The relationships between individual differences in working memory and language analytical ability and the effectiveness of different types of corrective feedback

Abstract

This study examined the relationships between individual differences in the executive component of working memory, and language analytical ability and the effectiveness of recasts, explicit correction and, metalinguistic prompts on the second-language (L2) development of the English past progressive. Participants were 155 Japanese learners of English, who were divided into recast, explicit correction, metalinguistic prompt, and task-only groups. The treatment groups completed tasks that required past progressive usage and received feedback. The executive component of working memory and language analytical ability were measured by the reading span test and LLAMA F. The outcome measures were an untimed grammaticality judgment test (UGJT) and elicited imitation test (EIT), which measured the participants’ declarative and procedural knowledge, respectively. The participants performed the pretest, immediate posttest, and delayed posttest. Multiple regression analyses showed that the executive component of working memory was significantly associated with the gain scores of the UGJT for the recast group and with the gain scores of the EIT for the metalinguistic prompt group. Language analytical ability was not associated with gain scores regardless of the test type for all groups.