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The poor writing outcomes of Jamaican students across all levels of education have been a subject of lament for educators and policymakers for several years. Despite such concerns, very little research has explored the challenges experienced by learners with Jamaican Creole as a home language when writing in English. While Jamaican Creole is the first language of most speakers, only Standard Jamaican English (English) is afforded official status and therefore is the language of instruction. Within this context, many children are educated through the medium of English while their first language is often disregarded and denigrated in the classroom. Given the differences between the languages, particularly in the areas of morphosyntax and phonology, as well as the importance of these skills in writing - it is worth exploring the nature of writing among learners in the Jamaican context. The present study therefore explores the characteristics of writing among learners with Jamaican Creole as their home language relative to their English dominant peers and investigates whether there are specific writing challenges experienced by these learners. The wider ecology of the writing classroom (instruction, curriculum, and language education policy) is also taken into consideration to gain a fuller understanding of student writing outcomes. A sequential mixed methods design consisting of three phases of gradually increasing focus was employed. In the first phase, a systematic review of the research on writing development among learners more typically identified as EAL was conducted to provide some insight on the nature of writing among learners whose home language differs from English -- the language of schooling. This was followed by the content analyses of the Jamaican curriculum and policy documents guiding writing instruction. In the final stages, semi-structured interviews were carried out with classroom teachers and language and literacy measures were administered to 90 Jamaican primary school students in Grade Six. Statistically significant differences were found in the overall writing outcomes of learners with Jamaican Creole as a home language and their peers with English as a home language (p < .001), with the former group performing more poorly on all writing subskills. In terms of the ecology of the writing classroom -- instructional approaches more in line with English immersion were dominant in both the classroom and the policy and curriculum documents, with teachers reporting feeling ill-equipped to teach writing in the Jamaican creole context. Findings from each phase of the study are integrated and discussed with reference to the simple view of writing and wider research to create a fuller account of the writing outcomes of learners with Jamaican Creole as a home language. Implications for second language writing theory as well as for writing pedagogy and policy in creole-speaking contexts are also discussed.

Among the most notable findings in recent bilingualism research is that the two languages are constantly active, thus giving rise to complex interactions, in the bilingual mind. One of the natural consequences of these interactions is the non-pathological attrition of the firstly acquired language, which is here understood as the manifestation of selective and reversible changes in the way the first language is processed and produced by speakers of a second language. In the last forty years, these changes have been investigated mainly in long-term residents immersed in a second language environment (usually anglophone countries) rather narrowly, by focusing only on a single domain in the first language. What happens to other types of late (i.e., post-puberty) bilingual speakers in different language domains at the same time, alongside what happens to their second language, is mostly underexamined. Hence, this thesis aims to fill the aforementioned research gaps by investigating the attrition of a firstly acquired language (English) in three different language domains (the lexicon, syntactic interfaces and prosody) of two types of late bilingual speakers (British classroom-based learners of Italian at UK universities as well as British long-term residents in Italy), by also considering what happens in their second language (Italian) within the same domains. The results of this research show, firstly, that similar types of lexical retrieval interference are experienced by both classroom learners and long-term residents, with only a slightly higher degree of interference being experienced by long-term residents. Secondly, syntactic interface structures are selectively affected by first language attrition only for long-term residents, even though both bilingual groups resolve syntactic ambiguities in the second language similar to a control group of first language speakers of Italian (despite some processing delays). Thirdly, while prosodic changes in the first language are not reported for either bilingual group - at least in initial confirmatory analyses - both groups do seem to have acquired the prosodic patterns of their second language, with long-term residents being virtually indistinguishable from Italian controls. Taken together, the findings of this thesis lend support to the idea that non-pathological attrition of a first language is a natural by-product of bilingualism, as it is found to affect the processing and production of different first language domains for both late bilingual groups examined. Crucially, these research findings reveal that the extent to which attrition is experienced varies according to the language domain and the specific structure under investigation. Interestingly, an inverse relationship between the second language and the first language is found for some bilingual speakers in certain areas, but not conclusively in others (e.g., for long-term residents in some aspects of the lexicon and syntax, but whether this is also the case for their prosody is not yet clear). This work thus points to the need for further research into first language attrition and second language acquisition, to fully understand the complex relationship between the two languages in the bilingual mind.

Informed by a critical realist perspective and using a multiple case study methodology, this PhD study recruited, interviewed and analysed 12 cases of white South African (wSAn) learners in the post-apartheid era who reached a high proficiency in an indigenous African language (AfL) as a second or additional language (L2). The phenomenon of study, L2 AfL learning (L2AfLL) by wSAns, was characterised as a form of L2 indigenous language learning (L2ILL) by settler-descendants occurring in other post-colonial contexts like New Zealand and Kenya, among others. As an overall framing device, an investment metaphor was reconceptualised for the purposes of this study as the 'L2 Investment' framework - inspired, but divergent, from Norton's (1995) construct of investment and later investment model (with Darvin, 2015). Six core cases were selected and analysed in depth; in the cross-case analysis, these were complemented by a further six peripheral cases, in order to achieve a measure of analytic generalisation from the inclusion of limit cases (Campbell & Yin, 2018). Viewed through an L2 Investment frame, it was found that successful investment in L2AfLL occurred in cases with nominal access to AfLs in high school; ideal neurophysiology and prior human capital; and intrinsic motivation. For those who lacked such ideal personal conditions, guardian investment by parents was sufficient to catalyse investment behaviour, or the introduction of circumstantial necessity through moving to an AfL-dominant, rural area. All successful cases were found to have committed to a 'transgressive modality' of L2AfLL, in which class and spatial boundaries were overcome. This was undertaken either in isolation, or in addition to an academic modality (high school or university). Beyond a narrow focus on the conditions for and development of linguistic capital, fluency in an AfL was typically found to be leverageable for further social and symbolic capital, limited occupational gain, as well as what was termed zookairotic capital - e.g. emergent senses of rootedness, legitimacy, physical and psychological security, and joy. This emerged primarily for investors themselves, but also for most AfL-speaking interlocutors. Evidence was thus found for the value of multiple instances of symmetrical multilingualism (Orman, 2007), with implications for broader social welfare and nation-building.

This study sets off to fill in a gap in the L2 research literature on empty categories in Mandarin Chinese by examining second language (L2) acquisition of a type of Chinese verb-less constructions by English-speaking learners. The verb-less constructions in question are Chinese gapping-like constructions which bear a surface resemblance to English canonical gapping constructions. Despite the surface similarities shared by Chinese gapping-like constructions and English canonical gapping, the two verb-less constructions derive from different syntactic representations, which is reflected in their different distributions. Moreover, there exist some semantic constraints unique to Chinese gapping-like constructions. The present study investigates both offline acceptability judgment and online production of Chinese gapping-like constructions by native MC speakers and L2 learners. It sets off to explore whether the similarities and differences between Chinese and English affect the developmental course and ultimate attainment of L2 Chinese gapping-like constructions at both the narrow syntax and the interface levels. The present study aims to contribute to the ongoing debates on two major topics in L2 research: i. the learnability of interface properties; ii. the effect of L1. 29 native Chinese speakers and 70 English-speaking learners of Mandarin Chinese ranging from beginners to advanced learners participated in the study, taking an online elicitation imitation task as well as an offline acceptability judgment task. It is found that both narrow syntactic properties and interface properties pose challenges in L2 acquisition of Chinese gapping-like VBE (Verb Ellipsis), which indicates that learnability issues are not specific to interfaces. The present study regards L1-L2 asymmetry as the primary cause for the persistent non-nativelike L2 attainment at both the narrow syntax level and the interface level. Meanwhile, other factors such as proficiency and input also play important roles in shaping learners' L2 grammars and L2 speech production mechanisms.

Study abroad (SA) has long been regarded as a learning environment that is beneficial to second language acquisition (SLA), especially in competencies related to social interactions (Kinginger, 2011). However, little is known about whether SA students make actual gains in domains of English they are typically exposed to outside of classroom settings such as phrasal verbs (PVs), and whether their informal language contact contributes to such development. To explore this relationship, this study investigates students' PV development and informal language contact, to understand how they make use of the L2 exposure during SA. This longitudinal mixed-methods study collected data from over 250 international foundation year students studying in the UK three times in one academic year. PV data were collected through standardized tests and speech samples, while L2 contact was measured via language contact questionnaires, social network surveys, and semi-structured interviews. Paired-samples t-test revealed that there were significant gains in receptive and productive PV scores between Time 1 and Time 2, while the overall informal language contact and social networks of the participants did not see significant changes from Time 1 to Time 2. Correlation and multiple regressions analyses revealed a stronger relationship between informal language contact and PV knowledge at Time 2 than at Time 1. Mixed-effects modeling revealed that the overall English proficiency of the participants, corpus frequency of the PVs in the British National Corpus, and the amount of language contact were significant predictors of PV scores, while semantic opacity of PVs, the Chinese L1 of the participants, and L2 social networks were not. This study underscored that the degree-oriented SA participants may have different prioritization and leisure time routines compared with summer school participants or exchange students abroad. With academic prioritization, the participants made limited gains in colloquial L2 vocabulary competency and their highly academic L2 contact did not greatly contribute to PV development.

