Learning Without Awareness by Academic and Nonacademic Samples: An Individual Differences Study

Abstract

This study addresses the role of awareness in learning and the variables that may facilitate adult second language (L2) implicit learning. We replicated Williams's (2005) study with a similar group of academic learners enrolled at university as well as a group of non-college-educated adults in order to explore the generalizability of the findings to an underrepresented population in research on L2 acquisition. Our results revealed that academic learners implicitly acquired items encountered during training (trained items), but this learning disappeared when academic and nonacademic groups were combined. We also observed modest correlations between intelligence and implicit learning of trained items; however, this association disappeared when other variables were considered. Overall, our study highlights the limited potential of implicit form–meaning associations for L2 adults in more general populations and emphasizes the challenges associated with convenience sampling in L2 research (Andringa & Godfroid, 2020). Additionally, it underscores the independence of individual differences in reading exposure, years of education, and nonverbal intelligence for implicit learning of trained items.