Language aptitude research: From testing to theory and practice

Abstract

Language aptitude refers to the set of cognitive abilities that allow us to understand, explain, diagnose, and predict why and how some individuals can learn a second/foreign language more effectively and efficiently than their peers, other things being equal (cf. Carroll, 1990; Doughty, 2019; Wen & Skehan, 2021). Since the modern inception of the concept in the 1950s in the USA (Spolsky, 1995), language aptitude research has undergone rollercoaster periods of developmental stages. The 1950s, 60s, and 70s, for example, were marked by interest and enthusiasm in the topic. But, skepticism and marginalization about language aptitude developed during the 80s and 90s. Subsequently, language aptitude research regained momentum around the turn of the new millennium (Vuong & Wong, 2019), boosted by Robinson's edited volume (2002) on the topic twenty years ago. The last few years have witnessed an exponential growth of publications of journal papers, edited volumes, and journal special issues (e.g., Reiterer, 2018; Wen et al., 2019; Granena, 2020; Doughty & Mackey, 2021; Li & De Keyser, 2021). As Doughty and Mackey have succinctly commented in their recent introduction to the latest issue of the Annual Review of Applied Linguistics (2021) dedicated to the theme, language aptitude has now become 2 one of the most "important, intriguing, messy, and often controversial" topics in second language research (Doughty & Mackey, 2021, p. 1). As indicated in the introduction chapter to a recent volume (Wen et al., 2019), when language aptitude research in the past sixty years is put into the framework of Richard Snow's (1992) criteria for 'an aptitude theory', (i.e., construction of language aptitude tests, aptitude theory construction, application of language aptitude to practice), we can claim that significant achievements have been made in the first set of criteria concerning the construction of language aptitude tests. Most of these well-established aptitude test batteries, among which the seminal Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT; Carroll & Sapon, 1959) is the most representative, can be utilized to predict second language learning outcomes fairly reliably, with an overall correlation of around R = 0.350~0.50 (Li, 2015). Notwithstanding these commendable achievements in aptitude test construction and development, progress in aptitude theory construction has been less impressive. So far, a language aptitude theory with adequate explanatory power for foreign/second language learning is still lacking. Then, when it comes to the third criteria, i.e., application of language aptitude to inform practice, progress has been rather slow (Wen, Skehan, Biedroń, 2017). To partially rectify this situation, the current volume has been developed to revisit and consolidate existing achievements made in language aptitude testing so far. More importantly, it aims to further push developments in aptitude theory and practice. In this introductory chapter, we first provide a brief state of the art review of language aptitude in the past six decades, summarizing the major research paradigms and methodologies and evaluating their achievements and limitations. Following these reviews, we discuss the background and rationale of the current volume, highlighting the key contents of each major chapter and their contributions to enhancing our understanding of the nature and implications of language aptitude theory and practice. We conclude the introduction by calling on scholars from multiple disciplines to make concerted efforts to follow and extend Richard Snow’s legacy (Corno et al., 2002) to build a viable language aptitude theory that will allow us to diagnose, predict, and explain the second language learning process and outcomes