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Expanding Individual Difference Research in the Interaction Approach: Investigating learners, instructors, and other interlocutors
Edited by Laura Gurzynski-Weiss
[AILA Applied Linguistics Series 16] 2017
► pp. 255–279

Chapter 11
Teachers’ provision of feedback in L2 text-chat

Cognitive, contextual, and affective factors

 | University of Hawai’i at Mānoa
 | University of Hawai’i at Mānoa
Numerous studies have examined the role of various individual differences in second language (L2) learning and use, finding that factors such as aptitude (e.g., Robinson, 2005; Skehan, 2002), motivation (e.g., Dörnyei, Henry, & MacIntyre, 2014; Masgoret & Gardner, 2003), anxiety (e.g., Horwitz, 2001, 2010), creativity (e.g., Bell, 2012; McDonough, Crawford, & Mackey, 2015), and working memory capacity (WMC; see Baddeley, 2003; Juffs & Harrington, 2011 for reviews), have a substantial impact on L2 learning outcomes. Although the majority of this empirical research has focused on the learner as interlocutor, a growing number of scholars have turned their attention to the potential influence of individual differences in the cognition of non-learner interlocutors (i.e., teachers; see Gurzynski-Weiss, 2014a, this volume). This exploratory research examines the relationship between teacher interlocutors’ WMC and their provision of corrective feedback in written synchronous text chat. While results indicated no statistically significant correlation between teachers’ WMC and their provision of feedback during interactions, findings from stimulated recall protocols suggested that several teacher, learner, and contextual factors (such as personal beliefs, knowledge of learners’ first language, and the communicative value of an error) play a mediating role in teachers’ feedback decisions.
Keywords: corrective feedback, individual differences, interaction, stimulated recall protocols, synchronous computer-mediated communication, teacher cognition, working memory capacity
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Background
    • Factors affecting teacher feedback
    • WMC and teacher feedback
    • Mode of interaction as an external variable
    • Present study
  • Method
    • Participants
    • Materials
      • Interactive tasks
      • Tests of working memory capacity
      • RSPAN
      • OSPAN
      • Stimulated recalls (SRs)
    • Procedure
    • Analysis
      • Coding the interaction data
      • Scoring the WMC tests
      • Analysis of the interaction data and WMC
      • Coding and analyzing the SRs
  • Results
    • Statistical analyses
      • Interaction results
      • WMC and feedback
    • Stimulated recall
      • Learner factors
      • Teacher factors
      • Performance factors
      • Contextual and affective factors
  • Discussion and conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
Published online: 12 December 2017
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/aals.16.11zie
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