategies, beliefs, affec- tive states are all potentially amenable to some degree of adaptation, and even rela- tively stable attributes such as aptitude, personality or gender may not be absolutely set in concrete. Context can be changed, learning goals can be re-directed. A student is, however, as old as he or she is, and nothing we (or they) can do will change that. Nevertheless, there is little agreement on the effect of age on the ability to learn language, a question which has given rise to heated controversy and a great deal of discussion and research over the years (for instance, Ausubel, 1964; Bialystok and Hakuta, 1999; Birdsong, 1999; Griffiths, 2008; Hyltenstam and Abrahamsson 2003; Singleton and Lesniewska, 2012; Pfenninger and Singleton 2017a, b; Griffiths and © The Author(s) 2020 11 C. Griffiths, A. Soruç, Individual Differences in Language Learning, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52900-0_2 12 2 Age Soruç, 2018). This chapter will, first of all, consider how learners are typically grouped according to their ages (young, adolescent, adult) and present some of the research on the different age groups before outlining some of the explanations sug- gested for the differences. A small-scale case study of a successful mature learner will then be presented along with implications for language teaching and questions which might stimulate further research. Young Learners Of course, the question of “How young is ‘young’?” is by no means an entirely easy one to answer in absolute terms. This is especially so since the age at which lan- guage is being taught is getting younger and younger in many places in the world, sometimes starting in nursery school, or even from birth. At the other end of the age group, we might ask “When does ‘young’ stop?” Any answer to these questions may have consequences for the teaching of “young” learners since it would seem to be no more than stating the obvious that a child in nursery school needs to be treated differently from a child approaching adolescence. For the purpose of this book, however, let us propose that “young” goes from birth to around 12 years of age, since by the age of 13, the pre-pubescent period has typically ended, and the child becomes a teenager. A number of early studies which investigated young learners and compared them with older learners concluded that younger is better. These classic studies include: Oyama (1976) investigated 60 Italian-born immigrants to the USA and con- cluded that the younger people were when they started learning English, the more native-like was their pronunciation. In the Netherlands, Snow and Hoefnagel-Höhle (1978) discovered that, although their adult immigrant students were well ahead of the children initially, the chil- dren had caught up with or even passed the adults within a year. In Canada, although older students made faster progress in a French bi-lingual programme initially, Harley (1986) concluded that students who started younger were ultimately more successful. Other studies, however, have tended to cast doubt on the “younger is better” idea: In a very extensive study over 10 years and involving 17,000 students of French in Britain, Burstall, Jamieson, Cohen, and Hargreaves (1974) produced results which seemed to indicate that the benefits of early instruction for language devel- opment are short-lived. A study of Canadian immersion programs by Swain (1981) concluded that an earlier start had much less effect than might have been expected. Background 13 More recent studies have tended to be more nuanced in their findings than the older studies, and they have tended to conclude that age interacts in a complex fash- ion with numerous other factors when learning language: Llanes (2010) administered a questionnaire to measure the participants’ progress during a 2–3-month stay abroad, which compared 39 children (ages 10–11) and 46 young adults. Although the results showed that children improved better than the adults, Llanes (ibid.) concluded it was because children spent much more time with native speakers and built up much wider social networks than adults, thus suggesting that factors other than age may be influential in terms of giving younger learners the advantage. In another study, Granena and Long (2013a, b) involved 65 Chinese learners of Spanish with different age of onset (3–6, 7–15, and 16–29 years). They found multiple sensitive periods for different language domains rather than abrupt boundaries, leading to the conclusion that “language aptitude can play a mitigat- ing role, modifying the negative effects of age of acquisition and age in general” (p. 336). In Japan, Nishikawa (2014) involved 47 participants, who were 10 years old and whose parents were non-native speakers of Japanese. The study also included a control group (N=17) of native speakers of Japanese to find out whether early child starters of Japanese could attain nativelike proficiency after constant expo- sure. The researcher concluded that “early onset did not seem to be the only condition for nativelike attainment” (p. 512). When Pfenninger and Singleton (2019) conducted a 5-year study in Switzerland involving 636 secondary-school students, of whom half had studied English from age 8 while the other half had started 5 years later, they concluded that the effect of age was overshadowed by other factors such as individual differences and context. However, although the evidence that younger is not necessarily better seems to be mounting, there does seem to be a global trend for introducing non-primary lan- guages (especially English) at younger and younger ages. Adolescent Learners By the time a child is around 13 years of age, s/he enters into a different phase of life, commonly known as adolescence, which may have its own sets of challenges, both for learners and for those who are trying to teach them. As with “young” learn- ers, there is no absolute agreement about when adolescence begins and ends, but it is commonly agreed that it starts with the onset of puberty and continues until around the end of the teenage years. By this stage, adolescents are usually working through Piaget’s (1950) Formal Operations stage when they become increasingly capable of logical and abstract thought. 