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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience

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This study investigates lexical and morpho-syntactic development in comprehension and production among university-level students who participated in a second language (L2) study abroad program. Prior to and at the conclusion of the short-term study abroad experience, English language learners of Spanish participated in a verbal fluency measure along with comprehension and production tasks. The verbal fluency measure revealed rapid lexical gains. However, the comprehension and production tasks showed that the comprehension of grammatical gender agreement was excellent, while the accuracy in the production of morpho-syntactic agreement decreased over the limited time spent abroad. We analyze this counterintuitive trend as a shift in learning strategy: from grammatical accuracy to communicative ease, in line with a theory of U-shaped development in second language learners (e.g., Sharwood Smith & Kellerman, 1989) and previous observations about the study abroad environment (Isabelli-García, 2010). Other analyses of morpho-syntactic accuracy in our production data provide additional support for this argument.
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 ./sar...sch
 – / - – © John Benjamins Publishing Company
Linguistic advances and learning strategies
in a short-term study abroad experience
John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Canada, University of Greenwich,
England / University of Toronto, Canada
is study investigates lexical and morpho-syntactic development in compre-
hension and production among university-level students who participated in a
second language (L2) study abroad program. Prior to and at the conclusion of
the short-term study abroad experience, English language learners of Spanish
participated in a verbal uency measure along with comprehension and produc-
tion tasks. e verbal uency measure revealed rapid lexical gains. However, the
comprehension and production tasks showed that the comprehension of gram-
matical gender agreement was excellent, while the accuracy in the production of
morpho-syntactic agreement decreased over the limited time spent abroad. We
analyze this counterintuitive trend as a shi in learning strategy: from gram-
matical accuracy to communicative ease, in line with a theory of U-shaped
development in second language learners (e.g., Sharwood Smith & Kellerman,
1989) and previous observations about the study abroad environment (Isabelli-
García, 2010). Other analyses of morpho-syntactic accuracy in our production
data provide additional support for this argument.
Keywords: study abroad, learning strategies, L2 development
. Introduction
Lexical and grammatical gains in second language (L2) acquisition have been
shown to share a similar developmental path (Bates & Goodman, 1997). is fact
is puzzling when considering previous work on study abroad (SA) and at-home
(AH) development. While such studies show that AH learners tend to fare better
on the grammatical components of standardized tests than learners who study
abroad, they fall short of their SA counterparts in terms of verbal uency. e
present study explores the relationship between lexical and grammatical advances
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
in L2 learners who study abroad using methodology informed by and grounded
in theories of L2 acquisition.
Although learners who study an L2 abroad — even for short periods of time
generally make signicant advances in L2 vocabulary, L2 grammatical devel-
opment remains somewhat controversial (see, however, Isabelli-García, 2010, for
an account of gender agreement in SA from a dierent perspective). While the
present study does not attempt to make explicit comparisons between SA and AH
learners, it does shed light on the clouded results in the SA literature by adapting
measures common to studies in L2 acquisition. ese tests allow us to operation-
alize lexical and grammatical development in the context of the SA environment.
Our study reports on the progress of 16 learners of L2 Spanish who partici-
pated in an intensive three-week SA program in Costa Rica. We focus on both
lexical and morpho-syntactic development. Lexical development is measured us-
ing a verbal uency measure (Gollan, Montoya, & Werner, 2002) and morpho-
syntactic development — specically grammatical gender agreement is mea-
sured by a comprehension task and a production task. As we will show in the
next section, previous SA studies have not fully examined gender agreement in L2
learners. ey have, however, addressed comparisons between learners in an AH
setting and learners in a SA setting. e present study is an opportunity to explore
whether developmental patterns from a SA setting match those already reported
in studies where learners are in AH settings. Our results suggest that SA learners
may have a dierent learning strategy than AH learners (at least in the beginning
stages of development). We propose that SA learners focus on the communication
of the content of their speech and attend less to grammatical accuracy. is evi-
dence, while at odds with previous work on gender agreement in L2 acquisition in
AH settings, is supported in our analyses of nominal and verbal morpho-syntactic
accuracy. e types of errors that we found to increase, decrease, or remain static
during the limited time abroad suggest that SA learners may have modied their
L2 strategies from pre- to post-SA, a nding in line with a U-shaped pattern of
development (Sharwood Smith & Kellerman, 1989).
In the next section, we discuss previous work investigating lexical develop-
ment and grammatical gender during SA experiences. Following this, we in-
troduce the present study by discussing the experimental tasks and procedures.
Finally, we present the results and their implications.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
. Background
. Study abroad and L2 acquisition
Research in SA has looked at a variety of variables that play a role in L2 acquisition.
ese include L2 development on speaking, reading, and listening skills (Brown,
Brown, & Eggett, 2009; Dewey, 2004, 2008; Segalowitz & Freed, 2004; Segalowitz et
al., 2004; Tschirner, 2007; but see Davidson, 2010, and Freed, 1995a, for reviews),
lexical development (Collentine, 2004; Laufer & Paribakht, 1998, Schwieter, 2013),
communicative competence (Freed, 1995b; Laord, 1995; Rothman & Iverson;
2007), identity and socialization skills (Pellegrino, 2005; Schwieter & Ferreira,
2014, forthcoming; Schwieter & Kunert, 2012; Wang, 2010), and the eects of the
length of time spent abroad on overall learning (Allen, 2010; Allen & Herron,
2003; Dwyer, 2004). ese studies highlight the growing body of literature on SA
and its eect on L2 acquisition.
It would seem that SA strongly supports, and potentially accelerates, L2 ac-
quisition. However, some studies have shown that SA L2 learners do not necessar-
ily fare better on (morpho-) syntactic measures (Collentine, 2004, 2009; Howard,
2001; Isabelli & Nishida, 2005). is is especially true of short-term SA experiences
(Llanes & Muñoz, 2009). is may be explained, as suggested by Freed (1995c), by
the dierential nature of the methodological approach in addition to the unique
participants and type of SA program. SA studies tend to use a standardized test-
ing format which is not necessarily a measure of any specic domain of syntax.
Moreover, the various areas of syntax and morpho-syntax are not all equal in their
complexity or in the challenges they pose for L2 acquisition. Acquiring gender
agreement is not directly equivalent to acquiring tense, aspect, number agreement,
etc. Each structure poses its own unique challenges. It follows then that using a
standardized test that collapses several grammatical domains instead of choosing
one domain and thoroughly investigating its acquisition leaves some ambiguity
in the results. It is dicult to make generalizations about a learner’s grammatical
development as a whole without rst carefully examining individual elements to
be acquired and their accuracy in every relevant interpretation and use. is paper
aims to contribute to this dialogue by exploring the development of L2 grammati-
cal gender agreement in a SA setting.
. Gender agreement in Spanish
Grammatical gender is a system of agreement classes in which the assignment of
gender is reflected in the agreement they mark on the article or adjective. Research
on grammatical gender has traditionally identied two central notions: Gender
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
assignment and gender agreement. Work by Audring (2008) dierentiates the two
by arguing that “gender agreement is not only an overt manifestation of gender
assignment, but that properties of agreement systems can themselves constrain
the assignment systems they express” (p. 93). In Spanish, all nouns have a gram-
matical gender which is oen (but not always) demonstrated in the morphology
of the noun (la mesathe.fem table.fem).1 e gender can be clearly seen in the
agreement morphology of both the article and any adjectives (la mesa-amarilla
the.fem. table.fem. yellow.fem., el horno-amarillo the.masc. oven.masc. yellow.
masc.). When acquiring a noun, a learner must also acquire its morpho-syntactic
gender and the operation of gender agreement.
Even though it is closely related to lexical development and it has shown to
be a dicult area of acquisition in AH studies, even for the most advanced L2
learners (Hawkins, 1998), SA and AH studies seem to have divergent goals. While
AH studies have documented an overall trend concerning default gender agree-
ment, SA studies have focused on adjective type and social factors (Isabelli-García,
2010). While all of these factors are important, there is still a notable gap in the
literature: are the same acquisition trends that have been consistently found in
AH studies observable in SA studies? If this is a general acquisition trend, the
answer should be yes. However, there is reason to suspect that the patterns of ac-
quisition may be distinct. First, upon learning a new L2 word, learners must also
acquire the gender features of the word (gender assignment), as well as apply the
syntactic operation of agreement, resulting in the matching gender of the article
(and adjective, if present). If vocabulary development is accelerated in SA con-
texts, perhaps the syntactic operation of gender agreement is also accelerated. is
would be consistent with previous ndings that the rate of acquisition may be ac-
celerated in SA contexts (Brown et al., 2009; Dewey, 2004, 2008; Llanes & Muñoz
2009; Segalowitz & Freed, 2004; Segalowitz et al., 2004; Tschirner, 2007). We also
wonder whether SA learners may dier qualitatively from their AH counterparts.
Given that the amount and type of input are distinct for AH and SA contexts, we
may expect dierences not only for the rate of acquisition but also the pattern of
acquisition, a possibility which we will discuss in more detail below.