Learners' native language (L1) influences their knowledge and use of second language (L2) vocabulary, a phenomenon known as lexical transfer. Past research on this shows that learners' L1 influences their L2 word choices, and that lexical similarity-which relates to cognancy-between L1 words and their L2 counterparts facilitates the processing of the L2 words, particularly during the early stages of L2 acquisition, and makes speakers more likely to use the L2 words in spontaneous productions. To extend past research, the present research investigates whether crosslinguistic similarity influences L2 vocabulary use in a task-based, English-as-a-foreign language educational setting. Specifically, it investigates whether increased similarity between languages as a whole increases L2 lexical diversity, and whether increased similarity between L1 words and their L2 counterparts increases the use of the L2 words. It investigates this using two matching learner samples, containing 8,500 and 6,390 English texts, written in response to 95 and 71 tasks, by speakers of 9 typologically diverse L1s, in the A1-B2 CEFR range of L2 proficiency. Surprisingly, lexical similarity between the L1 and the L2 as a whole did not influence L2 lexical diversity, regardless of learners' L2 proficiency. Likewise, lexical similarity between corresponding L1-L2 words did not influence the use of the L2 words, again regardless of L2 proficiency. Conversely, there were strong task effects on both L2 lexical diversity and L2 word choice. These findings show that the facilitative effect of crosslinguistic lexical similarity (especially the cognate facilitation effect) is constrained, and suggest that communicative needs and other task effects can override positive lexical transfer. This highlights the role of situational factors in crosslinguistic influence, and raises questions regarding when and how these and similar factors can override language transfer, for example when it comes to different types of transfer (e.g., positive vs. negative, or lexical vs. syntactic). In addition, this research contains substantial insights into related topics, such as the developmental patterns of L2 lexical diversity, accounting for task effects in language assessment, measuring crosslinguistic distance, and using online platforms to develop language corpora.

Crosslinguistic influence (CLI) is the influence that a bilingual's first language (L1) exerts on their second language (L2) and vice versa. Most research on the causes and effects of the phenomenon focuses on simultaneous bilingual children and syntax-pragmatics interface linguistic structures that are deemed susceptible to CLI. As such, it does not determine whether the phenomenon affects the development of L2 learners and/or the use of linguistic structures that are not susceptible to CLI. To this end, this doctoral project aimed to uncover the role of CLI in Greek children and adults' use of CLI-prone and not CLI-prone structures in English. In Experiment 1, 140 Greek-English sequential bilingual preschool children (35 attending a total immersion programme programme and 35 attending a partial immersion programme, as well as 34 Greek monolingual and 36 English monolingual controls) were tested on their use of sentential subjects (a syntax-discourse interface structure that is susceptible to CLI), once in Greek and once in English. The bilingual children were found to omit sentential subjects in English more often than their English monolingual peers. This finding could be attributed to CLI from the children's dominant L1 to their non-dominant L2. Experiment 2 was conducted parallel to Experiment 1, and aimed to ascertain if the subject omissions observed in Experiment 1 were indeed due to CLI. The same children were tested on their use of the subordinate clause marker 'to' (a syntactic structure that is not susceptible to CLI and, thus, could serve as a control) in the two languages. The analyses revealed that bilingual children omitted more clause markers in English than their English monolingual peers. This finding hints that bilingual children are attentive to the (cross-linguistic) distributional properties of the structures they are exposed to. Hence, Experiment 3 was designed to investigate whether the subject omissions observed in Experiment 1 also appeared at a more advanced state of L2 acquisition. To this end, a group of 31 Greek adult L2 learners were tested on their use of referential expressions, and their performance was compared to that of 30 English L1 speakers. Like their child counterparts, the adult L2 learners were also found to omit more sentential subjects from their utterances than the L1 controls - an effect attributed to CLI from the learners' L1, Greek, to their L2, English. Considered together, the results of these three experiments highlight that sequential bilingual children pattern with adult L2 learners in terms of their production (and CLI patterns therein). Moreover, they do not support traditional accounts of CLI which predict the phenomenon to arise in the case of structural overlap and/or just for interface linguistic structures. To provide a uniform account of omissions in L2 acquisition, the effects observed across the three experiments could be explained under a usage-based account that considers the structures' distribution in the L1 (and L2) input as well as the attentional mechanisms that sequential bilingual and L2 learners have developed through their exposure to the L1.

The significance attributed to cross-linguistic influence/L1 transfer has long been seen by researchers from different angles in the field of Applied linguistics, second language acquisition research and language teaching (Ellis 1994, Odlin 1989). Irrespective of the myriad of transfer studies that have been conducted over the past four decades, there still remains a surprising level of confusion and uncertainty in the field concerning the time, the place, the pattern and the extent of the manifestation of first language in the second language learners' use of the target language (Jarvis 2000). The current research examines the attitudes of Nigerian teachers towards the teaching and learning of L2 phonology and the challenges the L2 learners usually encounter in a bid to acquire the spoken aspect of English language in Nigeria. The study attempts to find out the main causes of difficulties in the area of L2 acquisition of English phonology in the hope of discovering some effective ways of overcoming such difficulties. The research adopted a qualitative research design and made use of the ethnographic method of data collection. The data collected were analysed using the iterative method of content data analysis. The findings of this research suggest that apart from the influence of the mother tongue (L1), the learning of L2 phonology of English in Nigeria is encumbered by socio-economic and political factors. The thesis argues that there is a possibility that the influences of the above factors on the L2 learners of English in Nigeria are higher than that of the L1. There are few context specific studies of L2 acquisition of English phonology in Nigeria. This research therefore makes a significant contribution to the literature in this area and to the ways in which language use is theorized.

Over the past twenty years, one of the most debated questions in bilingual acquisition is how heritage language speakers acquire their heritage language. In this thesis, we address how Greek heritage children acquire their heritage language. The heritage language is the first language (L1) children begin acquiring from birth that corresponds to a minority language. Gradually in the course of language development, the heritage language is taken over from the majority language of the environment where bilingual children grow up. Eventually, the majority language becomes the heritage children's second dominant language (L2). Under this language contact situation, the grammar of the heritage language in children is characterised by linguistic variation and change. The aim of this thesis is to explore the morphosyntactic features that are vulnerable (susceptible to change) in Greek heritage language acquisition as they are affected by contact with the majority language English. We argue, first, that ambiguous and opaque morphosyntactic features, such as case, qualify for a vulnerable structure in the acquisition of a heritage language. Second, we look at how factors like proficiency and exposure to the heritage language as well as the age of onset of the L2 contribute to the linguistic change of the heritage language. The present thesis addresses these questions in three experiments examining the acquisition of the nominal inflectional morphology in a variety of constructions in Greek heritage language children with English as their dominant L2. Study 1 (Chapter 2) investigates gender identification of gender inflection on nouns and determiners via an offline picture selection task. The results show that morphological salience overrides suffix ambiguity, and that syncretic suffixes undermine the identification of the gender value. Receptive vocabulary proficiency and cumulative length of exposure to the heritage language were found to affect gender comprehension. Study 2 (Chapter 3) examines the comprehension of case on nouns and determiners via an offline truth value judgement task. The results demonstrate that ambiguous suffixes do not override paradigmatic syncretism in structures with non-canonical word order and that Greek heritage children had lower accuracy than the monolingual peers but still higher accuracy than other reported Greek heritage children in the US. Gender comprehension accuracy from Study 1, receptive morphosyntactic proficiency, receptive vocabulary proficiency as well as cumulative length of exposure to the heritage language influenced case comprehension accuracy. Study 3 (Chapter 4) investigates the comprehension of referential short distance which-questions via an offline visual world paradigm task. The results reveal that non-ambiguous case suffixes when presented early in the sentence do not modulate comprehension and that ambiguous case suffixes in structures with non-canonical word order are not interpreted using the case-marking cues of the heritage language. The combination of gender comprehension accuracy to the heritage language from Study 1, case comprehension accuracy to the heritage language from Study 2 as well as receptive vocabulary proficiency to the dominant L2 contributed to heritage children's sentence interpretation accuracy and strategies. In the Discussion (Chapter 5), we argue that these findings taken together as a whole suggest that the heritage language has quantitative differences with the baseline control grammar found in native speakers of the heritage language. Heritage language children seem to use sentence comprehension strategies such as SVO word order over non-canonical sentences from their dominant L2 in structures of their heritage language that present variability and as such are vulnerable. The variation shown in sentence comprehension strategies provides evidence for future research that can explore how the sentence comprehension strategies of heritage language children unfold, and how factors like quality and quantity of the attrited parental input affect the development of the heritage language.