14 2 Age As Costley (2018, p. 19) puts it, adolescence is a period “in which significant physiological, cognitive and social change takes place”. In terms of learning lan- guage, an adolescent is past the “Critical Period” (Lenneberg, 1967; Penfield & Roberts, 1959). However, does this mean s/he is incapable of learning a language? Given that evidence is mounting that language can be learnt “until quite late in life” (Kinsella & Singleton, 2014, p. 458), it would seem that we must assume that teen- agers are certainly well capable of learning language if they are motivated to do so. A number of authors have looked into issues related to adolescent learning and have made important recommendations regarding the specific characteristics of adolescents which indicate a need to deal with them differently from either younger or older learners. Ryan and Patrick (2001, p. 439) point to the adolescents’ “increased desire for autonomy”. This may sometimes manifest itself in terms of resistance to estab- lished authority, but teenagers need to be allowed a certain level of autonomy since overly restrictive practices can be counterproductive (see the chapter on autonomy for further discussion of this issue). Tragant and Victoria (2006) note the adolescents’ development of metacogni- tion. This means that they are more willing and able to regulate their own learn- ing. Again, teenagers need to be allowed a certain level of freedom to manage their own learning in ways which best suit their developing style in order to avoid demotivation (see the chapter on style for further discussion of this issue). Harklau (2007) considers the effect of the adolescents’ developing sense of iden- tity. This is intimately tied up with their vision of their future selves, and how they want to be viewed by others. This, in turn, will affect motivation and will- ingness to invest time and effort in learning language, which may or may not accord with their future vision of themselves (see the chapter on motivation for further discussion of this issue). Merga (2014) looks at the influence of peer pressure on motivation. This will affect their willingness to invest time and effort in a learning endeavour which may not be in harmony with peer expectations and judgements, which can be harsh, and difficult for developing egos to deal with (more on this also in the chapter on motivation). Although adolescents can be challenging from the point of view of teachers who may at times have difficulty maintaining a required level of discipline among indi- viduals who are struggling to exercise their autonomy, manage peer relationships, and develop their own identity, Costley (2018, p. 20) argues that “Instead of being a hindrance, adolescence, and the co-occurring cognitive, emotional and psychologi- cal changes that take place at this time, have a positive impact on learning and are in fact beneficial, if classroom practices and learning opportunities are effectively designed and delivered”. Similarly, therefore, to young learners, we might conclude that successful language learning in adolescence depends not only on isolated vari- ables such as aptitude, but on a complex mixture of factors such as motivation, autonomy, style, cognitive development, affect and social influences. And, of course, Background 15 we cannot overlook the major physiological changes which take place dynamically over this period, and which inevitably impact learners’ psychological reactions, including their response to contextual characteristics, such as the physical class- room environment, their classmates and their teacher. Adult Learners Much of the research on adult learners has been negative in terms of older learner success. Examples include: A well-known case study describes a 10-month study of Alberto, a 33-year-old Costa Rican living in the USA. Although test results indicated that Alberto did not lack in cognitive ability, he appeared to lack motivation to learn English and made very little progress during the 10 months of the study (Schumann, 1975). Wes, a Japanese artist living in Hawaii, was also 33 years old. According to Schmidt (1983), Wes had a strong drive to communicate, and his oral compe- tence developed considerably. However, he showed little or no interest in formal study, and, as a result, he remained unable to read or write in English and gram- matical control remained low. Another example of an unsuccessful adult, Burling (1981) recounts his own experience of trying to learn Swedish while spending a year as a guest professor at a Swedish university. Burling was in his mid-50s, and he considered himself to have high motivation and positive attitudes. Nevertheless, he judged his own progress as “distinctly unsatisfactory” (p. 280). Griffiths (2003) reports the case of Yuki, a 44-year-old Japanese woman who came to New Zealand with her children. Wanting to stay with her children, rather than having to return to Japan leaving them behind, she applied for a student visa and was placed in the lowest class, where she made minimal progress. Yuki thought English was difficult to learn because “my mind is blank”, which she ascribed to her age. Nevertheless, in spite of these well-known studies which present a negative view of adult language learners, there has been “growing evidence that some learners who start learning as adults can achieve a native-like competence” (Ellis, 2008, p. 31). Examples of positive studies include: Neufeld’s (1978) study of adult native speakers of English in Canada seemed to indicate that adults could acquire native-like pronunciation when learning other languages. Ioup, Boustagui, El Tigi, and Moselle (1994) document a case of a successful adult language learner who achieved native-like performance in a new language (Arabic) within about 2 years when her new husband was conscripted into the army, and she was left in a situation of total immersion with her husband’s rela- tives in Egypt. 