. Acquiring gender agreement
While not thoroughly investigated in SA literature, the L2 acquisition of grammati-
cal gender agreement has been well studied in AH learners (Alarcón, 2011; Bruhn de
Garavito & White, 2002; Franceschina, 2005; Grüter, Lew-Williams, & Fernald, 2012;
. ere is some debate on the status of the morphology of the noun itself (see, for example,
Harris, 1991). For the purposes of our study this is not a relevant discussion.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
Montrul, Foote, & Perpiñán, 2008). For the most part, these studies have shown that
even though learners are able to acquire grammatical gender, they continue to make
production errors. Examples of gender mismatch can be seen in (1) and (2):
(1) *El mesa
*e-masc. table-fem.
e table’
(2) *La zapato
*e-fem. shoe-masc.
e shoe’
Gender mismatch discussions have largely revolved around the question of wheth-
er learners have truly acquired grammatical gender. Although previous ndings
suggest that learners do indeed know and are able to produce gender agreement,
they persist in making one specic error when speaking: ey use the masculine
morphology of articles with feminine nouns (Bruhn de Garavito & White, 2002;
McCarthy, 2008).2 is has been investigated by McCarthy as an example of an
underspecied morpheme being inserted into a more specied syntactic struc-
ture: e Underspecication Hypothesis (UH). In other words, while the speaker
has acquired both masculine and feminine gender morphology and the syntactic
operation of gender agreement, they may continue to overuse the masculine mor-
phology (as it has no features) rather than the feminine morphology (which has
the feature [fem]). is is based on the theory of Distributed Morphology (Halle
& Marantz, 1993) in which the syntax is argued to manipulate syntactic items
only. All vocabulary items, including gender agreement morphology, are inserted
aer all syntactic processes are complete. If the syntax results in an article that is
specied as [fem], then the feminine vocabulary item should be inserted as it also
has the feature [fem]. If the masculine morphology is inserted, as in (1), it does
not enter into feature clash but rather simply does not provide the feature that was
needed (it neither matches nor clashes). On the other hand, if the syntax is not
specied for gender, the masculine morphology should be inserted as it has no
features either. If the feminine morphology is inserted, it enters into feature clash.
When processing costs are high, the use of a default form (or the form that can
enter any derivation without crashing it) may be employed as a strategy.
is is not the only interpretation of this trend, but this bias towards mascu-
line morphology (or any one morphology) as a default requires explanation. e
UH is perhaps the best explanation to account for variation in L2 speakers even
. Some beginning learners in Bruhn de Garavito and White’s (2002) study used the feminine
article as the default, a trend also noted in Hawkins (1998). However, the distribution is not
random: learners choose a default form and subsequently overuse this form.
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
aer they have acquired gender agreement.3 While the UH, for the reasons stated
in the previous paragraph, will serve as a theoretical assumption for this paper, the
results could be interpreted under other frameworks, and we will explore some
other possible explanations of the results in the discussion section. It remains,
however, a consistent result in the literature that L2 learners overuse one gender
as a default form. We assume that this is a performance error, caused by high pro-
cessing demands (as in the UH), and not an acquisition error, but our results will
only partially support this hypothesis in a SA context.
e question then is if this same trend that has been noted in AH studies can
be seen in a SA context as well. e rapid vocabulary development associated with
an intensive SA experience may have an eect on the related morpho-syntactic
development of gender agreement. If it does, we may observe a higher level of
accuracy than we might expect from early stage learners, and perhaps observe
quantitative dierences from AH learners as well. On the other hand, in a SA set-
ting, where processing costs are high, we may see the same pattern observed in AH
studies: A pattern consistent with the use of a ‘default’ form. While there is reason
to believe that an increase in lexical development correlates with an increase in
grammatical development (Bates & Goodman, 1997), it is also possible that there
will be little to no grammatical improvement.
One study on gender agreement in Spanish in a SA context is Isabelli-García
(2010), who provides an investigation of gender agreement across dierent types
of nouns (where the gender is opaque or transparent) and dierent agreement
domains (attributive and predicative adjectives) in a SA setting. Many words in
Spanish are transparent (e.g., la mesathe.fem table.fem) but some are opaque
(el puente the.masc bridge.masc), and others still are marked with the vowel
normally used for the opposite gender (el tema — the.masc theme.masc). An im-
portant factor in L2 is the proximity of the noun to the agreeing element (e.g., the
adjective). Consider (3) from Isabelli-García (2010, p. 297).
(3) La casa de mi hermano es hermosa.
e.fem house.fem of my brother.masc is beautiful.fem.
‘My brother’s house is beautiful’.
In sentences with predicative adjectives such as (3), learners may produce (or ac-
cept) ‘hermoso’ (beautiful, the masculine form) as it is closer to the masculine
noun ‘hermano’ (brother, masculine) following the Minimal Distance Principle
. e question of ‘acquisition’ here refers to the studies cited that found very high success rates
in learners, but not as successful as native speakers. It is in these persistent errors that a ‘default’
pattern emerges, leading to the conclusion that the ‘default’ form is not a lack of acquisition but
rather a performance error.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
(Clark & Clark, 1977). Isabelli-García’s study stems from the previous work in AH
contexts in these areas. ese studies show trends that attributive nouns may be
acquired before predicative nouns and that the transparency of the nominal mor-
phology itself may play a role (Bartning, 2000; Pienemann, 1998a, 1998b; although
see Dewaele & Véronique, 2001 for conicting results among advanced learners).
In a pre- and post-SA (or AH) four-month period, Isabelli-García reports overall
high accuracy in gender agreement in both groups in a grammaticality judgement
task in which the stimuli were varied for the transparency of gender on the noun
(called morphological class in her study) and for attributive or predicative adjec-
tives. Results show overall high accuracy both pre- and post-SA (or AH) semes-
ter, but a slightly lower accuracy for predicative adjectives with non-transparently
marked nouns. e two groups, however, did not dier signicantly in their accu-
racy, suggesting that (at least for this level of prociency, time-frame and linguistic
domain), SA does not have a signicant eect on grammatical accuracy. Isabelli-
García’s study did nd, however, dierences between the AH and SA groups in
their correction rate, such that:
At home students give more attention to form than meaning throughout the se-
mester. On the other hand, the abroad students are in an environment where they
have to make themselves understood in Spanish in all contexts of their daily lives.
In the study abroad context, meaning will always trump form (pp. 199–200).
Isabelli-García (2010) argues that AH and SA groups may not dier quantitatively,
but rather qualitatively due to the learning environment: AH contexts favour ac-
curacy in form and SA contexts favour communication. While Isabelli-Gara de-
scribes the well-documented trend of using a ‘default’ form in L2 learners, this is
not one of the (many) factors reported in her study. In the present study, we will
also expand a well-established trend in L2 acquisition to a new learning context
(SA) in which the type of input will dier both in quantity and quality. We may
then expect to nd both qualitative and quantitative dierences.
. Present study
. Research questions and hypotheses
In the present study, we investigate lexical and grammatical development among
language learners in a short-term SA experience. We are interested in exploring
the following research questions:
RQ1: Does lexical robustness signicantly increase from pre- to post-SA?
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
RQ2: Does accuracy of nominal gender agreement signicantly increase in
comprehension from pre- to post-SA?
RQ3: Does accuracy of nominal gender agreement signicantly increase in pro-
duction from pre- to post-SA?
RQ4: Is there evidence for a ‘default’ masculine form in gender agreement?
Prior to conducting analyses comparing pre- and post-SA data, we predict the fol-
lowing hypotheses for each RQ:
H1: ere will be a signicant increase in lexical robustness;
H2: ere will be a signicant increase in nominal gender agreement accuracy in
comprehension;
H3: ere will be a signicant increase in nominal gender agreement accuracy in
production;
H4: Any errors that exist (or persist) in gender agreement will favour a ‘default
masculine form.
e rst hypothesis is based on previous work on SA (Collentine, 2004; Laufer
& Paribakht, 1998, Schwieter, 2013), the other three from previous work on AH
studies (Alarcón, 2011; Bruhn de Garavito & White, 2002; Franceschina, 2005;
Grüter et al., 2012; Montrul et al., 2008).
. Participants
16 language learners who were university students in a predominantly English-
speaking region of Canada, participated in a short-term SA experience. e learn-
ers ranged in age from 18 to 26 at the time of testing and were all native speakers of
English (L1) who had just completed their fourth semester (i.e., intermediate lev-
el) of university-level Spanish (L2). Language courses at the university are taught
by native and near-native instructors who use communicative and/or active learn-
ing pedagogies. Based on the university’s 12-week term structure, the amount of
L2 instruction totaled 48 weeks (144 hours). e participants also reported taking
French (L2) prior to university during which time they obtained a low to interme-
diate level of prociency.4 Descriptive statistics can be seen in Table 1.
. Although French is also a language with grammatical gender, Bruhn de Garavito and White
(2002) have shown that there is no transfer of grammatical gender from French to Spanish. Even
though we do not consider it to be an inuence here either, future work may benet from testing
whether or not there is indeed transfer.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
Table 1. Means (M) and standard deviations (SD) of participant characteristics pre-study
abroad
M SD
Age 20.50 2.10
L1 (English) Age of acquisition 0 0
L2 (French) Age of acquisition 7.40 2.10
L2 (Spanish) Age of acquisition 17.19 4.04
e SA setting included 21 days in an immersion experience in San José, Costa
Rica where the learners attended intensive grammar and conversation classes in
Spanish. ese instructional hours totaled 75 hours (25 hours x 3 weeks). In addi-
tion, the participants lived with Spanish-speaking host families and went on sev-
eral excursions led by Spanish-speaking guides. We should note that 21 days is
shorter than other studies that report on short-term SA which are typically from
6–8 weeks.