Motivation has been identified as a core mechanism in promoting achievement in language learning. Scant research, however, has been conducted into this construct in the field of Arabic as a Foreign Language (AFL). Arabic is multiglossic-consisting of a spectrum of standard, classical, and colloquial varieties-and has distinct ties to religion, thus presenting a unique case in terms of language learning motivation. This research examines the motivation of UK secondary school students studying for the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) in Arabic, using the lens of Dörnyei's (2009) Second Language Motivational Self System (L2MSS). The central hypothesis of this study-that motivation is a multi-componential, dynamic, and language-variety specific construct, which interacts with proficiency-is investigated by means of a longitudinal, mixed-methods design. The study adopts elements of Complex Dynamic Systems Theory (CDST; Dörnyei & Ryan, 2015), approaching motivation as a system within which there are multiple constituents and mechanisms, each themselves complex, and which interact with each other, often in a non-linear fashion. Data was collected from an initial sample of 265 students studying the Arabic GCSE in multiple schools around England at the beginning and end of one academic year (2017-2018). Motivation was measured in relation to three broad Arabic varieties: Modern Standard Arabic; Classical Arabic; and Dialects, operationalised according to the pragmatic language functions of each. To capture the complexity of learners' motivational self-concepts in relation to these language varieties, a new set of instruments measuring learners' Current, Ideal, and Ought-to selves was designed and tested for reliability and validity. The responses to these instruments were subsequently analysed to determine the structural validity of the L2MSS in the context of learning Arabic in UK schools. The nature, strengths, and interactions of learners' multiglossic self-concepts, along with their scores on two proficiency tests, were explored using t-tests and path model analysis. This facilitated the identification of intra-language variability in learners' self-concepts, interactions between their variety-specific current and future selves, and the relationships between the self-concepts and proficiency outcome measures, from both longitudinal and cross-sectional perspectives. Along with this quantitative data, interviews were conducted with 95 participants, which offer in-depth insights into the workings of the L2MSS and the legitimacy and efficacy of the model, as it currently stands, in capturing the diversity and complexity of motivation in this specific language learning context. The quantitative and qualitative datasets are analysed both individually and in concert, so as to integrate the findings and to present as comprehensive a picture of GCSE Arabic learners' motivations as possible. The findings offer provisional validation for the underlying tripartite structure of the L2MSS in the context of AFL in secondary schools, as well as providing empirical support for the conceptualisation of this language as multiglossic in nature. However, the results of the analyses undertaken in this study also: (1) challenge the strength of traditional links between self-concepts and outcome measures; (2) highlight issues with and propose expansions to the constructs of the Current and Ideal selves; (3) underscore the problematic nature of the construct of the Ought-to Self; (4) propose the integration of a new self-concept component, the Past Self; and (5) question the role of the central underlying mechanism of the model-self-discrepancy-in promoting progress in language learning. These findings have wide-reaching implications for policy, pedagogy, and research in the realms of Arabic learning and as well as the study of motivation theory within the field of second language acquisition.

This study aimed to explore the acquisition of articles by Arabic speaking Saudi EFL learners, specifically examining the problematic aspects of English articles usage. In particular, this study tested two different but interrelated hypotheses: The 'Fluctuation Hypothesis' and the 'Missing Surface Inflection Hypothesis'. In order to test the hypotheses, the study adopted a multi-method approach to data collection. The researcher used a survey questionnaire, test instruments and interviews for collecting the data. The sample consisted of 120 undergraduate ESL students and 10 teachers from two different Saudi universities. The data analysis revealed that the majority of the participants had difficulties in understanding the indefinite articles a/an and the null article Ø. However, it was found that they were confident in using the definite article the. This study noted different kinds of errors made by the participants. They include omission (dropping articles), substitution (using definite the in place of indefinite a/an), and addition (the use of articles in the place of zero articles). Further, the similarity that the English article system shares with the Arabic article system in using the definite article the had a positive influence on the students' acquiring the definite article in English. Contrarily, the study found a negative influence of the Arabic article system in learning English articles, resulting in the overgeneralization of rules derived from the Arabic article al-. The study confirmed all the hypotheses. First, Arabic EFL speakers produced the definite article the in English in definite contexts because of the Full Transfer Hypothesis that Arabic has overt article forms that represent definiteness. Next, the findings offered sufficient evidence to state that Arabic learners of English transfer the marking of definiteness from Arabic into their interlanguage grammar for English. It suggests that Arabic learners of English fluctuate between a/the in [-definiteness, +/-specific] contexts; in other words, with indefinite specific NPs (noun phrases). Moreover, the results reveal the fact that Arabic learners often omit articles, which provides evidence for the MSIH hypothesis.

In the history of pidgins and creoles, many documented contact languages are European-based ones because they arose as a direct result of European colonial expansion between the sixteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century. However, contact languages are developing entirely outside the European context as a result of ongoing international migration and economic integration created by globalisation. One such newly emerging pidgin is known as Gulf Pidgin Arabic (GPA). This unique linguistic phenomenon is a simplified contact variety of the Arabic language used in the Gulf States for communication between native Arabic speakers and foreign workers, as well as among the workers themselves. Pidgin languages have not been studied until relatively recently, since the middle of the last century. Similarly, GPA has received relatively little attention in the literature, apart from a few descriptive works such as Abed (2017), Almoaily (2012), Avram (2014), Næss (2008), Smart (1990), and Wiswal (2002). Importantly, there is an increasing labour market demand for women migrants in the Gulf, and this demand is often more stable than that for men; however, no studies to date have investigated the gender and language variation in Gulf countries conditioned by length of stay or substrate language. To carry out this research, an integrated research design, combining quantitative and qualitative phases of analysis, is employed to examine data drawn from one-to-one semi-structured interviews. Extensive background research on the Saudi social setting, the Pidgin languages, Gulf Arabic (GA) and GPA, and the major substrate languages of GPA is undertaken to investigate the sociolinguistic and linguistic situations that have resulted in the emergence of GPA. I analyse the influence of the first language of female GPA speakers and the number of years spent in the Gulf as potential factors conditioning language and gender variation in GPA. The dataset for the study consists of interviews with 72 informants from six linguistic backgrounds: Malayalam, Punjabi, Bengali, Tagalog, Sinhala, and Sunda. Interviews were conducted in Riyadh, the capital city of Saudi Arabia. Half of the informants had spent five years or less in the Gulf, while the other half had spent 10 years or more in the area at the time of interview. The analysis is based on 10 morphosyntactic phenomena: free or bound object or possessive pronoun, presence or absence of the Arabic definiteness marker, presence or absence of Arabic conjunction markers, presence or absence of the GPA copula, and presence or absence of agreement in the verb phrase and the noun phrase. Regarding the informants' choice of the studied morphosyntactic features, the results of this thesis demonstrate that the length of stay in the Gulf produces more accommodation to standard GA in women than men. However, this shift was significant for only one feature: conjunction markers. For the influence of the first language, a significant adaptation to the system of GA (the lexifier language) was found for two features: conjunction markers and nominal agreement. Furthermore, with years of stay in the Gulf, there was a significant shift for only two features: conjunction markers and definiteness. This finding could be taken to support both universalist theories and substrate theory of the emergence of contact languages. The two theories seem to have effects on the emergence of pidgins and creoles; it is worth noting that neither are separate from each other, and they can be complementary. Thus, my data supports Mufwene's (1993) complementary theory of genesis, which claims that universal as well as substratal factors can contribute to the emergence of contact languages.

