Implications of Aptitude Test Research and Psycholinguistic Theory for Foreign Language Teaching.

16 Pages·2007·0.29 MB·English

DOCUMENT RESUME
TM 000 901
ED 057 071
Carroll, John B.
AUTHOR
Test Research and
Implications of Aptitude
TITLE
for Foreign Language
Psycholinguistic Theory
Teaching.
Service, Princeton, N.J.
Educational Testing
INSTITUTION
RM-71-14
REPORT NO
Oct 71
PUB DATE
International
at XVIIth
15p.; Paper presented
NOTE
Applied
Irternational Association of
Congress,
Belgium, July 27, 1971
Psychology, Liege,
MF-$0.65 HC-$3.29
EDRS PRICE
*Individual
*Educational Research;
*Aptitude Tests;
DESCRIPTORS
Instruction;
Differences; *Language
Grammar; Teaching
*Psycholinguistics; Structural
Techniques
ABSTRACT
the'
language aptitude and
The nature of foreign
discussed. Areas include
implications for teaching are
consequent
individual difficulties,
skills, diagnosis of
teaching of aptitudinal
entities, "audiolingual
sounds as unique
necessity of identifying
and
theory," and inductive
"cognitive code learning
habit theory" vs.
techniques.
(MS)
deductive teaching
RM-71 -14
SEARCH
R
MEMORANDUM
Li
PSYCHOLINGUISTIC THEORY
IMPLICATIONS OF APTITUDE TEST RESEARCH AND
TEAT-CHING
FOR FOREIGN LANGUAGE
John B. Carroll
OF HEALTH
M.S. DEPARTMENT
EDUCATION & WELFARE
OFFICE OF EDUCAPON
BEEN REPRO-
THIS DOCUMENT HAS
RECEIVED FROM
DUCED EXACTLY AS
ORGANIZATION ORIG-
THE PERSON OR
VIEW OR CIN-
INATING IT. POINTS OF
RECESS' RILY
IONS STATED DO NOT
DU
01
REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE
CATION POSITION OR POLICY.
"Achievements and
Paper presented at Colloquium 15,
psycholinguistics to
prospects in the application of
languages," XVIIth International
the teaching of foreign
tam'
Applied Psychology,
Congress, International Association of
(=>
Lf6ge, July 27, 1971.
C)
Educational Testing Service
Princeton, New Jersey
October 1971
1
THEORY
IMPLICATIONS OF APTITUDE TEST RESEARCH AND PSYCHOLINGUISTIC
FOR FOREIGN LANGUAGE TEACHING
John B. Carroll
Educational Testing Service
there was considerable skdpticism that foreign
Twenty years ago
to be of
language aptitude could be measured with sufficient precision
Advances in psychometrics and in our.understanding of
practical use.
possible the
the nature of language and of language learning have made
development and wide application of several tests of foreign language
English and
aptitude --the Modern Language Aptitude Test in its various
Sapon, 1959, 1967; Correll &.
&
foreign language versions (Carroll
Aptitude
Ingenkamp, 1967; Ferencich, 1964), and the Pimsleur Language
Battery (1966).
language
The knowledge we now have about the components of foreign'
research can,
aptitude that have been iaentified in the course of this
language
I believe, lead to new insights into problems of foreign
wish to
learning and teaching, and it is to this possibility that I
address myself here.
aptitude
First, let me recount a few facts about foreign language
attempting
In the main, the work has been concerned with
and its testing.
school, university,
to predict the rate at which persons at the secondary
foreign language, but
and adult levels would successfully master a
elementary school children
useful tests of foreign language aptitude for
Research suggests that
have been devised in both English and German.
2
--2-
universal and
individual differences in foreign Ian:glace aptitude are
that aptitude
highly generalized in two senses: first, in the sense
the individual might
is equally relevant to any foreign language that
individual differences
choose to study, and second, in the sense that
equally among the native speakers
in foreign language aptitude are found
tests
Language aptitude can be measured by
of different languages.
Depending
sometimes less.
that can be administered in about an hour or
the conditions of
partly on how a foreign language is taught and
between measures of
learning, there are often striking relationships
In some of
language learning.
aptitude and of achievement in foreign
multiple correlations as high as
.84;
my own work I have obtained
nearly as high as this in
Pimsleur has obtained validity coefficients
apparently types of
On the oti.,-2 hand, there are
some of his studies.
in which the validity coefficients
foreign langu-8e teaching situations
not significantly different from zero.
are much lower; sometimes they are
(Carroll, 1962) to account for this
I have tried to develop a theory
attempts to take into account the
variation in validity--a theory that
uaLiLy o.L
opportunit-r 4
role of such variables as motivation,
in addition to specific
instruction, and general verbal intelligence,
model
I have suggested, in fact, that a
foreign language aptitudes.
of school learning," can be applied
such as this, which I call "a model
besides foreign language
to instruction in many other subjects
that if aptitude is
In brief, the theory suggests
(Carroll, 1963).
to learn something under
reflected in how much time an individual needs
opportunity to learn, and quality
optimal conditLons of motivation,
aptitude can be either increased or
of instruction, the role of
But it would be a
varied.
decreased when these other conditions are
-3-
digression from the major theme of this paper to discuss the details
of this model.
