How Languages You Know Influence the Language You're Learning | Science Behind Language Learning

Do the languages you know influence the language you’re learning? In this episode of the Science Behind Language Learning series, your guide Kaitlyn Tagarelli (Linguist, PhD) breaks down cross-linguistic influences in second and third language learning. We'll explore how similarities and differences between languages can help or hurt the language-learning process, sometimes in ways that you might not expect!

Wondering what languages were used in today’s episode?
German | Hallihallo (HAHleeHAHloh) and Tschüssi (chewsee) mean “Hi!” and “Bye!”

Want to know more about the scientific research consulted for this video?
Understanding Second Language Acquisition, by Lourdes Ortega (2014), provides an excellent, in-depth overview of all things SLA. This episode draws on Chapter 3, Crosslinguistic influences, which we highly recommend! In Second Language Acquisition: An Introductory Course (5th Ed.), Gass, Behney, & Plonsky (2020) give a rich historical context for the role of the native language in L2 learning, with many enlightening examples. Chapters 3, 5, and 7 are particularly relevant to this topic. If you’re interested in learning more about L3 transfer, check out a recent review by Puig-Mayenco, Gonzalez, Alonso, & Rothman (2020) in Second Language Research (Vol. 26, Issue 1, p. 31-64).

Kaitlyn Tagarelli (PhD, Georgetown University) is a Linguist and the Head of Research at Mango Languages. She holds a Ph.D. in Linguistics from Georgetown University, specializing in how the mind and brain learn languages. Aside from geeking out about all things neuroscience and linguistics, she loves hanging out with her family at their Connecticut home, trying to convince them to speak French with her.

#languagelearning #languagedifficulty #SLA

[mabolocairamaem.]

Thank you for the information. My teacher just gave us a quiz about this even though this topic was never discussed in our class. She also didn't provide us any materials to familiarize ourselves with this topic. At least I learned while watching this so thank you.

[gintaspusch]

great video, sad that cientific content is not pushed as much on youtube