There is a growing evidence base suggesting that the effectiveness of individual teachers is one of the most significant factors in predicting valued pupil outcomes. This has led to much debate about how in-service teachers might continue to develop and improve their practice. This study takes a single subject area (Modern Foreign Languages - MFL) as the context in which to explore teachers’ Professional Learning (PL) needs, experiences and motivations from July 2016 to July 2018. During Year 1, data tracking the PL priorities, experiences, well-being and self-efficacy of 57 MFL teachers clustered in 14 state school languages departments were collected via four iterations of an online questionnaire. Year 8 Students of French in 13 of the 14 schools (n=1370) completed a student perception questionnaire to gauge their classroom experiences. Questionnaire data were followed up with in-depth, semi-structured interviews with Heads of Department in six of the schools. Two languages departments were subsequently identified as productive contexts for teacher PL and in-depth case-studies of these departments were conducted in Year 2. Languages teachers expressed strong interest in accessing PL and they particularly identified the need to develop their preparedness to teach towards new examinations at GCSE and A Level. They also highlighted a need to develop students’ speaking skills and motivation. Over the course of the study, analysis shows very low levels of engagement in PL that shares characteristics with the effective PL practices identified by Cordingley et al. (2015). Very few teachers reported extended engagement in PL activities over the course of multiple sessions. Teachers’ access to PL experiences was shaped by a sharp focus on instrumental organisational aims related to the introduction of new examination specifications and curricula. Although no significant associations were found between teachers’ engagement in PL and pupils’ outcomes at GCSE, a strong correlation was noted between the size of the language department and pupils' value-added outcomes in language GCSEs. The possible underlying reasons for this pattern are discussed. Some Heads of Department perceived the changing curriculum as an opportunity for development and innovation, whereas others conceptualised the changes as a threat to established ways of working and to colleagues’ wellbeing. Working conditions and the nature of relationships between colleagues within institutions shaped the conditions for PL, with accompanying impacts on individual teachers’ sense of self-efficacy, engagement and intention to remain in the profession. The findings of this study have implications for policy makers, school leaders and Heads of Department wishing to build better conditions for teacher learning.

Nowadays, families migrate more frequently than ever before. Regardless of reasons for migration, it has a substantial impact on families in terms of their language, culture, and communication. The linguistic aspect is a key part of this issue, particularly in families with young children who enter school and have to develop a new language. There is a lot of research about the acquisition of a second language and the heritage language loss in an education context. This research focused on socio-emotional factors associated with first language (L1) maintenance and second language (L2) acquisition in a situation of migration in which both languages have implications for education. The relationship between second language acquisition and cognitive factors has been a focus of interest for many authors, but the influence of social and affective factors, such as parental attitude and cultural orientation on L1 and L2 acquisition has not been explored to such an extent. Moreover, Polish migrant families represent a non-traditional, more fluid type of migration, they often travel between their heritage and their host country, so patterns of language acquisition and influencing factors may also be different than those explored in previous studies. The purpose of the longitudinal study was to assess the direction and rate of development of L2 (English) and L1 (Polish) among the children of Polish migrants to Scotland who have just started primary school, and explore the social-emotional factors that might affect this. These consisted of the parents’ acculturation towards the mainstream (British) culture and language, enculturation towards their Polish heritage culture and language, selected family demographic features, and the children’s socio-emotional functioning as measured by the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) (Goodman 1997). Participants of the current study comprised 69 Polish children (37 girls and 32 boys) and the parents of 53 of the sample, resident in central Scotland recruited mainly through Scottish primary schools. There were three main research questions: (1) What is the rate and direction of development of L1 (Polish) and L2 (English) among the 4 to 6 year-old-children of Polish migrants to Scotland?; (2) In 4 to 6-year-old- children of Polish migrants to Scotland is acquisition of L2 and maintenance of L1 associated with parents’ cultural orientation towards Poland and Scotland, parental language attitudes to Polish and English, or socio-demographic factors?; (3) What is the link between L2/L1 acquisition/maintenance and the socio-emotional functioning of a child?; (4) What is the role of engagement with a language in the language acquisition of the 4 to 6 year-old-children of Polish migrants to the UK? The children’s L1 (Polish) and L2 (English) language skills were measured at the start of their first school year using two language proficiency measures (an English one and a Polish one). After 18 months the tests were repeated with the same cohort to give a measure of the change/progress in each language. Additionally, the parents of the assessed children completed the Acculturation Questionnaire, Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire, and Family, Language and Attitudes Questionnaire created for the current study. In regard to Research Question 1, the scores at T2 for English were significantly higher than at T1. However, the overall group score for Polish was significantly lower at T2 than at T1. One key finding was that the Polish did not progress for all but 15 (around 21%) out of 69 children. By contrast, only five (around 7%) out of 69 children did not make any progress on English. For Research Question 2, there was no association between parental cultural orientation scores on either mainstream or heritage scale and the children’s total language scores. Similarly, there was no link between parents’ language attitude scores and their children’s total language scores. However, both cultural orientation and their language attitudes scores predicted the amount of the children’s engagement with a language. In addition, previous language exposure and current language use were in turn strong predictors of L2 language scores. In terms of L1, the amount of engagement with a language was affecting the language scores only in the form of one of its components: the current language use. For Research Question 2, three socio-demographic measures also played a role: children’s place of birth, their time in Scotland and parents’ education. The children’s country of birth (Poland or Scotland) had an effect on their L2 and the length of their stay in Scotland had an effect on both L1 and L2. The parents’ education level influenced their L1 performance in a positive way, but the link between this variable and the children’s L2 results was not straightforward as there was a difference between the effects of fathers’ and mothers’ education. Mothers’ education was strongly associated with the children’s L1 progress. For Research Question 3, the SDQ findings indicated that some, but not all of the SDQ sub-scales (Pro-social, Emotions and Behaviour) in different ways were associated with the children’s language scores. However, both heritage and maintenance cultural orientations of the parents were negatively correlated with psycho-social functioning problems of their children: higher scores on enculturation and higher scores on acculturation parental attitude scales were associated with fewer behavioural problems in their children. Additionally, the parental heritage orientation was associated with their prosocial behaviour. This suggests that parental attitudes do play an indirect role in children’s social adjustment. For Research Question 4, for both Polish and English, in line with current literature, the amount of engagement with a language contributed significantly to the children’s scores. The above findings indicate that although the link between socio-emotional factors and the children’s linguistic development in L1 and L2 is not direct, they do play a role in language acquisition. It helps build a more complete picture of a complex relationship between socio-emotional and cognitive aspects of bilingual child development, contributing to the knowledge of this issue in both research and practice.

Automatic syntactic analysis is essential for extracting useful information from large-scale learner data for linguistic research and natural language processing (NLP). Currently, researchers use standard POS taggers and parsers developed on native language to analyze learner language. Investigation of how such systems perform on learner data is needed to develop strategies for minimizing the cross-domain effects. Furthermore, POS taggers and parsers are developed for generic NLP purposes and may not be useful for identifying specific syntactic constructs such as subcategorization frames (SCFs). SCFs have attracted much research attention as they provide unique insight into the interplay between lexical and structural information. An automatic SCF identification system adapted for learner language is needed to facilitate research on L2 SCFs. In this thesis, we first provide a comprehensive evaluation of standard POS taggers and parsers on learner and native English. We show that the common practice of constructing a gold standard by manually correcting the output of a system can introduce bias to the evaluation, and we suggest a method to control for the bias. We also quantitatively evaluate the impact of fine-grained learner errors on POS tagging and parsing, identifying the most influential learner errors. Furthermore, we show that the performance of probabilistic POS taggers and parsers on native English can predict their performance on learner English. Secondly, we develop an SCF identification system for learner English. We train a machine learning model on both native and learner English data. The system can label individual verb occurrences in learner data for a set of 49 distinct SCFs. Our evaluation shows that the system reaches an accuracy of 84\% F1 score. We then demonstrate that the level of accuracy is adequate for linguistic research. We design the first multidimensional SCF diversity metrics and investigate how SCF diversity changes with L2 proficiency on a large learner corpus. Our results show that as L2 proficiency develops, learners tend to use more diverse SCF types with greater taxonomic distance; more advanced learners also use different SCF types more evenly and locate the verb tokens of the same SCF type further away from each other. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the proposed SCF diversity metrics contribute a unique perspective to the prediction of L2 proficiency beyond existing syntactic complexity metrics.

This doctoral dissertation reports on an empirical study, which takes a feature-based approach and probes the L2 acquisition and processing of Chinese bei passives by adult English native speakers. In Chinese, an individual passive marker bei is used to mark passive constructions. Whilst historically used as a lexical verb, bei is in the process of being grammaticalised (i.e. semi-lexical) and hence contains a semantic component (Liu, 2012a). Three forms of bei passives and their semantic properties have been investigated: basic long bei passives (i.e. with an external argument), basic short bei passives (i.e. without an external argument), and the retained-object construction of bei. In total, 75 English native speakers with intermediate and advanced Chinese proficiency, and 33 native Mandarin Chinese speakers (serving as a control group) were tested by a series of on-line methods (a self-paced reading task and a reaction-time picture elicited word rearrangement task) and off-line methods (an untimed acceptability judgement task and a fill-in-the-blank task). The current study finds that the reconfiguration of target semantic features of bei is a gradual process and occurs feature-by-feature, depending on consistent and ample input-based evidence. This lends support to the Feature Reassembly Hypothesis (Lardiere, 2005, 2008, 2009). It is also found that morphosyntax-semantics mismatches lead to acquisitional difficulties, as predicted by the Bottleneck Hypothesis (Slabakova, 2008, 2009b), which shares a similar view to the Feature Reassembly Hypothesis. In addition, L1 English L2 Chinese learners are found to be subject to the formation strategy of English short passives, in line with Montrul (2001). A disjunction in L2 performance between off-line and on-line tasks has been found in the advanced learners, who show target-like on-line sensitivity to violations of semantic constraints on bei but fail to converge on the target grammar in off-line judgements. These findings are compatible with Ullman's (2001, 2005) declarative-procedural model and suggest that the increase in convergence on real-time comprehension and production in the advanced learners is a result of the more involved procedural system. The general findings of the current study lend support to the view (Sorace, 2009; White, 2011) that representational and processing difficulties must be teased apart in L2 acquisition.

