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ERIC Number: EJ1040871
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2014-Oct
Pages: 17
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0261-4448
EISSN: N/A
Language Learning in Mindbodyworld: A Sociocognitive Approach to Second Language Acquisition
Atkinson, Dwight
Language Teaching, v47 n4 p467-483 Oct 2014
Based on recent research in cognitive science, interaction, and second language acquisition (SLA), I describe a sociocognitive approach to SLA. This approach adopts a "non-cognitivist" view of cognition: Instead of an isolated computational process in which input is extracted from the environment and used to build elaborate internal knowledge representations, cognition is seen as "adaptive intelligence," enabling our close and sensitive alignment to our ecosocial environment in order to survive in it. Mind, body, and world are thus functionally integrated from a sociocognitive perspective instead of radically separated. Learning plays a major part in this scenario: If environments are ever-changing, then adaptation to them is continuous. Learning is part of our natural ability to so adapt, while retaining traces of that adaptation in the integrated mind-body-world system. Viewed in this way, SLA is adaptation to/engagement with L2 environments. "Interaction" also plays a central role in sociocognitive SLA: We learn L2s through interacting with/in L2 environments. Founded on innate, universal skills which evolutionarily "preceded" language and make it possible, interaction supports SLA at every turn. Having presented this argument, I illustrate it by analyzing a video clip of an EFL tutoring session, indicating various "sociocognitive tools" for interactive alignment which undergird L2 development.
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A