. Target language usage while abroad
Although usually taken for granted in SA contexts, we asked the participants to
estimate the amount of time per day they speak (or spoke) Spanish and English.
is was done prior to and at the conclusion of the SA experience to elicit rat-
ings for target language usage in Canada and in Costa Rica, respectively. For both
languages, the dierence between pre- and post-SA was signicant. On average,
participants felt that they used Spanish only 5.1% (SD = 3.9) of the time back home
in Canada and 40.8% (SD = 20.7) of the time during the SA experience. A two-
tailed dependent t-test showed this dierence to be signicant (t = 6.60, df = 15,
p < 0.001). e amount that they used English decreased signicantly, from 90.3%
(SD = 7.4) of the time on average prior to the SA experience to 54.5% (t = 7.80,
df = 15, p < 0.001). e increase in L2 use and decrease in L1 use are important to
show that the participants are in fact participating in a true immersion experience
much dierent from their learning situation back home.
. Methodology
ree tasks made up the experimental procedures in the present study. ese in-
clude: a verbal uency measure (VFM); a comprehension task; and a semi-spon-
taneous production task. All three tasks were administered at the beginning (be-
fore departing Canada) and conclusion (on the last day in Costa Rica) of the SA
experience.
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
.. Verbal uency measure
e VFM is an adaptation from previous work (Gollan et al., 2002; Rosselli et al.,
2000; Schwieter, 2013; Schwieter & Sunderman, 2008, 2009, 2011). is measure
requires that participants generate words within phonemic and semantic catego-
ries in a short period (e.g., 30 seconds). e VFM essentially is a test of lexical
robustness which estimates the strength and reliance between words and the con-
cepts that they represent in the mind. Lexical robustness has been hypothesized to
be an important element and estimate of global language prociency. e modi-
ed version of the VFM was conducted in a group setting, and was modied to
elicit written responses in a group setting for the sake of data collection facilita-
tion. Other than modifying the task from individual to group and from oral to
written, the materials and procedure were exactly the same as in the VFM from
the studies mentioned above.
In the VFM, a series of ten categories (ve semantic and ve phonemic) were
individually displayed in the center of a screen for 30 seconds each. e seman-
tic categories were: Sports, fruits, clothes, vegetables, colours; and the phonemic
categories included words beginning with the sounds: m, a, s, r, and g. Categories
were grouped by language to avoid language switching eects. Upon seeing the
category name, the participants were instructed to write as many words related
to that category as quickly as possible in the allotted time. e slide moved to the
next category aer the allotted time and there was no pause between categories
within each language. At the change of each category, the experimenter verbalized
the name of the category in case the participants were not looking at the screen
at that exact moment. As in previous studies, the VFM was conducted rst in
English, then in French, and then in Spanish. Between each of the languages, a
brief break was provided. e number of words produced for each of the catego-
ries was totaled for all three languages.
.. Comprehension task
e method of testing comprehension of gender morphology on articles before
nouns in Spanish is expected to demonstrate that production errors do not neces-
sarily guarantee lack of acquisition. We follow the assumption that comprehension
is required for accurate production (although some results have been found to
show the contrary, see Tasseva-Kurktchieva, 2008, 2015).5 In the present study, the
. Tasseva-Kurktchieva (2008, 2015) provides excellent evidence that predicts dierent patterns
of gender and number agreement development in production compared to comprehension.
Although this work is compelling, the current study is unable to make this comparison properly
due to its small sample size and ceiling eects in the comprehension task. It is, however, a good
avenue for future work.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
comprehension task employed was modeled aer White, Valenzuela, Kozlowska-
Macgregor, and Leung (2004) in which participants are required to rely on gender
and number cues in an n-drop6 structure cue. Participants were in a group set-
ting with individual answer sheets, and were instructed not to talk to each other
or share answers. In the experiment, learners were asked to choose from three
simultaneously-presented pictures on a projected screen to an n-drop oral and
visual cue, thus choosing the picture that agreed in gender and number with the
determiner and/or adjective given. All pictures were semantically plausible. e
answer sheet listed three multiple choice options on the page for each number:
A, B, or C, and each picture on the screen was always labelled as either A, B, or C.
e slides were a combination of three line drawings chosen from the
Snodgrass and Vanderwart (1980) normalized picture list. Because of the limited
prociency of the participants, the entire experiment only included the most com-
mon sixteen line drawings. Several animals were included as stimuli in the task.
is is important because the gender of a noun may have a close semantic rela-
tionship to the sex of an animate noun. e researchers expected participants to
assume that all animal nouns were male as even native speakers tend to use the
masculine as a ‘default’ form in this respect.7 e results indicated that they indeed
did make this assumption, and all nouns were assigned gender independently of
the biological sex.8
ree types of slides were included in the experiment: Target gender (16); tar-
get number (16); and distractor (21). In each slide, there were three pictures, with
only one variable change: either gender and number or adjective. In other words,
each slide contained either a gender and number dierence in the set of pictures
(e.g., a feminine, singular noun; a masculine, singular noun; and a feminine plural
noun) or an adjective change (e.g., one red, one yellow, one white – all masc. sing.).
e experiment included three cue phrases which were: “Dame…” (Give me), “Me
gustaría…” (I would like), and “Quiero…” (I want).
. N-drop, or noun-drop, is a term that refers to an implied noun. e speaker makes reference
to this noun, even though it is not explicitly mentioned, by use of gender and number agreement
morphology. For example, a speaker might say el rojo (the.masc. red.masc.) to mean ‘the red one’
instead of the fuller version el coche rojo (the.masc car red.masc) to refer to ‘the red car’.
. is tendency in native Spanish is also conceptual evidence for the Underspecication
Hypothesis, as it shows that the masculine morphology is not specied for gender and thus may,
in some contexts, be considered ambiguous, but the feminine morphology is not.
. Some participants consistently referred to the cat as feminine, but these participants also
informally mentioned aer the experiment that the cat looked like a female cat. ese tokens
were excluded from the analyses.
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
Additionally, only three colour adjectives were used: ‘blanco/a/s’ (white-masc./
fem./plural), ‘rojo/a/s (red-masc./fem./plural), and ‘amarillo/a/s’ (yellow-masc./
fem./plural). Because studies in L1 acquisition have shown that colour adjectives
tend to emerge rst (Liceras et al., 2000) and because these are easy to identify
(as opposed to adjectives of size, for example), these were the only three adjec-
tives chosen. Furthermore, their endings clearly indicate the nominal gender of
the absent noun (-o corresponds to masculine, -a to feminine, as opposed to ‘azul’
blue, which is invariable). Only denite determiners were used (‘el’/‘la’/‘los’/‘las’
the masc. sing., fem. sing., masc. pl., fem. pl.). e target gender slide contained
a cue that was singular and either feminine or masculine (e.g., ‘quiero el’ — masc.
sing. rojo-masc.sing.). In this trial type, the adjective (colour) remained constant
(see Figure 1). However, there was one target picture (accurate gender and num-
ber), one diering in gender only (accurate number), and one diering in both
gender and number. In this case, if an error occurred, it could be coded to see ex-
actly what type of error has occurred (gender, number, or both). A target number
slide consisted of one target picture (accurate number and gender), one picture
with a number error (accurate gender), and a picture with both gender and num-
ber errors (see Figure 2). In the distractor slides, all three pictures matched the cue
in gender and number, but diered in adjective colour (see Figure 3). e full list
of trials in the comprehension task can be seen in Appendix A.
In accordance with the procedures in White et al. (2004), immediately follow-
ing the task, each participant was shown a series of the 16 ashcards of the line
drawings used in the comprehension task and was asked to give the Spanish word
with an article. Any gender errors produced resulted in the elimination of that to-
ken from the comprehension analyses for that participant because any errors with
these nouns could constitute an error in gender assignment. In other words, it is
not clear whether they have learned the correct gender for these nouns. Any errors
A B
“Me gustaría la roja.
C
Figure 1. Target gender slide: “I would like the-fem.sing. red-fem.sing (one).
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
with such nouns would be ambiguous then between a gender assignment error
(lexical representation error) or a gender agreement error (they have learned the
gender for the noun but have made an error in syntactic agreement). us, only
nouns which elicited a correct gender agreement were included in the analyses.
Two versions of the task, which diered in the combination of nouns and adjec-
tives and the order of presentation were developed (one pre-SA and one post-SA).
is was done to avoid priming eects, and the results show that priming played
no role in the results.
.. Production task
e production of gender morphology was analyzed through a story recall task
inspired by Snape (2005). Two dierent stories9 in Spanish were used to measure
pre- and post-SA language production abilities (see Appendix B). e pre-SA
. e comparative results of the production task may be slightly weakened because we use two
dierent stories for pre- and post-testing. Future work may want to consider using the same
story for both pre- and post-SA testing.
A B
“Me gustarían las amarillas.
C
Figure 2. Number slide: “I would like the-fem.plural yellow-fem.plural (ones).
A B
“Me gustaría el rojo.