This portfolio thesis makes the case that participating in group devised theatre and using voice work benefits self-efficacy in additional language acquisition for advanced adult learners. The main source of evidence is the 'Performing Languages' project (2015) which took place at the University of Mulhouse, France, with adult participants from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. I also draw on my earlier practice undertaken during the development of the thesis, including an article chapter that discusses a pilot research project, 'Experiencing the Word' (2013). My practice-based research engaged group devised theatre and its attendant emancipatory and democratic ethos, to improve the participants' self-efficacy in using the target language, English. I argue that an egalitarian ethos engendered by group devised theatre can address relations of power and the dichotomies of student/teacher and native/non-native speakers which are counteractive to achieving strong self-efficacy for language learners. The approach of group devised theatre also encourages and accommodates the renegotiation of identity that is prevalent in language learners. The overall findings of the research show that the benefits of participation in group devised theatre include: increased self-efficacy in using the target language, English; development of communication and engagement skills; and better awareness of non-verbal communication, gesture and a developed understanding of the use of the voice. Descriptions of moments of practice ('vignettes') are included to illustrate particular points of the overall thesis and to provide the reader with a sense of the practice and research from a phenomenological perspective. Also examined are aspects of the creative and learning process that occurred outside of the ensemble devising process; these were not immediately apparent but, I claim, give a fuller picture of both the process of group devised theatre and additional language development that took place. Furthermore, this thesis maintains that the unfinished and messy nature of SLA should be recognised and embraced in additional language development and that group-devised theatre provides an exemplary methodology for doing so.

The majority of research in second language acquisition has traditionally focused on classroom-based, instructed learning. However, with the spread of new technologies and the concomitant globalisation of popular culture, informal second language practices (ISLPs; e.g. watching films and television, using social media, or playing video games in another language) are increasingly becoming part of the daily lives of many language learners, particularly those who are learning English. Previous studies of Informal Second Language Learning (ISLL) have provided evidence for a positive relationship between such informal language contact and L2 proficiency. However, considerable individual and group differences have also been recorded, which seem to indicate that not all learners participate in and/or can benefit equally from these activities. The present study employed a framework of student engagement (comprising behavioural, cognitive, affective, and linguistic aspects) in an attempt to provide deeper insight into the nature of German secondary school students' informal second language practices. It also explored the relationships between informal language contact and proficiency, motivation, and attitudes towards language learning, as well as their directionality; that is, the extent to which ISLPs promoted language development and changes in motivation, and whether more proficient and motivated students were more likely to engage in informal activities. The project involved mixed research methods with data collected in three phases: In Phase I, the researcher conducted focus group interviews with 47 students, which were subsequently transcribed and analysed via inductive and deductive coding. The qualitative findings then informed the development of an event-contingent diary for recording informal second language practices, including items to measure the different aspects of engagement, and a questionnaire for studying motivation and attitudes specifically in the context of ISLL. At this point, a C-test was also developed as a measure of general language proficiency in this particular learner population. After extensive piloting (Phase II) with a sample of 105 students, the new instruments were used to collect data from 354 further participants at two time points in Phase III. The nature of the students' engagement in informal second language practices and its relationships with motivation, attitudes, and proficiency over time were explored through statistical modelling (Multi-level Structural Equation Modelling and Latent Profile Analysis) and triangulated with the qualitative findings from Phase I. This study provided novel insights into the nature of learners' interactions with informal second language practices. Whereas previous research has primarily focused on the time learners spend on informal practices and the types of activities they choose (behavioural engagement), the current study also considered the role of emotions and attention to meaning and form (affective, cognitive, and linguistic engagement). Furthermore, the study yielded statistical evidence of the significant positive link between engagement in ISLPs and proficiency, which has been widely reported in the ISLL literature. Meanwhile, the findings, have also called into question the directionality of this relationship: The participants' prior proficiency explained a significant proportion of the variance in the overall engagement patterns, as well as some of the individual aspects of engagement (behavioural, cognitive, and linguistic engagement). However, none of the engagement measures significantly predicted changes in general language proficiency over the course of the study. By contrast, there was evidence of a reciprocal relationship between motivation and engagement in informal second language practices. That is, engagement was significantly predicted by learners' attitudes towards informal and formal language learning, their desire to become successful second language users (ideal L2 selves), and their reasons for wanting to learn English (language learning orientations). In turn, some aspects of engagement in ISLPs also predicted changes in students' beliefs about formal language learning, their perceptions of themselves as language users, and the extent to which they wanted to learn the language (as opposed to being obligated to do so). Altogether, this research has made strong theoretical, empirical, and methodological contributions to the emerging field of Informal Second Language Learning, as well as the wider field of Applied Linguistics. The findings are also of practical interest to, for example, teachers and policy makers seeking to gain a better understanding of the factors that determine participation and success in language learning beyond the classroom.

This study investigates the acquisition of conventional metaphorical expressions by Chinese learners of English. A conventional metaphorical expression, following the definition of cognitive semantics, refers to the use of a conventionalised non-literal meaning of a lexical item in a multi-word phrase. For example, the word 'attack' in the phrase 'attack one's idea', which should be interpreted as 'to criticise somebody or something severely', clearly departs from the literal meaning 'to use violence to try to hurt or kill somebody', and thus should be seen as a metaphorically used word. Consequently, the phrase 'attack one's idea' is a conventional metaphorical expression. This study explores learners' behaviour towards and acquisition of metaphorical expressions from two major perspectives: (1) possible cross-linguistic influence in the process of acquisition and factors that could affect cross-linguistic influence; and (2) the organisation of learners' bilingual lexicon and the status of metaphorical expressions in a bilingual lexicon. These two perspectives are considered to be the main factors that can influence learners' acquisition of metaphorical expressions: in order to acquire a metaphorical expression, learners should be able to integrate it into the bilingual lexicon, while the process of integration can be impacted by cross-linguistic influence. Previous research has mainly been conducted on the acquisition of certain figurative expressions in a second language, predominantly idioms; however, a combination of the two perspectives and a joint analysis on the acquisition of figurative language has yet to be accomplished. This study presents a first attempt of such analysis on the acquisition of a specific type of figurative language. The results of the experiments reported in this dissertation show that learners react differently to metaphorical expressions with different cross-linguistic availabilities (shared between Chinese and English or exclusively available in Chinese or English) but in general they encounter difficulty to achieve native-like performance when reading metaphorical expressions available in their second language. Persistent cross-linguistic influence is observed in two aspects, even among highly proficient learners: (1) learners encounter obstacles when acquiring the metaphorical expressions that are only available in their second language; and (2) learners seem to still activate the metaphorical meanings that are only available in their first language even when they read in their second language. These results altogether reflect that metaphorical expressions, regardless of cross-linguistic availability, are more difficult to acquire than literal expressions in a second language.

This study investigates second language (L2) acquisition of word orders and markers of collectivity in Chinese and Thai. One of the differences between Chinese and Thai is that Chinese nominal phrases appear with a “numeral + classifier + noun” word order while Thai phrases appear as “noun + numeral + classifier”. Another difference is that men, the Chinese collective marker, cannot be used with nouns referring to animals or indefinite nouns, while phûak, the Thai collective marker, can do so. Based on the cross-linguistic differences, an empirical study was conducted to answer whether Thai learners of Chinese and Chinese learners of Thai would be able to acquire target language (TL) structures that are different from those in their native language (L1) and whether they could reject incorrect TL structures. One hundred and forty-four participants were recruited to complete an acceptability judgment task and a self-paced reading task. It is found that both Chinese and Thai learners could perform native-like in their acceptance of TL word orders since early stages of acquisition. However, it took them until an advanced level to be able to completely reject incorrect TL word orders that resembled structures in their L1. Thai learners also faced difficulty rejecting the use of men with animal and indefinite nouns in their L2 Chinese. In contrast, Chinese learners tended to be successful in their acquisition of phûak. The results are interpreted in terms of roles of positive evidence and form-function transparency. In general, L2 learners tend to acquire a TL structure earlier when they can receive positive evidence in TL input and when a form-function connection of the structure is transparent. Nonetheless, these factors do not have an absolute effect on acquisition outcome since some learners may be able to use a probabilistic learning strategy to successfully acquire L2 knowledge even when positive evidence is unavailable.

