Recent studies suggest that similarity in emotional features and concreteness are critical cues underlying word association in native speakers. However, the lexical organization of a foreign language is less understood. This study aims to examine the structure of word associations within the mental lexicon of a foreign (English) and a native language. To this end, 145 native Spanish-speakers produced three lexical associates to cue words in both the foreign and native language. We observed that the associates were more neutrally valenced in the foreign language. Moreover, as cue words increased in their arousal, the produced associates were less arousing in the foreign language. Thus, the structure of these lexical associations could account for prior evidence of emotional detachment in foreign languages. Finally, as cues were more abstract, the foreign language associates were more abstract. Our findings revealed that the linguistic context modulated the lexical associations.

This study investigates whether the cognitive reappraisal strategy is influenced by the participant's language (native/foreign) when confronting a fearful stimulus. Sixty participants with subclinical phobia of cockroaches were exposed to several phobic and neutral pictures while they used cognitive reappraisal in their native language or a foreign one. Electrodermal activity, pupil dilation, and self-reports of affective valence and arousal were collected. Results showed that participants in the foreign context were more effective at using reappraisal to reduce valence self-ratings compared to using no regulation. Also, participants in the foreign context showed greater pupil size when reappraising their emotions, compared to the non-regulation condition. Depending on the language, no differences were found for arousal self-reports or electrodermal activity when using reappraisal. These results suggest that using a foreign language could be advantageous in reducing the negative valence through reappraisal. Psychophysiological results are discussed in light of cognitive effort studies.

Previous research has shown that bilingual speakers may be more tolerant to ambiguity, they might perceive situations of ambiguity more interesting, challenging and desirable (e.g., Dewaele & Li, 2013). To our knowledge, no data are available addressing the question whether the language in use can have an effect on the personality trait of tolerance of ambiguity (ToA). This study investigated whether and how reading statements in a second language (L2), as opposed to the native language (L1), affects ToA. 387 Italian–English bilingual adults completed a questionnaire measuring levels of ToA either in English or Italian. Results revealed that processing information in L2 promoted higher scores of ToA overall and in sentences that were related to challenging perspectives and change. Age, gender and L2 proficiency were significant predictors of higher ToA scores. This study offers new evidence that processing information in a L2 can affect tolerance of ambiguous situations.

This study reports data on 47 Tigrinya speaking Eritrean refugees learning French. L2 French proficiency is assessed through the placement test Ev@lang, a standardized grammar test, and fine corpus analyses. Analysis of individual factors shows that, whereas school education, number of years in Switzerland, and French classes attended play no role in proficiency, age penalizes learning and, critically, multilingualism facilitates it. Corpus analyses replicate difficulties commonly reported in the literature with root infinitives, determiner omission and gender errors. Productions also depart from previous reports as we observed a low rate of subject drop, a high rate of gender errors involving animate nouns, and the overuse of the feminine, in line with Tigrinya grammar. Finally, our data provide preliminary evidence of the validity of Ev@lang in assessing French proficiency in refugees, an issue which is becoming critical with the increased role of language skills in European asylum policies.

Fourteen young adolescents with specific reading disabilities received short term neuropsychological treatment–specifically left hemisphere (LH) or right hemisphere (RH) stimulation–in a clinical pilot project. The effects on single-word and passage reading were evaluated when the language of treatment was either Dutch (mother tongue) or English (foreign language). Transfer effects across the two languages were also studied. In general, the results indicate that these short term interventions may prove successful for the treated language and with the additional transfer to a second (not treated) language. (JINS, 1995, I, 494–500.)

This study addresses the challenges faced by Modern Foreign Language teacher trainees when asked to investigate the potential of a Personal Digital Assistant to support them both in their learning and in their teaching during their training year. Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) such as the Windows Pocket PCs used in this study have previously been found supportive by trainees in other professions with a large information content. Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) was chosen as the subject for this investigation as a particularly wide range of potential opportunities specific to MFL was foreseen. These opportunities ranged from supporting student teachers' learning by enabling access to email and other internet resources wherever they were based to enabling ‘on the spot’ audio or video recordingto support their teaching. For this investigation, seven student teachers from an MFL initial teacher training programme were loaned PDAs for the duration of their course. This paper reports on interviews conducted at the end of the training year with six of the student teachers in order to elicit their views on the PDAs they were loaned. They were all experienced information technology users and willing to explore the devices but there had always seemed to be a preferred alternative technology available either at home or in the classroom. Their reports shed much light on the current climate in schools and subject culture pressures as interpreted by student teachers in MFL departments but told us only a little about the functionality of a PDA and how it can support mobile assisted language learning. The socio-cultural context within the MFL departments where the trainees were placed meant that they did not feel comfortable about exploring the PDA functionality. They were not yet confident in their pedagogical identities and mostly felt they could not disrupt the established practice with the novel technology. However, when the devices were used, applications that appeared most effective in supporting learning to teach MFL with PDAs were those that enabled the capture of on-the-spot events and reflections. This could be either through the inbuilt recording functions, especially video, or by making notes using either the on-screen keyboard or by handwriting recognition.