C
Figure 3. Distractor slide: “I would like the-masc.sing. red-masc.sing (one).
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
story was 129 words long and the post-SA story was 205 words long (as increased
reading ability was anticipated) and they included 13 and 18 nouns, respectively.
e nouns in the stories clearly indicated their gender by having a preceding ar-
ticle, so that upon reading them, the gender should be clear. Each story was a new
interpretation of a traditional fairy-tale and contained both familiar and new vo-
cabulary. e length and diculty level was anticipated to be challenging for each
participant, but not impossible for any.
Participants were asked to read the story silently until they felt as though they
were familiar with it. e participants were given as much time as they needed and
were encouraged to ask for clarication or explanation regarding any unknown
vocabulary or grammatical forms. When ready, they were asked to retell the story
in their own words, rst in English (to be sure that they indeed understood) and
then in Spanish. is meant that they could either use the nouns given to them
in the story or another similar noun that they already knew (e.g., instead of ‘cas-
tor’ — beaver many participants opted to say ‘animal’ — animal).10 Because of the
amount of freedom given to the participants to express the story using words that
they already knew, we were able to create a spontaneous production context that
was still comparable across participants.
e responses were digitally-recorded and transcribed and the noun phrases
were isolated and analyzed. e percentage of gender errors was measured by tak-
ing the number of masculine determiners with feminine nouns divided by the
total number of feminine analyzable nouns, and the number of feminine articles
with masculine nouns divided by the total number of masculine analyzable nouns.
. Results
. Verbal uency
RQ1 asked whether lexical robustness improved from pre- to post-SA. e current
study hypothesized that overall, the participants would make signicant gains in
Spanish lexical robustness. is hypothesis was shown to be true. e mean lexi-
cal robustness measures prior to and at the conclusion of the SA experience can
be seen in Table 2. A dependent samples two-tailed t-test revealed that partici-
pants showed a signicant increase in Spanish lexical robustness (t = 6.93, df = 15,
. We thank an anonymous reviewer for pointing out that this may bias the results given that
participants might have used the words they knew and not the ones in the text. Nonetheless, if
there were an eect, this would more than likely lead to an improvement in the post-test which
was not the case in the present study.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
p < 0.001). eir lexical robustness in English seemed to improve as well, t = 2.13,
df = 15, p < 0.05. However, their lexical robustness in French did not change signi-
cantly, t = 0.58, df = 15, p > 0.05.
Table 2. Mean scores and standard deviations (in parentheses) for lexical robustness pre-
and post-study abroad
Pre-SA Post-SA Dierence
L2 (Spanish) lexical robustness 29.9 (11) 48.1 (9.6) + 18.2
L1 (English) lexical robustness 82.4 (8.5) 86.00 (10.9) + 3.6
L2 (French) lexical robustness 35.1 (16.1) 36.00 (17) + 0.9
While it is possible that these eects are due to increased familiarity with the task,
we do not believe that this is the only factor. Firstly, there are no such results for
French. Secondly, the increase in English is much less than that of Spanish, al-
though it appears to be consistent across participants. We believe that this is still
convincing evidence that the lexical robustness of the participants in Spanish is
signicant (see also Schwieter, 2013). While the results for English may indicate
some task-based results (a consistent increase by only 4%), this is not enough of a
dierence to discredit the results for Spanish (an increase of 60%). L1 lexical ro-
bustness did not increase in Schwieter’s (2013) or Schwieter and Ferreira’s (forth-
coming) study reporting on similar short-term SA experiences. In Table 3, we pro-
vide one participant’s list of words produced for the category ‘ropa’ (clothing) for
pre-SA and post-SA, thus illustrating the lexical robustness.
Table 3. Examples of L2 words produced in the verbal uency measure pre- and post-SA
Pre-SA Post-SA
Category: Ropa (clothes) Camisa
Zapatos
Pantalones
Zapatos
Pantalones
Camiseta
Corbata
Traje
Bufanda
Calcetines
. Comprehension
Our second RQ asked whether gender morphology in comprehension would in-
crease. Gender agreement morphology did not pose a problem for participants ei-
ther pre- or post-SA. As can be seen in Table 4, which shows the average accuracy
in the pre- and post-SA tests, comprehension errors were very low at pre-SA and
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
because there was little room for improvement, they did not signicantly improve
over the limited time spent abroad, as shown by the Wilcoxon signed ranks test,
z = 4, p > 0.05.11
Table 4. Mean accuracy (in %) and total number of eliminated words pre- and post-SA
Tested items Excluded items Correct tokens Error tokens Accuracy %
Pre-SA 320 20 (2.7) 274 (4.16) 26 (2.6) 91 (16.9)
Post-SA 320 58 (2.2) 259 (2.43) 3 (0.5) 98 (4.6)
Note: Standard deviation appears in parentheses.
e results of the comprehension task do not show improvement over the limited
amount of time abroad. e pre-SA accuracy is at ceiling so there is little room
for improvement, but an upward trend can be seen. However, if we look closely at
the number of words eliminated (from failure to identify the correct gender in the
post-test), we nd that they decrease in accuracy, making more errors in explicit
identication. is means that they were less accurate in identifying the gender of
nouns but were more accurate with the nouns that they did know.
It is important to note that this task includes a limited number of tokens (for
example, only three adjectives). is makes the production task more open-ended,
and more variation is expected in that task. It also explains why the participants
did so well. As there was a limited number of tokens, the participants had little
room for error.
. Production
RQ3 asked if learners showed improvement in production in terms of accuracy
in gender agreement. It was hypothesized that accuracy in syntactic morphol-
ogy would increase due to the massive amount of input in the target language,
as evidenced by the increase in lexical robustness. e participants in the pres-
ent study constantly interacted in the L2 in nearly every experience. Given that
comprehension of gender accuracy was high at the beginning of the SA experi-
ence, an increase in gender morphology agreement was anticipated. Accuracy in
gender agreement was very high both pre- and post-SA and there was no signi-
cant dierence. In the production task, however, the participants not only failed
to show an increase in accuracy in the production of articles, they also exhibited
a signicant decrease in agreement accuracy in spontaneous production. In the
. Due to the small sample size and some variation in levels of prociency, the data was not
shown to be normally distributed. For this reason, all statistics provided in the Results section
are the results of a paired Wilcoxon test.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
pre-SA experiment, participants made gender mismatch errors on only 11 of the
124 nouns produced (5%, SD = 46.3), whereas in the post-SA experiment, they
produced such mismatches on 43 of 181 nouns produced (16%, SD = 26.7). is
decrease in accuracy was shown to be signicant (z = 21, p < 0.05).
Recall that the score from the production task was determined by adding all
noun constructions produced and then subtracting invariable determiners, in-
vented or English nouns or determiners and null noun constructions (native or
non-native like), as these would be impossible to use as a means of measuring
gender agreement. In the pre-SA task we eliminated 54 tokens and in the post-SA
task we eliminated 23 tokens. In cases of self-correction we analyzed only the self-
corrected token. While lexical robustness increased and comprehension was high
and maintained a high level of accuracy, we found that accuracy in production of
gender agreement decreased.
. Masculine form bias
RQ4 asked whether participants would demonstrate a ‘default’ masculine form
in gender agreement. e fact that learners made more gender mismatch errors
at the conclusion of the SA experience was surprising, but does not necessarily
eliminate the possibility of a bias for masculine determiners. As discussed above,
prior work in L2 acquisition studies shows that learners in a classroom setting
show a bias for masculine morphology (e.g., Bruhn de Garavito & White 2002).
e results of our production task can be seen below in Table 5.
Table 5. Raw distribution and mean accuracy of feminine determiners (FD) and mascu-
line determiners (MD) among feminine nouns (FN) and masculine nouns (MN)
Pre-SA Post-SA
FD-FN *MD-FN MD-MN *FD-MN FD-FN *MD-FN MD-MN *FD-MN
Raw
number of
tokens
60 6 53 5 67 16 71 27
Accuracy 91% 91% 81% 72%
Note: * indicates ungrammatical.
Table 5 shows that pre-SA the participants produced the incorrect masculine
determiner with feminine nouns 9% of the time (SD = 26.7) and they produced
feminine determiners with masculine nouns 9% of the time (SD = 12). is dier-
ence was not signicant (p > 0.05). Post-SA, the participants produced on average
masculine articles with feminine nouns 19% of the time (SD = 25.3) and they pro-
duced feminine articles with masculine nouns 28% of the time (SD = 28.4). Again,
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
this dierence was not signicant: (p > 0.05). us, there appears to be no bias for
the use of the masculine article as a default form either pre- or post-SA.12 is is
contrary to previous studies and deserves further investigation. In all, the results
show that not only did the learners make signicantly more gender agreement
errors aer the SA experience, they also exhibited a distinct distribution of errors
compared to previous L2 acquisition research.
. Post-hoc analyses
e results thus far have pointed to two interesting ndings: L2 learners made
signicantly more gender agreement errors post-SA than pre-SA; and they neither
use the masculine nor the feminine determiner as a default form in either stage
of development. To further investigate these ndings, we conducted additional
analyses on the data from the production task. We hypothesized that errors which
impede communication would decrease and errors that do not impede communi-
cation would either increase or remain constant.