In this thesis I explore the phonological nature of newly acquired perceptual representations by highly proficient late-learners of English whose L1 is Spanish, specifically in the case where two different L2 sounds are being initially mapped onto the same L1 category. I claim that these perceptual representations are not phonemic; rather, what these learners acquire are phonetic representations that can be discriminable under certain conditions in a manner similar to that of native speakers, but that are nevertheless identified as tokens of the same L1 category. Since speech perception is a categorisation process where the acoustic input is mapped onto the existing phonemic categories, then late-learners will use their L1 representations when perceiving acoustic input; and will therefore have no need to create new perceptual categories. An alternative hypothesis holds that late-learners can bootstrap new perceptual categories by means of UG access, which allows them to bypass the default categorisation process and notice the difference between their L1 categories and the actual L2 input, so that new perceptual categories can be created. This thesis focuses on the acquisition of the perceptual contrast between the open-mid back unrounded vowel /2/ and the low back unrounded vowel /A/, both of which are mapped onto the same L1 perceptual category /a/. Two experiments were conducted. Subjects were divided in three groups: one of native speakers (NS), a group of highly proficient nonnative speakers of English with Spanish as L1 (NNS-A), and a group of L1 Spanish speakers who were nonproficient in English (NNS-B). The experiments included identification, discrimination and rating tasks along synthesised /A - 2/ vowel continua (7-step and 5-step). The results showed that unlike the NS group, both groups of nonnative speakers categorised the tokens along the /2 - A/ continuum randomly when using L2-like labels; and showing a strong preference towards /a/ when using L1-like labels. Discrimination, on the other hand, differed according to the task: discrimination of adjacent tokens yielded similar results across the three groups, but nonadjacent tokens showed that the NNS-A group is more sensitive than the NNS-B group and less sensitive than the NS group. Finally, prototypicality ratings showed that while NS considered the endpoints of the continuum as good exemplars of the categories /A/ and /2/, both groups of nonnative speakers rated all tokens along the continuum as equally good instances of /a/. From these results I conclude that while late-learners of L2 English do not create new phonemic categories for /A/ and /2/, they are able to perceive a difference that nevertheless does not seem to be enough to create a category split. These findings have implications for a theory of learnability in SLA, since it suggests that latelearners have partial access to UG insofar as input alone leads to learning within the phonetic domain but not to creation of new phonemic categories.

This project uses corpus linguistics and geostatistics to test the sociolinguistic typological theory put forward by Peter Trudgill on the history of Norwegian. The theory includes several effects of societal factors on language change. Most discussed is the proposal that ‘intensive’ language contact causes simplification of language grammar. In the Norwegian case, the claim is that simplificatory changes which affected all of the Continental North Germanic languages (Danish, Swedish, Norwegian) but not the Insular North Germanic Languages were the result of contact with Middle Low German through the Hanseatic League. This suggests that those simplificatory changes arose in the centres of contact with the Hanseatic League: cities with Hansa trading posts and kontors. The size of the dataset required would have made it impossible for previous scholars to test this prediction, but digital approaches render the problem tractable. I have designed a 3.5m word corpus containing nearly all extant Middle Norwegian, and developed statistical methods for examining the spread of language phenomena in time and space. The project is made up of a series of case studies of changes. Three examine simplifying phonological changes: the rise of svarabhakti (epenthetic) vowels, the change of /hv/ > /kv/ and the loss of the voiceless dental fricative. A further three look at simplifying morphological changes: the loss of 1.sg. verbal agreement, the loss of lexical genitives and the loss of 1.pl. verbal agreement. In each case study a large dataset from many documents is collected and used to map the progression of the change in space and time. The social background of document signatories is also used to map the progression of the change through different social groups. A variety of different patterns emerge for the different changes examined. Some changes spread by contagious diffusion, but many spread by hierarchical diffusion, jumping first between cities before spreading to the country at large. One common theme which runs through much of the findings is that dialect contact within the North Germanic language area seems to have played a major role: many of the different simplificatory changes may first have spread into Norwegian from Swedish or Danish. Although these findings do not exactly match the simple predictions originally proposed from the sociolinguistic typological theory, they are potentially consistent with a more nuanced account in which the major centres of contact and so simplifying change were in Sweden and Denmark rather than Norway.

Previous studies have shown that teachers and students using English as the medium of instruction (EMI) in science classrooms encounter many language challenges with teaching and learning processes. Problems include the limited English communication skills of science teachers, the lack of EMI training for science teachers, the students' different language abilities and science teachers' beliefs that they are not responsible for addressing students' language needs in science. Teachers' lack of language awareness has led to poor teaching practices and limited interactions in the classrooms. This lack of language awareness, in turn, suggests that there are limited opportunities for students to learn English as a second language in the science classroom. This study extends the research on EMI classroom interactions in Hong Kong (Lo and Macaro, 2012) to the previously unexamined context of senior secondary science classrooms. A total of 19 teachers and 545 students from grades 10 and 11 EMI science class were recruited in Hong Kong from 'early-full EMI' schools (full EMI instruction from grades 7 to 12) and 'late-partial EMI' schools (Chinese medium from grades 7 to 9 and partial EMI instruction from grades 10 to 12). The project used multiple sources of qualitative data (i.e. semi-structured interviews and 33 videotaped classroom observations) to explore the similarities and differences in classroom interactions during the first and second years of the senior science curriculum (grades 10 and 11) in the two types of EMI schools. This project also investigated these science teachers' and students' perceptions of EMI teaching and learning processes, their preference of instructional language and their beliefs about teaching and learning in the EMI environment. Interviews also probed teachers' language awareness, teachers' and students' belief about EMI, students' self-concepts in science (students' perceptions or beliefs about their ability to do well in science, see Wilkins, 2004)) and their perceptions of language challenges and coping strategies in EMI classrooms. The results from the observational data show similar interactional patterns in both early-full and late-partial EMI science classrooms when measured as percentages of interaction time, distribution of time between teacher and student talk and frequency of pedagogical functions. However, the nature of the interactions is different. In late-partial EMI schools, overall, there are more (but shorter) student initiations and responses, more use of higher-order questions from the teachers but less direct feedback to students. Both teachers and students tend to use their L1 more. In both types of schools, there was less interaction time and a lower maximum length of student turns and more L1 use in grade 11 than in grade 10. The discourse analysis of the four biology lesson transcripts also shows that both early-full and late-partial EMI students predominantly produced incomplete sentences consisting of short, technical nouns or noun phrases referring to scientific items. Science teachers rarely made any attempts to correct their students' language mistakes, nor did they encourage students to produce a complete sentence. This lack of teacher feedback on students' L2 language production perhaps reflects the fact that EMI science teachers rarely provide comprehensible input to facilitate students' L2 language learning. These findings suggest the important role of the teacher's modified input in teacher-student interaction in developing students' content knowledge and language skills. The adoption of EMI appears to lead to the development of students' comprehension of content knowledge more than development of their language production skills. As a result of their language shortfalls, the students' L2 productive skills remain under-developed despite English instruction. This lack of language support by teachers appears to indicate a gap between the aims of the EMI policy and its implementation. The interview and questionnaire data show that the science teachers from both the early-full and late-partial EMI schools held many of the same views about their EMI teaching experiences, but they differed in their attitudes towards the value of English language skills and their language awareness. The early-full EMI teachers believed English language skills were important and these early-full teachers have a higher language awareness than the late-partial EMI science teachers. Students from both types of schools also held similar views about their EMI learning, indicating that they welcome the adoption of EMI instruction. However, while the late-partial EMI students see EMI as an opportunity to improve their English, those in the early-full EMI schools believe that EMI discouraged them from learning. By providing an evidence-based, pedagogically focused analysis of teacher and student classroom interactions and their perceptions, this research sheds light on ways to improve the quality of instructional practices in different EMI classrooms in Hong Kong and in similar contexts around the world.