It has been puzzling to me that there has been little recognition
of the implications of foreign language aptitude research in current
According to these theories,
theories of native language acquisition.
(1967), the ability to acquire
as propounded for example by Lenneberg
one's first language is largely innate, but exists only during a
of
certain critical period, say during the first six or seven years
the age
life, after which it declines almost to a vanishing point by
respects
To be sure, learning a second language is in many
of puberty.
these
quite different from learning one's mother tongue, but certainly
Fbr example, both
kinds of learnings have some common properties.
acquire
require the capacity to remember and reproduce sounds and to
I believe it is reasonable to propose
and apply grammatical rules.
acquisition that would apply to
a somewhat modified theory of language
e th(
both native and second languages, namely th
wl
individual
"critical period" in the early years of life, during which the
(be it native or f=eign),
has a heightened capacity to learn any language
to which this capacft:
there are indix-idual differences in the degree
in effect, di-Terences
declines, and that these individual differences are,
Persons with high foreign language
in foreign language aptitude.
for same reason 10.5-,
aptitude at puberty or beyond are those who have
which they are nattvely
little of the language acquisition ability with
thosir
endowed, whereas those with poor foreign language aptitude are
I would empalasize that this
who have last most of this innate ability.
be able to confirm until
is only a speculation, one that we may not
Parenthetically,
appropriate longitudinal studies are performed.
:
41
should also remark that although I can accept the notion of innate
language acquisition ability or abilities, I do not subscribe to the
strong form of this theory which claims that a "language acquisition
form taken
device" is specially adapted for learning the particular
(1971).
by human language, as suggested by McNeill
aptitude.
Let us look more Closely at the nature of foreign language
consists of
Correlational and factor-analytic studies suggest that it
Those that
1958).
several relatively independent abilities (Carroll,
ability, grammatical
have been most clearly identified are phonetic coding
sensitivity, and inductive ability.
and store in
Phonetic coding ability is the ability to identify,
For example,
sounds.
long-term memory, new language sounds or strings of
auditory nonsensr
if a person is presented with a string of two or three
such as mental
syllables and then made to do a distracting task
to repeat the nonsense
arithmetic for ten seconds, after which he is asked
in learning foreign
syllables, his ability to do so is related to his success
of this
A somwhat more indirect, but more practical measure
languages.
learn the phonetic
ability is a test in which the individual has to
his own language or
transcriptions for a series of phonemes, either phonemes,in
between heard sounds and
in a foreign language, by noticing the correspondences
depends on
Apparently, success in this learning task
the printed symbols.
It seems obvious that
of the sounds.
success ir. remembering the identities
of a foreign language,
phonetic coding ability is demanded.in the learning
identities of the new phonemes
because the individual must not only learn the
remember the phonetic
of that language, but must also recognize and
words, and Antonation contours of
sequences represented by the morphemes,
5
that language.
-5--
ability
Grammatical sensitivity may be defined as the individual's
sentences
to demonstrate his awareness of the syntactical patterning of
individual elements
in a language and of the grammatical functions of
Although it is often said that linguistic "competence,"
in a sentence.
(1965), involves some kind of "knowledge"
in the sense defined by Chomsky
"knowledge" is ordinarily
of the grammatical rules of a language, this
(In fact, I shall suggest, later in this
out of conscious awareness.
better regarded as a system of habits,
paper, that this "knowledge" is
A person who is "competent"
it.)
contrary to Chomsky's interpretation of
grammatical sentences
in a language is able to create and understand new
1
much less
without being aware of the "rules" underlying such sentences,
Nevertheless, some adolescents and
being able to formulate those rules.
demonstrate an awareness
adults (and even some children) can be made to
The most direct
of the syntactical structure of the sentences they speak.
pairs of
test of this ability consists of a series of items in which
In each pair, a particular word
sentences are presented to the subjects.
the first sentence, and the subject
or plu'ase is singled out for attuntion in
sentence which has an analogous
has to find a word or phrase in the second
Even among adults, there are large individual differences
grammatical flInction.
related to success
in this abY..ity, and these individual differences are
ability is called
in learning foreign languages, apparently because this
grammatical rules and apply them in
upon when the student tries to learn
constructing or comprehending new sentences in that language.
is inductive
A third major component of foreign language aptitude
of inductive
It is not yet certain whether this is the same kind
ability.
so-called Inductive
ability that is measured by factor-analytic tests of the
It is probably
Reasoning factor, but I am inclined to-'believe that it is.