Participants made errors (of any kind) on 43.5 % (SD = 17.2) of the nouns pro-
duced in the pre-SA task and 36.8% (SD = 26.8) in the post-SA task. is dierence
was not signicant (t = -0.7, df = 15, p > 0.05). is result indicates that the learners
made about the same number of nominal errors prior to and at the completion of
the SA experience. e rise in gender errors then may be indicative of a change in
error type.
As for the nominal domain, common errors were: Gender agreement errors;
failure to produce an article when necessary (non-native-like null articles); and
using English or made-up nouns. Table 6 presents examples of each type of error.
While gender agreement errors do not impede communication, the omission of an
article, when its use is necessary, does impede communication, as it makes refer-
ence to an antecedent. Without this reference the target noun may be hard to iden-
tify. For example, the sentence in Table 6, *Compro mesa — I.buy table, does not
specify if the speaker is buying a table or the table. is distinction may reasonably
cause confusion. Also, using a made-up word or an English word is certainly an
impediment for communication. us, upon closer examination of the produc-
tion task, we expect errors of the rst type to either increase or remain unchanged
and of the second two types to diminish by the conclusion of the SA experience.
. We are grateful to an anonymous reviewer for the suggestion that we investigate individual
patterns of each learner. While we did not see any clear patterns we would like to note that this is
probably due to the small number of tokens per participant per noun type (masculine and femi-
nine) per testing time (pre- and post-SA). is is a limitation of this paper and would provide
valuable insight in future studies.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
Table 6. Types and examples of nominal errors
Type of error Example
Gender agreement *un mesa — a.masc table.fem
Non-native-like null articles *comproo mesa — I.buy table
Made-up or English nouns *un cato — referring to un castor — a beaver /
un beaver — a beaver (in English)
Our predictions for these types of errors were correct: A two-tailed dependent
samples t-test13 revealed that the usage of made-up words decreased signicantly
(t = -2.2, df = 15, p < 0.05) and the decrease in omission of articles approached sig-
nicance (t = -1.8, df = 15, p < 0.10), while gender errors as a whole increased (see
Figure 4).
Figure 4 presents the distribution of nominal error types. We did not give
overall accuracy as each of the error types are proportions of a dierent subset of
nouns (recall that invariable determiners were eliminated from the gender analy-
sis, but this would not have an eect on the other two). Moreover, determining
when it is possible to make an error by not including a determiner when one is
needed proved to be too complex to allow for a clear presentation of the data as a
proportion of accurate production. Not all nouns need an article in every context
and not including one does not always result in ungrammaticality but sometimes
a semantic error (not analysed here). For this reason, the results are visually pre-
sented as a proportion of errors, but we believe that qualitative dierences in the
types of errors produced are still clear.
. From this point on, the data was normally distributed and so parametric tests are used.
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Gender *Null Det English/Made-up
Pre
Post
% of Nominal Errors
Figure 4. Proportion of nominal production errors by L2 Spanish speakers pre- and
post-SA
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
In order to see if this trend also appeared for other syntactic categories, we also
analyzed verb usage in the production task data. Common errors included: Using
English or made-up verbs; person agreement errors; and tense errors. Table 7
shows examples of these three types of errors. We would expect a decrease in the
production of English or made-up verbs, as already discussed, because they im-
pede communication. Person agreement errors also cause a large amount of con-
fusion as they can modify the subject preforming an action. us, both of these
types of errors are expected to decrease from pre-SA to post-SA. e tense errors
are a special case, as this is an area that has been shown to have a default form
(McCarthy, 2008) which is the use of the present tense in place of the past tense.
While we did not see a default pattern in the gender agreement morphology of
nouns, we may still expect to see this pattern with verbs.
Table 7. Types and examples of production errors
Type of error Example
Made-up or English verbs *El plota — he plota, meaning throw/
*El throws — he throws (in English)
Person agreement *El tengo — He I.have
Tense Él lanza la pelota y aterrizó en la piscina —
He throws the ball and it landed in the pool.
Participants made errors (of any kind) on 53% (SD = 22.5) of the verbs produced
in the pre-SA task and 70% (SD = 26.2) in the post-SA task. is dierence was
signicant (t = -2.4, df = 15, p < 0.05). is result indicates that the learners made
more verbal errors at the completion of the SA experience than they did prior to
the SA experience. However, it is important to see what kind of error they make
and we see the same kind of qualitative change over time spent abroad as we have
shown for nominal errors.
Figure 5 shows the percentage of errors for English/made-up verbs and the use
of the present tense for another tense (usually the past).14 ere were not enough
tokens of person agreement to conduct a statistical analysis. e results did not
indicate a signicant decrease (or increase) in English or made-up verbs (p > 0.05),
but they do indicate an increased reliance on the present tense as a default form for
the past tense (t = 3.5, df = 14, p < 0.01).
e learners made gender agreement errors in the production task but not in
the comprehension task because they are more likely focused on communicating
. Note that the percentage of the English/made up verbs is a proportion of errors to all verbs
produced, while the use of the present tense is the proportion of errors to all conjugated verbs
in any tense except the present.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
the semantic content of the story rather than on grammatical accuracy. is is why
the default pattern previously noticed in AH populations did not emerge. We do
however see the default pattern in the use of the present tense for the past tense.
We suggest that this pattern emerges for the same reason: it does not impede com-
munication whereas an error in the opposite direction (the use of the past tense
for the present) might.
. Discussion
From the results of our study, two surprising ndings merit discussion. e rst
was that L2 learners appear to make more gender agreement errors post-SA com-
pared to pre-SA and the second was that there was no evidence of using the mas-
culine determiner as the default form either in pre- or post-SA. ere are three
possible explanations for these two results: 1) limited time spent abroad; 2) low
L2 prociency level; or 3) a switch in learning strategies to favour a communi-
cation-based approach. Our rst two explanations are logical consequences that
we hypothesize and are not directly supported by theories of L2 acquisition and
our third explanation draws on previous accounts of U-shaped development
(Kellerman, 1985; Sharwood Smith & Kellerman, 1989).
e rst explanation is that three weeks abroad is not enough time to positive-
ly aect gender agreement, or at least for learners with beginning and intermediate
prociency levels. It is possible that gender agreement requires much more time to
master. Indeed, L2 acquisition research has consistently shown that the acquisition
of gender agreement is a long and gradual process and in fact, it should not be sur-
prising that gender agreement did not improve given the brevity of time abroad.
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
English/Made-up Present Tense
Pre
Post
% Errors on all verbs
Figure 5. Verbal production errors in L2 Spanish speakers pre- and post-SA
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
What was unexpected, however, was the fact that gender agreement actually wors-
ened aer three weeks abroad. ese counterintuitive ndings could be a product
of a methodological limitation. Although every attempt was made to reduce ex-
perimental limitations and remain consistent with prior experimental designs, it
is possible that the way in which we employed the production task did not allow
us to fully assess gender agreement. Future work using a pre- and post-test design
should consider in more detail the behavior of the learners in the pre-test (speci-
cally looking at ceiling eects from the onset). ese studies should also consider
tracking gender agreement development over a longer period of time in the SA
context to see at what point, if any, learners will begin to make improvement in
gender agreement, or at least to look more like AH learners (who use one gender
as the default form). Longitudinal studies including delayed post-tests are sorely
needed as evidenced by Pérez-Vidal’s (2014) volume and in particular the chapter
by Juan-Garau (2014) on grammatical accuracy. is explanation, however, does
not predict a divergence from AH in the use of the default form nor the drop in
accuracy.
e second possibility is that the participants were too early in their develop-
ment to experience morpho-syntactic gains. Magnan and Back (2007) argue that
a certain level of metalinguistic information is required prior to SA experience in
order for participants to make optimal linguistic gains (however, for arguments
supporting a grammatical advantage for less-procient learners, see Alarcón,
2006, and in favour of a vocabulary learning advantage, see Schwieter, 2013).
Because our participants had a very low error rate (approximately 5%) prior to the
SA experience, we are skeptical to accept that the participants were ‘too novice’ to
show improvement in gender agreement. As such, this second possible explana-
tion is unlikely correct.
e third possibility for reduced accuracy in gender agreement is that learners
may have indeed made signicant gains in gender agreement but that these gains
are masked by the fact that learners have turned their attention from grammati-
cal accuracy to communicative uency in L2 production. Isabelli-García (2010)
found a higher correction rate for attributive and predicative adjective agreement
for AH learners when compared to SA learners.
is finding may suggest that the [AH learners] give more attention to form than
meaning throughout the semester. On the other hand, the [SA learners] are in an
environment where they have to make themselves understood in Spanish in all
contexts of their daily lives… is conveying of meaning may lead the [SA learn-
ers] to focus more on meaning as a survival tactic (pp. 299–300).
Put dierently, a SA experience presents L2 learners with an environment in which
speaking to be understood takes priority over grammatical accuracy. Accurate
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
gender agreement is not essential for communication and perhaps L2 learners who
study abroad realize this rather quickly and subsequently adapt communicative
strategies. While a native speaker would not say something like *el mesa (the.masc
table.fem, ‘the table’), a listener can still extrapolate the communicative intent and
it is possible that language learners who partake in a SA experience swily come
to realize this. While this is not strictly the explanation of the U-shaped pattern
previously observed in L2 learners, it is in line with the previous observational
patterns: Learners acquire the correct form, and then digress back to the incorrect
form, before nally mastering the form later on.