Listening comprehension strategies have been explored almost exclusively in uni-directional listening when learners are listening to audio recording. The lack of research on students' strategy use in understanding the teacher in the classroom is surprising, given how pervasive it is for students to listen to the teacher. In order to fill this research gap, this study explored the listening strategies adopted by learners in comprehending the teacher's input in the English as a Second Language (ESL) classroom in Hong Kong (HK). A Likert-scale questionnaire was developed and administered to 867 HK Secondary 3 students, 646 of whom also completed two tests of linguistic knowledge (LK) - a receptive Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT) and a grammaticality judgement task (GJT). A sub-sample of 59 students then took part in an innovative computer tracking programme which simulated classroom learning and incorporated different types of teacher input while eliciting learners' strategy use targeted at these inputs. Lesson observation and stimulated recall interviews were also conducted to give insight into learners' strategy use in an authentic lesson from a more qualitative point of view. Findings suggested that there were some strategies which were specific to the context of listening to the teacher in the ESL classroom. Furthermore, while learners with low and high LK demonstrated some differences in their strategy use, there existed a sub-group of learners with low LK who were at least comparably strategic with learners with higher LK, providing some evidence that strategy use is not wholly dependent on levels of LK. Finally, findings also pointed to the importance of the type and difficulty of teacher input on learners' strategy use. Implications for further research and pedagogy are discussed.

South Tyrol, which is situated on the border between Austria and Italy, has been considered a 'peace model' by many nation-states since the creation of the province's autonomy statutes. The objective of these statutes was to allow for minority protection of the German- and Ladin-speaking communities while also permitting Austria to be the 'protector' of South Tyrol even though the province is situated in Italy. Another bi-product of these statutes was the creation of the 'separate but equal' education system, which allowed the German-, Italian- and Ladin-speaking communities to have individual schools in order to protect their culture and language identity. In the past several decades, there has been an increase in 'mixed' marriages with members of differing language groups producing bilingual children. Additionally, civil service positions now require that all applicants have a mandatory comprehension of the L2, or in some cases L3, in order to apply for certain posts. As the education system tries to adjust to local concerns regarding the insufficient teaching of the L2 in monolingual education, the concept of South Tyrol as a 'peace model' is brought into question. In this thesis, I examine how the South Tyrolean school system is reflective of society at large as its divided education mirrors the current fissures existent amongst the language communities. With parents looking for alternative measures to instruct their children in the L2, some residents would prefer a bilingual schooling option to encourage inter-group assimilation. Furthermore, I discuss, outside of education, external social factors in the region which impact L2 learning creating language learning 'blocks' and 'victim' versus 'conqueror' mentalities. The objective of this research is to try and understand how South Tyrol continues to be in transition as the province adjusts to more bilingualism despite the historical need to preserve the language minorities.

This thesis presents the findings from a qualitative investigation into teachers’ use of code-switching in bilingual classrooms in Wales. The results of the 2001 census show a slight increase in the proportion of Welsh speakers in Wales, to 21%. This change, combined with increasing governmental support for the Welsh language, suggests that we may now be entering a period of stable Welsh-English bilingualism for those who speak Welsh. This study builds upon previous research into teachers’ use of code-switching by investigating 6 teachers’ perceptions of code-switching during the research period. It is proposed that teachers’ perceptions and awareness of their bilingual identity, examined through case studies have a central role in the decisions made in the bilingual classroom. Synthesising various approaches to code-switching provides educators with an overview of code-switching and its implications for instruction and the classroom as a community. This study makes an important contribution to the understanding of the dynamics of code-switching at classroom level rather than syntactic level, as there is very little research into the bilingual teaching interface in Wales. Ideally, the findings will contribute to the debate on multilingual practice as a natural and effective means of language teaching as well as a force for intercultural understanding. The author is interested in exploring how far and in what ways teachers are aware of the benefits of code-switching and to raise awareness of the relationship between code choice and wider social factors. The study has two main objectives. Firstly, to investigate how far teachers employ code-switching as a strategy and their reasons for doing so. Secondly, to explore how far, and in what ways, these teachers’ identities undergo a process of transformation as a result of their experiences of the research process. The study provides a number of useful insights into the dynamic interplay between code-switching and learning as a legitimate way of using a shared language to scaffold pupils’ learning. A range of teachers’ perceptions of code-switching were detected and the significance of these findings are discussed. The study provides an insight into perceptions of the functions and rationale for code-switching from a teacher’s perspective, which may contribute to the multilingual turn debate and have pedagogical implications.

The questions addressed in this study arose from an earlier project which attempted to provide videoconferencing opportunities for Second Language (SL) teachers to engaging in bilingual “virtual exchanges” for their students (hereafter referred to as “eTandem videoconferencing”). This investigation was initially motivated by the interest on discovering why these teachers and their students did not take the opportunity to participate in the synchronous part of the exchanges. This qualitative study reports on the developmental paths experienced by twenty SL teachers from the US, the UK, Switzerland and Spain and their pupils in the process. It particularly aims to discover what teachers' roles emerge in the process. The research also focuses on how these teachers’ practices are consistent with a more social constructivist approach to Computer Assisted Language Learning. The investigation builds on Hartnell-Young’s theoretical model (2003) of teachers’ roles where computers are used. Data collection involves an initial survey, observation of teachers and students before, during and after the exchanges and video-stimulated recall interviews with the teachers. The research centres on critical incidents experienced by these teachers. Hugues' model (2009) of the expanded critical incident approach provides the methodological framework. In line with her model, the study has created a multifaceted word picture of these teachers, further characterised by a condensed set of critical findings. The teachers’ accounts reveal several incidents that inhibited or supported the teachers’ development in terms of how they planned the learning environment regarding the physical space, the virtual setting and the social environment and in terms of how they mediated the implementation of the exchanges towards a more interactive approach. In doing so, this investigation adds to the knowledge base available to educators and researchers by offering greater understanding about these SL teachers’ particular experiences.

This thesis explores how learner independence was implemented as a curricular goal at a tertiary level Preparatory Programme (PP) in the United Arab Emirates. This exploratory-interpretive case study shows how students and teachers at the English programme responded to an Independent Learning Log (ILL) and how they interpreted learner autonomy with respect to the ILL. The study analyzes how various interpretations of autonomy affected the students’ and teachers’ attitudes towards the ILL. The interviews and the surveys used in this study were conducted between 20122014. The data was examined using Critical Discourse Analysis and was coded with NVivo software. As a result of the data analysis, the researcher identified themes related to student and teacher roles in the promotion of autonomy, learner representations in TESOL, and issues of control and agency, in the language classroom and out-of-class. The findings suggest that, in the teachers’ discourse, students are assigned passive roles and are often represented as lacking, deficient, and in need of control. Furthermore, the teachers are represented as the agents and controllers of education. These findings are supported by other studies from different cultural settings. This suggests that the US and THEM divide is not unique to the context of this study, but, rather, that it reflects a broader issue that is characteristic of TESOL discourse. In the discussion section, the researcher demonstrates how the themes identified in this study draw on a Social Order perspective in education. It is argued that this conceptual model remains ingrained in teachers’ and students’ group consciousness as the default model for learning. We conclude that learner independence as an educational goal is incompatible with this way in which students and teachers conceptualise education. In order for autonomy to become a feasible educational goal, we need to re-think how we organise language learning and what roles teachers and students assign each other. Overall, this case study reveals the problems that educators may face when promoting autonomy in a language programme. An understanding of these issues may help future language programmes develop better strategies towards fostering learner autonomy at an institutional level.

Several recent studies (e.g., Benson and Chik, 2010; Sockett, 2014) suggest that as a result of changes in technology and the concomitant emergence of a globalized culture, highly effective out-of-class, informal English acquisition is becoming more common. The present study compared high-level, well-motivated Central Brazilian classroom-trained learners (CTLs) with fully autonomous self-instructed learners (FASILs) of similar backgrounds. Using linguistic tests, a questionnaire and a structured interview, the study analysed group differences as well as individual differences in language proficiency, learner histories, behaviour, beliefs, and attitudes. The key research question asked whether there existed, in more than rare circumstances, FASILs who attained levels of proficiency at least as high as highly-motivated, well-trained CTLs? Furthermore, if the knowledge and skills of FASILs were, in some respects, superior to those of CTLs, what variables accounted for the advantage? FASILs significantly outperformed CTLs across a battery of linguistic tests measuring a range of knowledge and skills. Test results indicated that while CTLs tended to plateau at upper intermediate levels, FASILs generally improved through advanced levels, often achieving native-like levels of knowledge and use. The strongest contributing factor to proficiency was found to be self-determined motivation driven by a personalized relationship with English often marked by a transnational identity. The evidence suggests this type of motivation, significantly more associated with FASILs than CTLs, led users to engage deeply with the linguistic details of informal sources. The findings challenge dominant paradigms in several fields of SLA which prioritize expert regulation over independent discovery and controlled, collaborative environments over real-world contexts of use entered into for personal reasons. A hoped for consequence of this study is that SLA research and teaching practice will begin to recognize and promote rather than regulate or dismiss the unique learning arcs that more and more English learners experience in their everyday lives.