16 2 Age A number of adult Dutch learners of English in a study by Bongaerts, van Summeren, Planken, and Schils (1997) could not be distinguished from native speakers, suggesting that “it is not impossible to achieve an authentic, native-like pronunciation of a second language after a specified biological period of time” (Bongaerts et al., 1997, p. 447). Although they found that overall, target language attainment was negatively cor- related with age, Birdsong and Molis (2001, p. 235) nevertheless found “modest evidence of nativelike attainment among late learners”. A case study reported by Griffiths (2003) describes Kang, a 41-year-old Korean placed in the lowest elementary class when he arrived at the language school in New Zealand. He had left his wife and young children in Korea and obviously missed them. Nevertheless, Kang settled single-mindedly to his work, and by the end of his 7-month course, he was working in the advanced class. Asked why he thought he had made such good progress, Kang replied, “My heart is 100% want to learn”. His motivation was to learn English in order to improve his job pros- pects and provide better opportunities for his family, and he was more successful than many of the much younger students with whom he studied. Profiles of successful adult learners are presented by Muńoz and Singleton (2007) who asked L2 adult learners of English to re-tell the narrative of a movie. Judged by native speakers of English, two of the students scored within the native speaker range. Reichle (2010) discovered high levels of native-like proficiency among some of the adult participants in his study. He concluded that “these results are incompat- ible with the traditional notion of a critical period for second language acquisi- tion” (p. 53). When Kinsella and Singleton (2014) investigated 20 adult Anglophone near-­ native users of French, three of the participants (all married to a French spouse, with either bilingual or French-speaking children, and strong links to the French community) scored within the native speaker range. The authors noted that “a number of affective variables seemed to play a markedly more important role than maturational factors in the high attainment” (p. 441), and they concluded that “native-likeness remains attainable until quite late in life” (p. 458). Study abroad students (N=102) were recruited by Baker-Smemoe, Dewey, Bown, and Martinsen (2014). Results showed that cultural sensitivity and social networks rather than age significantly contributed to learners’ target language development. Although it is common to find studies claiming that younger is better, especially for phonology, Moyer’s (2014) study found some “exceptional outcomes” (p. 418) in phonology for late target language (TL) starters, and argued that “age of onset (AO) by itself is not a sufficient explanation for attainment” (p. 421). Studies such as these led Muńoz and Singleton (2011, p. 26) to argue for a “loos- ening of the association” between age and language attainment. And, as with both young learners and adolescents, a complex amalgamation of variables other than age per se seem to contribute to successful language learning for adults. These Explaining Age-related Differences in Language Learning 17 include motivation, affect, cultural and social factors, as well as exposure to the target language context. Explaining Age-related Differences in Language Learning Possible explanations for age-related differences in language development are var- ied, including neurological, psycho-affective, and contextual. Neurological Maturation From a neurological point of view, it has been suggested that there is a critical period for language development (often known as the Critical Period Hypothesis or CPH), during which language can be acquired or learnt more quickly and easily than at other stages of life (Lenneberg, 1967; Penfield and Roberts, 1959). Past this point, the process of myelination progressively wraps the nerves of the brain in myelin sheaths (Long, 1990) which, like concrete pathways in a garden, define learning pathways, making it easier to get from one point to another, and removing the need to re-learn information or procedures every time they are encountered, but reducing flexibility. However, although much of the evidence seems to point to the fact that younger students are more successful than older students, especially in the long term (e.g. Harley, 1986; Oyama, 1976; Snow and Hoefnagel-Höhle, 1978), the exceptions such as Julie (Ioup et al., 1994), as well as those mentioned by Bongaerts et al. (1997), Muńoz and Singleton (2007) and Griffiths (2003) render any dogmatic assertions on the subject unsustainable. As Bialystok and Hakuta (1999, p. 177) put it: “biological restrictions such as brain maturation should not be so easily overturned”. In recent years, technological advances have made the exploration of brain activ- ity increasingly viable. According to Paradis (1994), a first language is acquired implicitly, whereas a language learned after the end of the critical period is learned explicitly, and the two systems are developed in different areas of the brain. Ullman’s (2001) Declarative/Procedural Model also argues for first and subsequent languages being processed in different areas of the brain. However, according to Green’s (2003) Convergence Hypothesis, both first and subsequent languages are mediated by a common neurolinguistic network. Abutalebi (2008) also concludes that the same neural structures are engaged for both first and subsequent languages. Although research in this area is still relatively new, and results are often inconclu- sive, contradictory and difficult to interpret (see Muńoz and Singleton, 2011 for more details and discussion on this issue), evidence seems to be mounting that the functioning of the neurolinguistic systems of the brain are not age-dependent, or at least not entirely so. The fact probably remains, however, that most who do manage to learn a new language to a high level usually started relatively young. If biological age cannot explain this, we need to consider other possible factors. 