In the present study, the U-shaped pattern is not supported by the fact that the
SA learners did not overuse the masculine morphology, contrary to previous stud-
ies in L2 acquisition. Given that prior work has suggested that learners overuse the
masculine morphology as a result of increased processing demands (McCarthy,
2008), we expected to nd the same pattern here. While this is not directly sup-
ported, it is possible that the learners are not using a default form, but have instead
determined from their environment that grammatical gender agreement is of little
communicative importance (in comparison with other elements) and have aban-
doned the idea entirely, using the masculine and feminine morphology seemingly
at random. e post-hoc analyses that we conducted support this explanation and,
while it may be less desirable than an underspecication interpretation, it seems to
be the most plausible of the three possibilities.
While an AH comparison group is not included here, we do believe the dier-
ences found between our results and the results of previous AH studies are not ful-
ly due to task eects (although we should not completely discount this possibility).
e production task is unconstrained enough such that the learners were able to
communicate the stories back to the experimenter with relative ease. Although the
vocabulary in the story was no doubt challenging for the learners, they all adapted
to the task by simply retelling the story using words that they knew (if they could
not remember ‘castor’ — beaver they may have used ‘animal’ — animal). It is this
creativity that leads us to believe that the task was exible enough to elicit spon-
taneous production and to be compared with previous studies. Nonetheless, we
would like to point out that the comprehension task included well-known nouns
and only three colour adjectives whereas the production task included less-com-
mon nouns. Subsequent studies should be mindful of these possible eects by bet-
ter balancing the frequency of words across experimental tasks.
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
. Conclusion
is study investigated the acquisition pattern and errors of intermediate L2 learn-
ers of Spanish in a short-term SA experience. e results suggest that aer three
weeks in a SA environment, learners experienced signicant lexical gains and a de-
crease in a few types of errors which impede communication (e.g., made-up nouns
and the omission of articles). e learners also experienced an increase in errors
which do not impede communication (e.g., gender agreement) and in the use of one
default (underspecied) form (e.g., present tense for past tense). e results show
that learners in a SA setting dier from learners in an AH setting (based on the ex-
tensive previous literature on L2 acquisition gender agreement) in that they do not
use the masculine morphology as a default form. ey do, however, use the present
tense as a default form. is evidence suggests that learners who study abroad un-
dergo a shi in learning strategy so that their main objective is on communication.
Consequently, they prioritize resources to achieve accuracy in the areas that are the
most essential for communication. is preference can be seen in the types of errors
that persist, decrease, and increase. In all, we argue that learners who study abroad
develop their L2 in a communicative-oriented manner, while learners who learn in
a classroom setting may be more inclined to technical grammatical accuracy.
e present study provides insight on how a short-term SA can aect L2
lexico-grammatical competence. However, we would like to identify a few meth-
odological limitations. Firstly, the study’s sample size is rather small and future
work should consider incorporating more participants to have stronger and more
generalizable results. ese studies could also incorporate a more diverse spec-
trum of L2 prociencies among the participants. Secondly, while it was not one of
our study’s objectives to compare the SA learning context to the AH (traditional)
setting, the addition to a comparison AH group of learners would be benecial.
Finally, while we feel that our tasks measured what we wanted, the ceiling eects in
the comprehension task and the rather high (91%) pre-departure accuracy of gen-
der agreement dictate that we not completely rule out task eects. More research
will enable us to answer these unclear results and may wish to consider using the
same story in the pre- and post-SA recall task.
Much is le to be explored when it comes to gender agreement acquisition in
SA contexts. Future work should continue to investigate the development of spe-
cic linguistic areas, perhaps over longer periods and including delayed post-tests,
but should also bear in mind that what participants produce (either in written
or spoken form) may not necessarily be an accurate representation of what they
have or have not acquired. Future work should consider carefully what structures
are more relevant to oral communication and include both a production and a
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
comprehension component to ensure that the errors that persist are the result of a
performance issue and not of incomplete acquisition.
Acknowledgements
A previous version of this paper was presented in March 2014 at the 36th American Association
for Applied Linguistics Conference in Portland, Oregon. We would like to thank Prof. John L.
Plews (Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Canada) for his helpful comments as we developed this
paper. We are also very grateful to the three anonymous peer reviewers for their insightful sug-
gestions. Finally, we would like to thank Prof. Martin Howard and Prof. Carmen Pérez-Vidal for
their professionalism and warm nature at the International Conference on the Culture of Study
Abroad for Second Languages held in July 2015 at Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Canada.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
Appendix A. Materials from the Comprehension Task
Slide Type Response A Response B Response C
Distractor Blue Bear Yellow Book White Donkey
Distractor Blue dogs Red books Yellow bears
Number Yellow tables Yellow apple Yellow dog
Gender Red cat Red books Red chair
Distractor Yellow leaf Red table Blue nose
Number Red house Red beds Red donkey
Gender Yellow cats Yellow chair Yellow eye
Distractor Yellow book Blue pencil White dog
Distractor Blue eyes Yellow cars Red dogs
Gender Red table Red dogs Red bear
Number Red Eye Red window Red bears
Gender White apple White noses White pencil
Distractor Yellow house Blue nose Red table
Number Yellow bed Yellow donkey Yellow noses
Distractor Yellow tables Red noses White windows
Number Red apple Red bear Red house
Distractor Blue cat Yellow eye Red car
Distractor Yellow eyes White cars Blue dogs
Number Yellow window Yellow car Yellow eyes
Gender Red donkey Red nose Red pencils
Gender Red apples Red car Red nose
Number Red donkeys Red car Red apple
Gender Yellow donkey Yellow bears Yellow table
Number White book White house White bears
Number Yellow apple Yellow leaves Yellow book
Gender White eye White dog White window
Distractor Yellow tables Red apples Blue windows
Gender White eye White cars White nose
Gender Yellow pencil Yellow window Yellow bed
Number White apple White pencil White books
Distractor Blue dog Red car Yellow donkey
Distractor Blue apples Red houses White beds
Gender White eyes White table White cat
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 John W. Schwieter and Gabrielle Klassen
Slide Type Response A Response B Response C
Number Red house Red cats Red dog
Distractor Red dogs Blue books White bears
Number Red book Red apples Red window
Gender White car White chair White leaves
Number Yellow pencil Yellow dogs Yellow house
Number White dog White pencils White windows
Gender Yellow chairs Yellow houses Yellow dog
Distractor Yellow window Blue apple Red house
Number White bed White windows White bear
Gender Red dog Red nose Red chairs
Distractor White chairs Red windows Blue apples
Number White house White book White chairs
Gender Red windows Red pencil Red chair
Number Yellow cars Yellow apple Yellow dog
Gender White chair White car White dogs
Distractor Blue dog Red car Yellow donkey
Number White donkey White leaf White apples
Distractor Red bears Yellow donkeys Blue cats
Gender Red table Red nose Red car
Distractor Blue nose White chair Yellow window
Distractor Red bear Yellow book Blue donkey
Distractor Yellow house Blue nose Red table
Gender Yellow nose Yellow cat Yellow donkeys
Distractor Blue eyes Yellow cars Red dogs
Appendix B. Story Recall Task
Pre-SA
Había una vez, en un lejano país, un castillo donde vivían una Princesa y su hermano, el Príncipe.
Un día, mientras el príncipe se preparaba para nadar, la princesa jugaba cerca de la piscina con
su juguete favorito, una pelota dorada. Aunque la pelota dorada era, sin duda alguna, el juguete
favorito de la Princesa no ponía mucho cuidado. De hecho, la lanzó al aire tan fuerte que ésta
no regresó a sus manos sino que se cayó en la piscina. ¡Pobre Princesa! Por fortuna, su valiente
hermano se dispuso a ayudarla. Desgraciadamente, el príncipe no tuvo mucho éxito. Aún así la
Princesa no tendría de qué preocuparse puesto que pronto recibiría ayuda…Apareció un super-
castor! El Super-castor, el héroe, emergió de la piscina con la pelota dorada de la princesa.
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Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience 
Authors’ addresses
John W. Schwieter
Department of Languages and Literatures
Wilfrid Laurier University
411 Bricker Academic Building
75 University Avenue
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
N2L 3C5
jschwieter@wlu.ca
Gabrielle Klassen
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
University of Toronto
Room 208, Victoria College
91 Charles Street West
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
M5S 2C7
gabrielle.klassen@mail.utoronto.ca
[Once, in a distant land, a castle where lived a Princess and her brother, the Prince. One day,
while the prince was preparing to swim, the princess was playing near the pool with her favorite
toy, a golden ball. Although the golden ball was, without doubt, the princess’s favorite toy, the
Princess was not very careful. In fact, she threw it up in the air so hard that it did not return
to her hands but fell in the pool. Poor Princess! Fortunately, her brave brother was prepared
to help. Unfortunately, the prince was not very successful. Still the Princess would not have to
worry because she would soon receive help …Super-beaver appeared! e hero, Super-beaver,
emerged from the pool with the princess’s golden ball.]