The research in this dissertation is the first attempt in Hungary to reveal language learners' language proficiency in the public education sector through a vocabulary size test as an alternative method. Based on the assessment of vocabulary in learners' coursebooks, the analyses of teacher talk and the answers in learners' informal strategy questionnaire reveal the possible sources through which the learners' can get an access to new vocabulary and also what they do themselves in order to acquire new words in- and outside of the classroom. The results of this research can prove that even the Hungarian language learners' English language knowledge can be at a considerably good level. The starting point for the research was that both language teachers and students have been evaluating the Hungarian learners' English language knowledge as insufficient, despite the relatively many English classes in the public education. This negative assumption has been supported by the data of Eurostat (2009) statistics, which says that the Hungarians are the last ones in Europe concerning their foreign language knowledge. There has also been guessing that the Hungarian learners' English knowledge does not meet the international standards and like this it is falling behind foreign students' English language knowledge. The results show objectively how Hungarian learners' knowledge compares with other learners in other countries from the point of view of English as a foreign language. The current dissertation is hoped to be a substantial contribution to the field of teaching and learning English as a foreign language in Hungary, in particular, and to the field of second language vocabulary acquisition, in general.

The overarching goal of the dissertation is to illustrate the relevance of learner corpus research to the field of second language acquisition (SLA). The possibility that learner corpora can be useful in mainstream SLA research has a significant implication given that they have not been systematically explored in relation to SLA theories. The thesis contributes to building a methodological framework to utilize learner corpora beneficially to SLA and argues that learner corpus research contributes to other disciplines. This is achieved by a series of case studies that quantitatively analyze individual variation and the role of native language (L1) in second language (L2) development of English grammatical morphemes and explain the findings with existing SLA theories. The dissertation investigates the L2 development of morphemes based on two largescale learner corpora. It first reviews the literature and points out that the L2 acquisition order of English grammatical morphemes that has been believed universal in SLA research may, in fact, vary across the learners with different L1 backgrounds and that individual differences in morpheme studies have been relatively neglected in previous literature. The present research, thus, provides empirical evidence testing the universality of the order and the extent of individual differences. In the first study, the thesis investigates L1 influence on the L2 acquisition order of six English grammatical morphemes across seven L1 groups and five proficiency levels. Data drawn from approximately 12,000 essays from the Cambridge Learner Corpus establish clear L1 influence on this issue. The study also reveals that learners without the equivalent morpheme in L1 tend to achieve an accuracy level of below 90% with respect to the morpheme even at the highest proficiency level, and that morphemes requiring learners to learn to pay attention to the relevant distinctions in their acquisition show a stronger effect of L1 than those which only require new form-meaning mappings. The findings are interpreted under the framework of thinking-for-speaking proposed by Dan Slobin. Following the first study, the dissertation exploits EF-Cambridge Open Language Database (EFCamDat) and analyzes the developmental patterns of morphemes, L1 influence on the patterns, and the extent to which individual variation is observed in the development. Based on approximately 140,000 essays written by 46,700 learners of 10 L1 groups across a wide range of proficiency levels, the study found that (i) certain developmental patterns of accuracy are observed irrespective of target morphemes, (ii) inverted U-shaped development is rare irrespective of morphemes, (iii) proficiency influences the within-learner developmental patterns of morphemes, (iv) the developmental patterns at least slightly vary depending on morphemes, and (v) significant individual variation is observed in absolute accuracy, the accuracy difference between morphemes, and the rate of development. The findings are interpreted with dynamic systems theory (DST), a theory of development that has recently been applied to SLA research. The thesis further examines whether any systematic relationship is observed between the developmental patterns of morphemes. Although DST expects that their development is interlinked, the study did not find any strong relationships between the developmental patterns. However, it revealed a weak supportive relationship in the developmental pattern between articles and plural -s. That is, within individual learners, when the accuracy of articles increases, the accuracy of plural -s tends to increase as well, and vice versa.

This thesis examines the possibility that connectivity in learner lexicons can be measured using receptive word-association tasks.

The research presented in this PhD dissertation examines the phenomenon of semantic implicit learning, using semantic preferences of novel verbs as a test case. Implicit learning refers to the phenomenon of learning without intending to learn or awareness that one is learning at all. Semantic preference (or selectional preference – as preferred in computational linguistics) is the tendency of a word to co-occur with words sharing similar semantic features. For example, ‘drink’ is typically followed by nouns denoting LIQUID, and the verb ‘chase’ is typically followed by ANIMATE nouns. The material presented here spans across disciplines. It examines a well-documented psychological phenomenon - implicit learning – and applies it in the context of language acquisition, thereby providing insights into both fields. The organisation of this dissertation groups its experiments by their methodology. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the current psychological and linguistic literature. Chapter 2 includes a pen-and-paper study carried out in a classroom environment on Polish learners of English, where awareness is assessed by subjective measures taken at each test question as well as a post-experiment questionnaire. Chapter 3 includes a collection of 5 computer-based experiments based on a false-memory paradigm. After exposure to sentential contexts containing novel verbs, participants are shown to endorse more previously unseen verb-noun pairings that follow the correct semantic preference patterns to the pairings that violate it. The result holds even when participants do not reveal any explicit knowledge of the patterns in the final debriefing. Awareness is additionally assessed using indirect measures examining correlations of confidence judgements with performance. Chapter 4 examines whether implicit learning of novel verb semantic preference patterns is automatic. To this end, a reaction time procedure is developed based on two consecutive decisions (“double decision priming”). The method reveals that semantic implicit learning, at least in the described cases, exerts its influence with a delay, in post-processing. Chapter 5 comprises research done in collaboration with Dr Nitin Williams, University of Reading. It documents an attempt at finding neural indices of implicit learning using a novel single-trial analysis of an electroencephalographic (EEG) signal, based on empirical mode decomposition (EMD) denoising. Chapter 6 presents a final discussion and indications for future research. The main contribution of this dissertation to the general field of implicit learning research consists in its challenging the predominant view that implicit learning mainly relies on similarity of forms presented in training and test. The experiments presented here require participants to make generalisations at a higher, semantic level, which is largely independent of perceptual form. The contribution of this work to the field of Second Language Acquisition consists of empirical support for the currently popular but seldom tested assumptions held by advocates of communicative approaches to language teaching, namely that certain aspects of linguistic knowledge can develop without explicit instruction and explanation. At the same time, it challenges any view assuming that vocabulary learning necessarily relies on explicit mediation. The experiments collected here demonstrate that at least word usage in context can be learnt implicitly. A further contribution of this dissertation is its demonstration that the native language may play a key role in determining what is learnt in such situations. A deeper understanding of the phenomenon of semantic implicit learning promises to shed light on the nature of word and grammar learning in general, which is crucial for an account of the processes involved in the development of a second language mental lexicon.

Usage-based approaches to Second Language Acquisition (SLA) hold that grammatical development can at least in part be explained by a trajectory from initially entrenched formulaic chunks of linguistic material through partially abstract low-scope patterns to abstract constructions. Although earlier empirical research found little to support such a trajectory, more recent research suggests that when the methodological focus is on the breakdown of tokens not on the acquisition of abstract morphology formulaic chunks do seem to develop into at least low-scope patterns. What is not clear from these later studies, however, is why users select tokens from the environment, how these selections are repurposed to meet communicative needs and what grammatical development may be the result of such repurposing. Drawing on insights into usage-based approaches to SLA in general, and specifically predictions that the analogical processing of similar tokens can explain in part a trajectory from tokens in the linguistic environment to abstract constructions, this study investigates whether intervention in the form of task demands and written task productions can drive the selection and repurposing of task-relevant input, and whether such repurposing may influence the development of past-counterfactual constructions in instructed SLA. The study uses a classroom-based pre-test/post-test quasi-experimental design with pre-sessional university students in intact classes (n=92). Out of the three groups in the study, one group were exposed to instances of past counterfactuals which were identical to the forms needed for task completion in terms of function and lexical items (Literal Group). A second group were exposed to instances which called for the same function but different lexical items for successful task completion (Analogous Group), while a third group were not exposed to input. Results show that the analogous processing of task-relevant tokens led to positive and significant gains on most acceptability judgment and production test measures. Regression models further show that the selection of tokens explained very little variance, while analogical processing, operationalised as the repurposing of tokens to fit task demands, explained a significant amount of the variance in the same models. These findings highlight the importance of analogical processing in SLA and the significant implications such processing has for cognitive accounts of SLA and for second language teaching.