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LANGUAGE APTITUDE AND GRAMMATICAL DIFFICULTY

An EFL Classroom-Based Study

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 January 2016

Şebnem Yalçın  and
Nina Spada
Şebnem Yalçın*
Affiliation:
Boğaziçi University
Nina Spada
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
*
*Correspondence concerning this manuscript should be addressed to Şebnem Yalçın, Boğaziçi University Faculty of Education, Department of Foreign Language Education, Bebek 34342 İstanbul, Turkey. E-mail: sebnem.yalcin@boun.edu.tr
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Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between foreign language aptitude and the learning of two English structures defined as easy or difficult to learn. Using a quasiexperimental design, 66 secondary-level learners of English as a foreign language from three intact classes were provided with four hours of instruction on the passive (a difficult structure) and the past progressive (an easy structure). Language aptitude was measured using the LLAMA Aptitude Test (Meara, 2005). Language outcomes were measured with a written grammaticality judgment and an oral production task. The results revealed that one of the aptitude components, grammatical inferencing, contributed to learners’ gains on the passive but not the past progressive on the written measure. Another component of aptitude, associative memory, contributed to learners’ gains on the past progressive on the oral measure. The results provide support for the claim that different components of aptitude contribute to the learning of difficult and easy L2 structures in different ways. There is also support for the proposal that different components of aptitude may be involved at different stages of language acquisition (Skehan, 2002).

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Studies in Second Language Acquisition , Volume 38 , Special Issue 2: Cognitive Perspectives on Difficulty and Complexity in SLA , June 2016 , pp. 239 - 263
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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