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Article In: Study Abroad Research in Second Language Acquisition and International Education: Online-First Articles

Oral proficiency retention of L2 Chinese learners following study abroad

ORCiD logo with link | University College Cork
ORCiD logo with link | Xiamen University of Technology
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Abstract
This study examines L2 Chinese learners’ oral retention during the formal instruction at home (AH) context after a period of study abroad (SA). Specifically, it investigates oral developments of L2 Chinese learners in a six-month AH context following their return from ten-month SA. Participants were ten English-speaking undergraduate L2 Chinese learners at an Irish university. Complexity, Accuracy, and Fluency (CAF) measures were employed to assess learners’ oral development, with seven metrics providing an in-depth performance evaluation. Data were collected at three time points: pre-SA (T1), post-SA (T2), and six months after returning to AH (T3). Analyses focused specifically on the T2–T3 period to examine the long-term retention of oral proficiency gains following SA. Results showed lexical diversity and syntactic subordination retention, while erosion was observed in fluency (e.g., increased silent pauses) and lexical sophistication. Such findings suggest that learners in the AH context tend to concentrate on learning vocabulary (diversity) and syntactic complexity at the expense of fluency, accuracy (Juan-Garau, M., & Pérez-Vidal, C. (2007). The effect of context and contact on oral performance in students who go on a stay abroad. Vigo International Journal of Applied Linguistics, (4), 117–134.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) and lexical sophistication.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
    • 2.1L2 speaking development in Mandarin during study abroad
    • 2.2L2 speaking retention after SA
    • 2.3L2 speaking Mandarin retention after SA
  • 3.Study and methodology
    • 3.1Setting and design
    • 3.2Participants and SA context
    • 3.3Data collection
    • 3.4Data analysis
  • 4.Analysis and results
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Research question 1: Concerning oral maintenance
    • 5.2Research question 2: Concerning oral loss
  • 6.Conclusion
  • 7.Limitations and directions for future research
  • Note
  • References
References (60)
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