Full Description
Language Aptitude: Advancing Theory, Testing, Research and Practice brings together cutting-edge global perspectives on foreign language aptitude. Drawing from educational psychology, cognitive science, and neuroscience, the editors have assembled interdisciplinary authors writing for an applied linguistics and education audience. The book is broken into five major themes: revisiting and updating current language aptitude theories and models; emerging insights from contemporary research into language aptitude and the age factor or the critical period hypothesis; redefining constructs and broadening territories of foreign language aptitude; exploring language aptitude from a neurocognitive perspective; and exploring future directions of foreign language aptitude research. Focused on critical issues in foreign language aptitude and second language learning and teaching, this book will be an important research resource and supplemental reading in both applied linguistics and cognitive psychology.
Contents
List of Contributors
Foreword by Rod Ellis
Acknowledgments
1. Introduction and Overview
Zhisheng (Edward) Wen, Peter Skehan, Adriana Biedroń, Shaofeng Li and Richard L. Sparks
Part I
Revisiting and Updating Tests and Theories
2. The MLAT at 60 Years
Charles W.. Stansfield, and Daniel J. Reed
3. Development and preliminary validation of a foreign language aptitude test for Chinese learners of foreign languages
Lanrong Li, and Shaoqian (Sheila) Luo
4. Language aptitude implicates language and cognitive skills
Peter Skehan
5. Six decades of language aptitude research: A comprehensive and critical review
Shaofeng Li
Part II
Emerging Insights on Age and Ultimate Attainment
6. Difficulty and ease in learning foreign languages at the primary school level: general learning ability, language aptitude or working memory?
Amelia Lambelet, and Raphael Berthele
7. Language aptitude: Insights from U.S. high school students
Richard L. Sparks, Jon Patton, and Julie Luebbers
8. Language aptitude: Insights from Hyperpolyglots
Michael Erard
9. Language aptitude: Insights from L2 adult exceptional learners
Adriana Biedroń
Part III
Redefining Cognitive Constructs and Models
10. Working memory as language aptitude: The Phonological/Executive Model
Zhisheng (Edward) Wen
11. Declarative and procedural memory as individual differences in second language aptitude
Joshua Buffington, and Kara Morgan-Short
12. Cognitive aptitudes for explicit and implicit learning
Gisela Granena, and Yucel Yilmaz
Part IV
Perspectives from Cognitive Neuroscience
13. Neurophysiological indicators of the linguistic components of language aptitude
Jinxing Yue
14. Neuro-psycho-cognitive markers for pronunciation/speech imitation as language aptitude
Susanne Reiterer
15. In search of a cognitive model for interpreting expertise
Minhua Liu
Part V
Research Agenda and Future Directions
16. The future of language aptitude research
Robert DeKeyser
17. From individual differences in language aptitude to personalized learning
Loan C. Vuong, and Patrick CM Wong
Index