A
-6-
most closelvasscciated
through thjs factor that foreign language aptitude is
apparently, much less
with general intelligence (the other factors being,
In the case of language learning, inductive
correlated with intelligence).
(in either auditory or
ability is the ability to examine language material
patterns of correspondences
printed form) and from this to notice and identiry
A typical
grammatical form.
and relationships involving either meaning or
in an artificial
method of measuring this ability is to present materials
the grammatical and
language in such a way that the individual can induce
Such an ability might well be
semantic rules governing that language.
because even
called upon in the learning of an actual foreign language,
presentation of rules,
in a form of teaching that emphasizes the formal
of the rules for himself.
the learner must inevitably work out the application
the teaching of foreign
What implications do these findings have for
languages?
to which the
One view of aptitude is that it represents the degree
to a learning task--
individual has mastered the skills that are requisite
terminology employed by
i.e., the "entering behaviors" for the task, in the
If this view is correct, it
behavioristically-oriented psychologists.
improve learning
should be possible to improve aptitude, and indirectly,
tested by aptitude
efficiency, by giving specific training in the skills
of this possibility
To my knowledge, the only important study
measures.
Weiss of Stanford University
has been conducted by'Robert Politzer and Louis
Unfortunately, I am unable to agree entirely
& Weiss, 1969).
(Politzer
investigators, because of
with the limited conclusions reached by these
One of their
designs.
what I consider to be flaws in their research
made to give
findings, however, was quite clear: when an attempt was
e aptitude skills in conjunction
specific training in certain languag
-7--
resented by
with regular language courses, this training tended to be
and usefulness
the students involved, who could not perceive its relevance
But as I would interpret their results, this
in foreign language learning.
pf training
training (as opposed to no training, or to a "placebo" type
effect either
involving cultural enrichment studies) had no -ignificant
in foreign
in improving language aptitude or in accelerating progress
experimental
The gains in aptitude that did occur in both
language learning.
to the effects of the
and control groups were attributed by the authors
could have been
regular language training, but at least part of these gains
There was some evidence that
due to practice and mai-,uration effects.
foreign language training,
aptitude training conducted outside the context of
improvement in
viz., in "study skills" classes, could produce some
flawed by the fact
g-nammatical sensitivity, but this result is possibly
skills classes was,
that the mean initial alltitude level of the study
the language training classes.
apparently, considerably lower than that of
Politzer-Weiss study is that
About all that can be said as a result of the
foreign language aptitude
the design and possible usefulness of training in
skjlls needs much further investigation.
the teaching
There are some general grounds for pessimism regarding
It is the usual finding that training tends to
of aptitudinal skills.
differences (Anastasi, 1958)
increase rather than decrease individual
performance are improved on the average.
even when absolute levels of
native endowments in language
If foreign language aptitude is linked to
earlier, it may be difficult
acquisition ability in the way I have suggested
And even if
native endowment.
for training to override the effects of
this effect may be quite specific
training can improve measured aptitude,
transfer to the language learning
to the measures employed and'. may not
task itself.
prospects
The papers at this colloquium are to be addressed to future
this spirit I wish to
more than to the consideration of past work, and in
likely to have
propose that the findings of aptitude research are more
suggesting
implications for foreign language teaching if they are viewed as
language training
strategies of learning and teaching within the context of
skills.
rather than suggesting techniques of training prerequisite
of
At one level of application, aptitude measures provide means
From the
learners.
diagnosing the patterns of difficulties exhibited by
rot highly
fact that the components of foreign language aptitude are
from student to
correlated, it follows that these patterns will vary
student, the
With a knowledge of the profile of the individual
student.
individualize instruction by directing
teacher may be in a better position to
special ei-rmtion to the learner's difficulties.
techniques of tea:l.hing
At a higher level of application, specific
that may be useful for all students are suggested.
coding ability implies
The fact of individual differences in phonetic
of discriminating sounds,
that the student's problem is not so much one
language teachers, as it is one of identifying
as commonly believed among
Discrimination of
in memory.
sounds as unique entities and storing them
in a sense incidental to the
sounds is necessary, of course, but it is
The distinction I am making between
identification and storage processes.
to that between relative
discrimination and identification is analogous
The student
special case of this.
and absolute judgment; in fact it is a
produce particular sounds, noti
must therefore be taught to identify and
Identification may be
merely to notice differences between sounds.
"tag"--a particular phonetic
facilitated by giving each sound its own