Post-SA
Hace mucho tiempo existió un reino llamado Waterloo, éste estaba rodeado de montañas y de
un bosque encantado. Cuenta una vieja leyenda que más allá del bosque encantado y en la cima
de la montaña vivía un dragón feroz quien recibía el nombre de ‘Maestro de los Acertijos’. En
el reino vivía una dama bonita, que había escuchado la leyenda del Maestro de los Acertijos
desde hacía muchos años. Se contaba que el dragón tenía una corona de oro puro y joyas y la
persona que pudiera responder sus acertijos recibiría la corona y la llave para abrir la Puerta de
Oro del Reino. La dama tenía mucho interés en abrir esta puerta. Un día, la dama decidió ir en
búsqueda del dragón y responder a sus acertijos. Los aldeanos trataron de prevenir a la dama
sobre el peligro del viaje pero a la dama no le importó. Mientas la dama se internaba cada vez
más en el Bosque Encantado, se escuchaban sonidos extraños que provenían de las sombras
de los árboles. Pronto, encontró el dragón, quien no era ni feroz ni peligroso. Era el más guapo
dragón que jamás había visto. Se enamoraron inmediatamente, y pasaron juntos y felizmente el
resto de sus vidas.
[Long ago there was a kingdom named Waterloo, it was surrounded by mountains and an en-
chanted forest. An old legend that beyond the enchanted forest and on top of the mountain
lived a erce dragon who was known as ‘Master of the Riddles’. In the kingdom there lived a
lady, who had heard the legend of Master of Riddles from many years ago. It was said that the
dragon had a crown of pure gold and jewels and the person who could answer his riddles would
receive the crown and the key to open the Golden Gate of the Kingdom. e lady was keen to
open this door. One day, the lady decided to go in search of the dragon and answer its riddles.
e villagers tried to warn the lady of the dangers of the journey but the lady did not care. As
the lady went further into the Enchanted Forest, strange sounds were heard coming from the
shadows of the trees. Soon, she found the dragon. He was neither ferocious nor dangerous. He
was the most handsome dragon she had ever seen! ey fell in love and happily spent the rest
of their lives together.]
... This shift in processing strategy occurs sometime around when L2 learners typically choose to study abroad (i.e., at early and intermediate levels). For L2 learners who choose to participate in an immersion experience, this learning context may be at least partially responsible for the U-shaped pattern observed in L2 processing and acquisition (Schwieter and Klassen 2016). ...
... Previous work in SA contexts has almost entirely relied on offline responses, but some clear trends can be observed for morpho-syntactic development. Many studies report no gains in these grammatical domains (Collentine 2004(Collentine , 2009Howard 2001), while others have found that learners perform worse after a short stay abroad (e.g., Cubillos et al. 2008;Isabelli-García 2010;Schwieter and Klassen 2016). These results have been explained as the consequence of a learning context which entails a shift in task demand. ...
... In the case of the SSH, a shift towards a communication-based strategy may cause learners to rely more on lexical-pragmatic cues, supporting the U-shaped processing pattern previously observed in offline studies (e.g., Schwieter and Klassen 2016). In other words, if the adapted version of the SSH holds true, L2 learners may show even less native-like sensitivity in both integrative and predictive tasks after SA. ...
Article
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In this paper, we examine the effects of learning environment on second language (L2) gender agreement. English speakers learning L2 Spanish participated in a self-paced reading task and a picture selection task prior to and after a short-term study abroad experience. The results from the self-paced reading task showed that their reliance on the masculine article as the default (e.g., McCarthy, Corrine. 2008. Morphological variability in the comprehension of agreement: An argument for representation over computation. Second Language Research 24(4). 459–486) was reduced over time abroad. Findings from the picture selection task showed that the learners did not attend to the gender of articles unless it was their only cue, but that after the study abroad experience they began to use gender as an anticipatory cue for lexical selection. We interpret these results as support for an adapted version of the Shallow Structures Hypothesis (Clahsen, Harald & Claudia Felser. 2006a. Grammatical processing in language learners. Applied Psycholinguistics 27(1). 3–42; Clahsen, Harald & Claudia Felser. 2006b. How native-like is non-native language processing? Trends in Cognitive Sciences 10(12). 564–570) and the notion that in immersion contexts L2 learners shift their parsing strategy to be more communicatively focused (Schwieter, John W. & Gabrielle Klassen. 2016. Linguistic advances and learning strategies in a short-term study abroad experience. Study Abroad Research in Second Language Acquisition and International Education 1(2). 217–247).
... Scholars in L2 acquisition are increasingly interested in SA and its implications for L2 development (e.g., Barron, 2006;Díaz-Campos, 2004;Isabelli, 2004;Lafford, 1995Lafford, , 2004Schwieter & Ferreira, 2014;Schwieter & Kunert, 2012) and political-, cultural-, and identity-related issues (e.g., Block, 2007;Kinginger, 2013a;Plews, 2015). The body of work investigating SA and L2 acquisition has focused on a number of issues including verbal fluency (e.g., Brecht, Davidson, & Ginsburg, 1995;Davidson, 2010;Freed, 1995;Schwieter, 2013b), writing (e.g., Sasaki, 2009), sociolinguistic and pragmatic competence (e.g., Barron, 2006;Iwasaki, 2010;Regan, Howard, & Lemée, 2009;Shardakova, 2005); lexical and grammatical development (e.g., Guntermann, 1995;Howard & Schwieter, forthcoming;Isabelli, 2004;Milton & Meara, 1995;Schwieter & Klassen, 2016), phonological development (e.g., Díaz-Campos, 2004), learning perceptions (e.g., Amuzie & Winke, 2009), and learning strategies (e.g., Paige et al., 2006;Schwieter & Klassen, 2016). Other research has shown that an SA experience is not necessarily a magical formula for L2 learning (Kinginger, 2011) and that linguistic improvement and cultural understanding is not guaranteed (Jackson, 2009;Wilkinson, 1998). ...
... Scholars in L2 acquisition are increasingly interested in SA and its implications for L2 development (e.g., Barron, 2006;Díaz-Campos, 2004;Isabelli, 2004;Lafford, 1995Lafford, , 2004Schwieter & Ferreira, 2014;Schwieter & Kunert, 2012) and political-, cultural-, and identity-related issues (e.g., Block, 2007;Kinginger, 2013a;Plews, 2015). The body of work investigating SA and L2 acquisition has focused on a number of issues including verbal fluency (e.g., Brecht, Davidson, & Ginsburg, 1995;Davidson, 2010;Freed, 1995;Schwieter, 2013b), writing (e.g., Sasaki, 2009), sociolinguistic and pragmatic competence (e.g., Barron, 2006;Iwasaki, 2010;Regan, Howard, & Lemée, 2009;Shardakova, 2005); lexical and grammatical development (e.g., Guntermann, 1995;Howard & Schwieter, forthcoming;Isabelli, 2004;Milton & Meara, 1995;Schwieter & Klassen, 2016), phonological development (e.g., Díaz-Campos, 2004), learning perceptions (e.g., Amuzie & Winke, 2009), and learning strategies (e.g., Paige et al., 2006;Schwieter & Klassen, 2016). Other research has shown that an SA experience is not necessarily a magical formula for L2 learning (Kinginger, 2011) and that linguistic improvement and cultural understanding is not guaranteed (Jackson, 2009;Wilkinson, 1998). ...
Article
Full-text available
This study discusses a 5-week study abroad experience in which a group of English-speaking Canadian university students learning Spanish participated in a faculty-led study abroad experience in Spain. A mixed-methods approach combining quantitative measurement and qualitative inquiry was used to explore how often and with whom the second language (L2) learners used English and Spanish during their sojourn. At the conclusion of the study abroad program, the learners completed a Language Contact Profile and responded to open-ended questions that encouraged their meta-reflection on language contact, perceptions of culture, and personal outcomes. The findings show that learners relied on situations from their free time abroad to better understand the target culture rather than on required activities such as visits to museums or heritage sites. Students reported an appreciation for the L2 culture, mostly related to the relaxed and welcoming atmosphere and an increase in their L2 confidence. The findings also underscore the importance of constant interaction in the target language with host community members. Future programming and related research should emphasize learners' engagement with the host community, both prior to arrival and throughout their time abroad. Résumé Cette étude traite d'une expérience d'études à l'étranger d'une durée de 5 semaines. Un groupe d'étudiants d'une université canadienne de langue anglaise apprenant l'espagnol ont séjourné en Espagne. Cette étude à méthodologie mixte a combiné des mesures quantitatives à une enquête qualitative pour explorer combien souvent et avec qui les apprenants de langue seconde utilisaient l'anglais et l'espagnol durant leur séjour. À la suite de ce séjour, les participants ont complété un profil de contacts linguistiques et ont répondu à des questions ouvertes encourageant la métaréflexion sur les contacts linguistiques, les perceptions de la culture et les résultats personnels. Les résultats ont révélé que les apprenants s'appuyaient sur leurs activités quotidiennes pour mieux comprendre la culture cible au lieu des activités requises comme les visites aux musées ou aux sites patrimoniaux. En outre, les étudiants ont exprimé une appréciation de la langue seconde, surtout par rapport à l'ambiance décontractée et accueillante ainsi qu'à leur confiance accrue dans leur habileté à communiquer dans leur langue seconde. Les résultats ont aussi indiqué l'importance d'une interaction constante avec la langue seconde. La programmation future ainsi que la recherche qui y est reliée devrait favoriser l'interaction avec les étudiants et leurs hôtes, à la fois avant leur arrivée et pendant leur séjour à l'étranger.
