WORKING MEMORY AND L2 ORAL FLUENCY

Greg Mizera

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EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism Cognitive Abilities and Testing

Abstract

This main experiment in this project was designed to test the hypothesis that individual differences in working memory (WM) capacity correlate significantly with individual differences in the ability to speak a second language (L2) fluently. A pilot project was carried out to provide a set of quantifiable factors that produced a reliable description of L2 oral fluency. These factors were related to speed of delivery, pause profiles and morphosyntactic accuracy. In the main experiment, 44 native English speakers who were studying Spanish as a foreign language were tested with a set of three working memory tests, and the scores from these tests were correlated with the scores of three L2 oral fluency tests. The hypothesized strong correlations between working memory capacity and fluency were not found. Furthermore, many of the working memory scores did not correlate strongly with each other. These negative results are explained here partly by reference to the complex nature of speaking in a foreign language, which may tax other faculties more than working memory. Personal and affective variables are also mentioned as a possible explanation, as well as the relationship between working memory and long-term memory stores.

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References

1891The Principles of Psychology 1994The magical number seven, plus or minus two: Some limits on our capacity for processing information.1964ASPECTS OF THE THEORY OF SYNTAX 2000The episodic buffer: a new component of working memory?1980Individual differences in working memory and reading 1981Principles of Language Learning and Teaching 2016Perception and Communication 1989Second Language Acquisition and Second Language Learning

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2009Individual Differences in Working Memory Capacity and the Development of L2 Speech Production 2014The role of task sequencing in L2 development as mediated by working memory capacity 2019The impact of opinion-gap, reasoning-gap, and information-gap tasks on EFL learners’ speaking fluency 2013Working memory capacity and L2 speech performance in planned and spontaneous conditions: a correlational analysis 2010Phonological Memory and Implications for the Second Language Classroom 2011

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