Main theories in Second Language Acquistion

Main theories in Second Language Acquistion

1. Imput hypothesis

   • Three fundamental questions
     • Under what conditions do learners make initial form-meaning connections?
       • Why, at a given point in time, do they make some and not other form-meaning connections?
         • What internal psycholinguistic strategies do learners use in comprehending sentences and how might this affect acquisitions?
   • Involve the assumptions that an integral part of language acquisition is making form-meaning connections during comprehension.

2. Generative Linguistic Acquisition (1957)

   • Aims to provide a characterization of the linguistic competence of native speakers of a language
     • Explain how it is posible for a child first language (L1) acquirers to achieve that competence

3. Processability theory

   • Is a theory of second language development
   • At any stage of development, the learner can produce and comprehend only those second language (L”) linguistic forms which the current state of the language processor can handle

4. Sociocultural theory (Wertsch, 1985)

   • Argues that human mental functioning is fundamentally a mediated process that is organized by cultural artifacts, activities, and concepts.
   • Developmental processes take place through participation in cultural linguistic, and historically formed settings.
     • Family life
     • Peer group interaction
     • Public spaces
     • Work places
     • Formal educational contexts

5. Complex dynamic systems theory (Larsen-Freemanm, 1994)

   • Provides an ontological position (i.e., principles of reality) for understanding language, language use, and language development in complex and dynamic terms
   • Proposes that language is a complex adaptive system, exhibiting both stability and dynamic change.

6. Connectionism (1980)

   • It assumes that SLA results from increasing strength of associations between stimuli and responses
     • Knowledge is assumed to be distributed between neural connections and learning consists of reinforcing certain types of connection.

7. Behaviorism

   • The law of exercise which indicates that language learning is promoted if the learner repeats the responses to the stimuli.
     • Practice plays a fundamental role
     • Reinforcement, such as approval of correct responses strengthen the association and is necessary to learning