... Incluso después de una inmersión de solo tres semanas de estudio en el extranjero, los estudiantes pueden lograr incrementos significativos de léxico, así como una disminución del tipo de errores que impiden la comunicación, un aumento de errores que no la impiden y el uso del tiempo presente como forma sustituta universal. Están asimismo más orientados a la comunicación que a la gramática (Schwieter y Klassen, 2016). Schwieter y Ferreira (2014) hallaron que las habilidades lingüísticas mejoraron tras una oportunidad de inmersión para realizar estudios en el extranjero de corta duración (en España), pero se observó solo una mejora marginal en los niveles de escritura y lectura. ...
Article
Debido a limitaciones financieras, de tiempo o personales, cada vez hay mayor interés en experimentar una verdadera inmersión lingüística a través de programas de corta duración de estudios en el extranjero. Sin embargo, crear un entorno de instrucción efectivo durante tres o cuatro semanas constituye a menudo un desafío, además de que existen pocos estudios sobre los efectos de estos programas cortos, a pesar de que los beneficios en el aprendizaje de la lengua meta, en términos discursivos, de habilidades y fluidez, pueden ser similares a los de los programas de largo plazo (Lafford, 2006), que es el modo más común de estudio en el extranjero en Estados Unidos (Chieffo y Griffiths, 2004). En este artículo se analizan los programas de estudios de corta duración en el extranjero como modelos de inmersión real con un fuerte componente cultural. Se concluye que gracias a ellos se mejora el dominio lingüístico y cultural de los estudiantes a través de la combinación del entorno tradicional del salón de clases y actividades de inmersión auténticas. Al fomentar la interacción diaria con hablantes nativos, los estudiantes pueden tanto aprender elementos pragmáticos como desarrollar sensibilidad cultural.
... Indeed, as we have noted earlier, other factors apart from communicative adequacy may also play a role. Notably, the learner's focus on the communicative meaning of his/her interlocutor's input during communicative interaction as opposed to grammatical form (Schwieter & Klassen, 2016), which may not be very salient in real-time communicative interaction, as well as the learner's underdeveloped metalinguistic knowledge, which would allow him/her to productively treat the input available during study abroad at a grammatical level. ...
... There are a number of methods, both qualitative and quantitative, which researchers can use to track and assess the language learning of education abroad participants. While some studies are designed to compare language learning in the host speech community with learning in traditional classroom settings in the home environment (e.g., Isabelli-García 2010; Segalowitz and Freed 2004), others utilize within-group analyses to explore linguistic and intercultural development in two or more timespans (e.g., Faretta-Stutenberg and Morgan-Short 2018; Grey et al. 2015;Schwieter 2013;Schwieter and Klassen 2016). The design choice depends on several factors, including the research questions, availability of research equipment and materials, the expertise of the researcher, and the structure and length of the education abroad programme. ...
Article
Exploring the underinvestigated area of instruction during study abroad, this article offers a quantitative study of linguistic development among second language university learners of Chinese during a semester in China. A comparison is made between learners following task‐based language teaching and a comparison group following a traditional approach at two proficiency levels. Spoken task data are analyzed within the framework of complexity, accuracy, and fluency. Quantitative findings point to enhanced linguistic development on the various measures used over the course of instruction abroad across the groups irrespective of instructional treatment and proficiency level. However, relative differences between the two groups point to an advantage of task‐based learning in a study‐abroad context. The findings are discussed in relation to the insights they allow into the role of different instructional treatments during study abroad, along with some directions for future research.
Article
While research on second language (L2) vocabulary development after a study abroad (SA) experience has been largely investigated, findings are still not clear-cut because of the multifaceted nature of vocabulary and the different methodologies used when investigating its growth. For this reason, the aim of the present study was to elucidate the link between SA and lexical development. A multilevel meta-analysis including 25 studies was conducted to examine the extent to which overall, receptive vocabulary (RV) and productive vocabulary (PV) are impacted by a SA experience. A second objective was to determine whether length of stay (LoS) in the target country has an effect on L2 vocabulary development. Results showed that international stays have a significantly large impact on RV and overall vocabulary and a significantly moderate impact on PV. The analysis also showed that LoS alone cannot be used as a predictor of gains in the students’ L2 vocabulary.
Chapter
Study abroad research has become an established area of inquiry with theoretical impact and methodological sophistication. The field has incorporated the different approaches and methodological changes that have characterized SLA scholarship, including technological advances and new designs. The present volume contributes an update on and a systematic critical appraisal of the methods employed in study abroad research to identify strengths and weaknesses and to look ahead and point towards new directions. The volume is organized around different areas -approaches, instruments, linguistic levels, and learners and their context-, each one including a number of chapters authored by outstanding experts in the field.
Chapter
Everything we do involves language. Assuming no prior knowledge, this book offers students a contemporary introduction to the study of language. Each thought-provoking chapter is accessible to readers from a variety of fields, and is helpfully organized across six parts: sound; structure and meaning; language typologies and change; language and social aspects; language acquisition; and language, cognition, and the brain. The book's companion website also offers three brief chapters on language and computers; animal communication; and dialectal varieties of English. The chapters feature illustrative tables, figures and maps, along with three types of pedagogical boxes (Linguistic Tidbits; Pause and Reflect; and Eyes on World Languages) that break up text, contextualize information, and provide colourful accents that give real data from languages across the globe. Key words are bolded and defined in a glossary at the end of the book, while end-of-chapter summaries and practice exercises reinforce the key points discussed.
Article
This article is based on findings from my doctoral dissertation that investigated the narratives of former short-term study abroad (3–4 weeks) participants after they had settled back in their home country for one to two years. The theme of sexuality, as it relates to the intercultural journey of study abroad, was a prominent theme that arose from the narratives of one of the participants and continued 2 years after the participant had returned home and began to interact in their home country environments. There is a dearth of research on how the narrative of sexuality can inform the journey abroad and after the participant returns to their home country. Therefore, it is important to employ narrative and Queer methodologies in the study abroad research to explore issues related to sexuality. Employing such methodologies will help increase reflection in study abroad programs and will diversify the research and the curriculum to include other groups of students that are often underrepresented in the study abroad research.
Article
Full-text available
This study discusses a 5-week study abroad experience in which a group of English-speaking Canadian university students learning Spanish participated in a faculty-led study abroad experience in Spain. A mixed-methods approach combining quantitative measurement and qualitative inquiry was used to explore how often and with whom the second language (L2) learners used English and Spanish during their sojourn. At the conclusion of the study abroad program, the learners completed a Language Contact Profile and responded to open-ended questions that encouraged their meta-reflection on language contact, perceptions of culture, and personal outcomes. The findings show that learners relied on situations from their free time abroad to better understand the target culture rather than on required activities such as visits to museums or heritage sites. Students reported an appreciation for the L2 culture, mostly related to the relaxed and welcoming atmosphere and an increase in their L2 confidence. The findings also underscore the importance of constant interaction in the target language with host community members. Future programming and related research should emphasize learners' engagement with the host community, both prior to arrival and throughout their time abroad. Résumé Cette étude traite d'une expérience d'études à l'étranger d'une durée de 5 semaines. Un groupe d'étudiants d'une université canadienne de langue anglaise apprenant l'espagnol ont séjourné en Espagne. Cette étude à méthodologie mixte a combiné des mesures quantitatives à une enquête qualitative pour explorer combien souvent et avec qui les apprenants de langue seconde utilisaient l'anglais et l'espagnol durant leur séjour. À la suite de ce séjour, les participants ont complété un profil de contacts linguistiques et ont répondu à des questions ouvertes encourageant la métaréflexion sur les contacts linguistiques, les perceptions de la culture et les résultats personnels. Les résultats ont révélé que les apprenants s'appuyaient sur leurs activités quotidiennes pour mieux comprendre la culture cible au lieu des activités requises comme les visites aux musées ou aux sites patrimoniaux. En outre, les étudiants ont exprimé une appréciation de la langue seconde, surtout par rapport à l'ambiance décontractée et accueillante ainsi qu'à leur confiance accrue dans leur habileté à communiquer dans leur langue seconde. Les résultats ont aussi indiqué l'importance d'une interaction constante avec la langue seconde. La programmation future ainsi que la recherche qui y est reliée devrait favoriser l'interaction avec les étudiants et leurs hôtes, à la fois avant leur arrivée et pendant leur séjour à l'étranger.
Article
This study, conducted by IES in late 2002, was designed to measure the longitudinal correlations between specific program features—language study, housing choice, duration of study, enrollment in foreign university courses, participation in an internship or field study, among others—and a variety of student outcomes. A 54-year-old, not-for-profit, academic consortium, IES regularly conducts formative and summative evaluations of its programs, surveying students both during and immediately after their study abroad experiences. This longitudinal study was undertaken with the intent of comparing end of academic term evaluation results with longitudinal results. Only through such a retrospective longitudinal study could the sustainability of results, the effects of program design, and the impact of shifts in student participation patterns be assessed.
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This paper outlines the value of persistence, creativity and effective communication in a post-acute neurobehavioural rehabilitation unit, illustrated by a case of systematic desensitisation to vehicular travel, achieved six years post head injury.