18 2 Age Psycho-affective Factors Psycho-affective factors have been suggested as a major reason why younger learn- ers are often more successful than older learners at learning a new language (e.g. Krashen and Terrell, 1983). These variables might include cognitive differences (such as aptitude), affective factors (such as culture or language shock, motivation and investment) or various other individual differences. Cognitive differences between older and younger learners have been hypothe- sized as an explanation of the results of several studies which have found that adults often make faster initial progress with language learning, but younger learners are more successful in the long run (e.g. Harley, 1986; Snow and Hoefnagel-Höhle, 1978). More recently, Muñoz (2006) came to a similar conclusion: the older learn- ers performed better than the younger ones initially (after 200 hours of instruction), but after 726 hours, the gap had decreased considerably. Krashen (1985) explains older learners’ faster initial progress in terms of their ability to negotiate meaning, while according to Ellis (1985), older students can consciously think about the rules which gives them an initial advantage. It has been suggested that affective variables such as culture shock (which leaves the learner feeling confused and excluded) and language shock (which leaves the learner feeling nervous and humiliated) may be the most important factors associ- ated with adult language learning (e.g. Schumann, 1975, 1976). Language and cul- ture shock are likely to affect motivation, since, as one matures, and already has a well-established linguistic resource at one’s disposal, the motivation to invest in learning a new language may be challenging to find. Indeed, it has been suggested that motivation is the most significant single factor which determines how success- ful an individual will be at learning a language, irrespective of age (e.g. Dörnyei, MacIntyre, and Henry 2015; Ushioda, 2008). It is motivation which will determine the level of investment (in terms of how hard they work, for how long, and how much they are prepared to sacrifice in terms of other resources) learners are pre- pared to make (e.g. Norton Peirce, 1995; Darvin & Norton, 2015; Norton, 2012). In addition, there is a potentially almost infinite number of individual variables which might impact on language learning. Commonly listed among these factors are gender, aptitude, personality, learning style, strategies, attitude, beliefs, auton- omy and prior learning experience as well as personal factors such as family, job and health. When these factors are all combined, they produce an incredibly com- plex and dynamic picture, which, in its totality, constitutes a learner’s sense of identity. Identity is increasingly being recognized as a powerful determiner of successful language learning (e.g. Gao and Lamb, 2011; Norton, 2013). As we mature, our sense of who we are (and are not) becomes more established, and we may tend to become less willing to accept change of any kind. Our language is one factor which contributes to our sense of who we are, as noted by the adult university students in a study by Soruç and Griffiths (2015). Although there was some initial uptake of native-speaker features of spoken English in this study, by the time of the delayed post-test, most of these features were no longer being used, which several of the Explaining Age-related Differences in Language Learning 19 students attributed to conflict with their own identity. In other words, as Piller (2002) comments, identity is actually more important than age when it comes to learning a language. Social and Ecological Context The concept of social distance was introduced by Schumann (1976) to describe how similar or dissimilar cultures are from each other and to explain why people tend to find some cultures (and their languages) easier to adapt to than others. Young people generally seem to have less problem with social distance than adults, since they commonly want to identify with a peer group, which will often mean that they are willing to adopt the peer group’s way of speaking; in other words, they are less “culture-bound” (Valdes, 1986). Adults, however, often deliberately retain a distinc- tive accent in order to maintain their identity. Socio-affective variables are consid- ered by some to be the most powerful influences on the differences in language learning ability according to age. For instance, describing his own “distinctly unsat- isfactory” (p. 280) attempts to learn Swedish when he spent a year as guest profes- sor in Sweden, Burling (1981) is in no doubt that “generalized social changes” (p. 290) are the main cause of age-related differences in language development, which mean “an adult is likely to give up and conclude that he has lost the capacity to learn a language” (p. 284). A key feature which distinguishes one sociocultural group from another is the ecological context in which they operate (e.g. Kramsch, 1993). Children who move from one context to another often have little difficulty, but adults may struggle to adapt to different customs or, perhaps, a different language, which may conflict with their own established ways of doing things and require a renegotiation of identity (Pavlenko and Blackledge, 2003). According to their age, it is possible