Language Sciences Annual Symposium 2024: How can learning a second language be made effortless?

• 12:00 to 19:30
• Thursday, 21 November, 2024
• Cripps Court, Magdalene College

The Cambridge Language Sciences (CLS) Annual Symposium is an annual meeting of minds, bringing together language scientists of all disciplines from the University of Cambridge for an afternoon of talks, poster presentations and informal networking.

This year's theme is one of the CLS “moonshot” questions. These are ambitious scientific questions which act as a driver for interdisciplinary exchange and collaboration.

Registration is now closed.

The list of posters is available here. 

Poster abstracts are being uploaded to the Cambridge Open Engage platform here.

Event Overview (see below for abstracts)

• 12:00 - 12:45 | Registration & Lunch

• 12:45 - 14:30 | Research Dialogue 1: Differences Between Child and Adult Language Learning

Speakers: 

• Emma James (Dept. of Psychology, University of York) | Slow and steady wins the race? Consolidating new vocabulary in childhood and adulthood

• Henriëtte Hendriks, Professor in Language Acquisition and Cognition (University of Cambridge), Deputy Director of the Centre for Lifelong Learning and Individualised Cognition (CLIC) in Singapore | Discourse-pragmatic principles and their acquisition in childhood and adulthood

Chair: Jenny Gibson (Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge)

• 14:30 - 15:00 | Poster Slam (Part 1)

• 15:00 - 15:45 | Poster Exhibition & Refreshments

• 15:45 - 17:30 | Research Dialogue 2: Positive Learner Emotions, Motivation, and Reward in Language Learning

Speakers: 

• Jean-Marc Dewaele, Emeritus Professor in Applied Linguistics & Multilingualism (Birkbeck, University of London) | How learners’ positive emotions and motivation can make the effort in foreign language learning worthwhile

• Saloni Krishnan, Associate Professor in Developmental Language Sciences (UCL Language and Cognition) Can reward drive language learning? 

Chair: Mirjana Bozic (Dept. of Psychology, University of Cambridge)

• 17:30 - 18:00 | Poster Slam (Part 2)

• 18:00 - 18:15 | Closing Remarks

• 18:15 - 19:30 | Posters and Drinks Reception

For any event queries, please contact events@languagesciences.cam.ac.uk.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of Cambridge University Press & Assessment in making this event possible.

Note: The call for posters has now closed 

Poster session organisers: Shanshan Hu (Theoretical & Applied Linguistics), sh2194@cam.ac.uk, Mila Marcheva (Computer Science & Technology), mmm67@cam.ac.uk, Sammy Weiss-Cowie (MRC Cognition & Brain Sciences Unit), Sammy.Weiss-Cowie@mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk

Posters: 

• The list of posters is available here. 

Abstracts:

• Emma James (Dept. of Psychology, University of York)

Slow and steady wins the race? Consolidating new vocabulary in childhood and adulthood

It is widely believed that children excel at language learning, yet adults consistently outperform children in the lab. This talk will present a series of studies to show that while adults encode novel words very rapidly, children show greater gains in memory performance by later tests. These findings will be interpreted within a complementary learning systems framework (Davis & Gaskell, 2009; McClelland et al., 2020), which distinguishes between rapid hippocampal-based encoding processes and slower consolidation into long-term knowledge. I will consider the proposal that prior knowledge and sleep-associated mechanisms differentially support consolidation at different stages of development, and discuss how this shift could account for language learning differences from childhood to adulthood.

• Henriëtte Hendriks, Professor in Language Acquisition and Cognition (University of Cambridge), Deputy Director of the Centre for Lifelong Learning and Individualised Cognition (CLIC) in Singapore

Discourse-pragmatic principles and their acquisition in childhood and adulthood

In this presentation, we will show how the developmental routes of children and adults differ, but not always in ways expected, and what explanations above and beyond mere linguistic ones, one might be able to suggest. These will contain issues regarding the focus on language learning, influence of the L1, statistical learning skills, cognitive flexibility, and others.

Language acquisition typically starts with individual words and smaller constructions, but ultimately has to lead to the freedom to construct longer texts in which each of the smaller items has its place and is appropriately used. This skill, sometimes referred to as discourse-pragmatic skill has to be acquired by both children acquiring their L1 and adults acquiring an L2.

The discourse-pragmatic organisation of texts abides by some very general universal principles, but is then expressed by language-specific means. This raises the question of L2 learners being advantaged because they will have acquired the universal principles (through their L1), but possibly being disadvantaged because they have acquired different language-specific means to express these principles.

• Jean-Marc Dewaele, Emeritus Professor in Applied Linguistics & Multilingualism (Birkbeck, University of London)

How learners’ positive emotions and motivation can make the effort in foreign language learning worthwhile

In this talk I will argue that if foreign language (FL) learning does not include a degree of effort,  it would not be enjoyable. Dewaele and MacIntyre (2014) argued that Foreign Language Enjoyment emerges when learners engage in challenging tasks for which they only just have sufficient ability. These tasks typically give learners a degree of control, allow them to be creative, authentic, and involve collaboration. They also allow learners to experience Peace of Mind while controlling their levels of Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety and Foreign Language Boredom (Dewaele et al., 2023). Learner emotions and motivation are correlated but conceptually different (Dewaele & Meftah, 2024). Positive learner emotions, motivation and skills are part of a positive feedback loop. Learners are more likely to convinced that the effort is worth it in a positive emotional atmosphere where there is mutual trust, respect, humour, and a clear plan for progress.

References: Dewaele, J.-M., & MacIntyre, P.D. (2014). The two faces of Janus? Anxiety and enjoyment in the foreign language classroom. Studies in Second Language Learning Teaching, 4, 237-274.
Dewaele, J.-M. & Meftah, R. (2024). How Motivation and Enjoyment spread their wings during English Foreign Language learning: A pseudo-longitudinal investigation into Moroccan learners. Learning and Motivation 85.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lmot.2024.101962

• Saloni Krishnan, Associate Professor in Developmental Language Sciences (UCL Language and Cognition)

Can reward drive language learning?

Struggling readers typically report enjoying reading less, establishing a vicious cycle that limits their opportunities to build word knowledge. Why does this happen, and can this cycle be broken? In this talk, I'll show how reading and language learning tasks can evoke a sense of intrinsic reward, activating reward-processing systems in the brain. This experience of intrinsic reward fuels memory for words. Interestingly, the strongest readers show the most pronounced intrinsic reward responses, suggesting that effort impacts perceived reward. Based on these results, I propose that the intrinsic reward in language learning comes from successfully predicting upcoming information—where confidence in one's learning serves as a powerful reinforcer, even without external feedback. I’ll also explore how gamified extrinsic rewards, such as points or social feedback, could enhance learning, tying our findings to efforts to gamify education.

Papers: Bains, A., Barber, A., Nell, T., Ripollés, P., & Krishnan, S. (2024). The role of intrinsic reward in adolescent word learning. Developmental science, e13513.

Garvin, B., & Krishnan, S. (2022). Curiosity-driven learning in adults with and without dyslexia. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 75(1), 156-168.

Bains, A., Spaulding, C., Ricketts, J., & Krishnan, S. (2023). Using a willingness to wait design to assess how readers value text. npj Science of Learning, 8(1), 17.