that learning context or the ecological environment may affect students differently, as argued by Pfenninger (2017). Learning situation can vary considerably from a formal class- room to naturalistic environments (where students learn by being immersed in the target language), to distance learning. Classrooms can also vary greatly, and classes may be conducted during the day or at night. All of these ecological factors may affect students differently according to their individual characteristics, including their age. Perhaps most important of all contextual factors in terms of target language development is the opportunity for exposure to the target language. Marinova-Todd (2003), for instance, found that out of 30 participants from 25 countries, the 6 most proficient students all lived with native speakers of the target language. Moyer (2009) also discovered that interactive experience in the target language was more critical for target language development than instruction. Likewise, in a study involving 11 Spanish students, Muńoz and Singleton (2007) found that the most proficient learners were living with native speakers of English. In other words, although, perhaps, merely living in an input-rich environment does not necessarily guarantee that a learner will be motivated to use the opportunity to learn, there is Sex/Gender 3 To Get You Thinking Before You Read 1. What do you see as the difference between sex and gender? 2. Do you agree that females are better language learners than males or vice versa? 3. How does sex/gender interact with other variables, such as beliefs, style, race/ethnicity/nationality/culture, aptitude/proficiency, personality, strate- gies, autonomy, affect/emotion, motivation or socio-ecological context? Background The two terms which form the title of this chapter are often used more-or-less syn- onymously. Strictly applied, however, sex is a biological attribute (whether the indi- vidual is male or female). Gender, on the other hand, is more a culturally constructed concept, which may include commonly accepted behavioural norms, language, dress codes, etc., and which is often described in terms of masculine and feminine. When we first learn about a new baby, sex is often the first individual difference to attract a question: “Is it a boy or a girl”? everyone wants to know. And a child’s sex will begin to shape its identity from the time it is born (or even before). From this time forward, an individual’s sex “will be a powerful factor contributing to opportunities which will be open or closed” (Griffiths, 2018, p. 56). In fact, as Sunderland (1994, p.211) explains, “the effects of gender roles, relations and identi- ties are everywhere. Ironically, because of this, in much writing and thinking on English language teaching, gender appears nowhere”. Why is there such reluctance to deal with this topic, we might wonder? Is it because it seems so obvious it is hardly worth further investigation? Is it because of nervousness since it is a topic where it is treacherously easy for the unwary to © The Author(s) 2020 29 C. Griffiths, A. Soruç, Individual Differences in Language Learning, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52900-0_3 30 3 Sex/Gender inadvertently stray into politically incorrect territory? As Nyikos (2008, p.74) clearly states, however “the potential for gender to affect language learning can…not be ignored”. So, what is the effect of sex/gender on language development? There are a number of studies which investigate this relationship (for instance, Bacon, 1992; Boyle, 1987; Burstall, 1975; Eisenstein, 1982; Farhady, 1982; Nyikos, 1990, 2008; Sunderland, 1998, 2000). On a biological level, some research appears to indicate that women have more nerve cells in the left half of the brain where language is centred, and, in addition, women often appear to use both sides of the brain (Legato, 2005). It is com- monly believed that females are better language learners than males, (e.g. Ellis, 1994; Larsen-Freeman and Long, 1991, although, as these authors point out, consistent research evidence to support this belief has proven elusive). It is also possible that girls’ linguistic development may be as much a social phenomenon as it is a biological one, since, as Nyikos (2008, p.75) notes: “much of the perceived female superiority in language capability may be due to the added effort which adults tend to lavish on baby girls compared with baby boys”. And if we are to consider the relationship of sex/ gender to the development of linguistic proficiency, we also need to consider the rela- tionships to other variables, such as culture, aptitude, personality, style, strategies, autonomy, beliefs, affect and motivation. Let us look at these one at a time. Culture If we refer to the study of culture shock reported in Chap. 4 of this volume and analyse the data according to sex/gender, we find no significant differences according to any of the items, in either cultural context (Australia and Turkey). Neither males nor females report being significantly more homesick or lonely. Neither report having more difficulty with being understood, understanding others or making friends. There are no significant differences for problems such as religion, culture, or getting on with people. Neither are males or females more or less concerned about food, prejudice, feelings of not belong- ing or people’s perceived coldness. Almost the only suggestion of a sex/gen- der difference is Ana’s comment that she feels some prejudice because she wears a scarf. In spite of this, she prefers life in Australia, which, presumably, suggests that her concern over this matter is not too strong. In a study of international students’ views, Çetin, Bahar and Griffiths (2017) also found that there were relatively few significant differences between men’s (N = 185) and women’s (N = 124) views of Turkish culture, and most were only at the p