How Accurate Is Your Correlation? Different Methods Derive Different Results and Different Interpretations.

Assessing the association between conceptual constructs are at the heart of quantitative research in educational and psychological research. Researchers apply different methods to the data to obtain results about the correlation between a set of variables. However, the question remains, how accurate are the results of the correlation obtained from these methods? Although various considerations should be taken to ensure accurate results, we focus on the types of analysis researchers apply to the data and discuss three methods most researchers use to obtain results about correlation. Particularly, we show how correlation results in bivariate correlation, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) differ substantially in size. We observe that methods that assume independence of the items often generate inflated factor correlations whereas methods that relax this assumption present uninflated, thus more accurate correlations. Because factor correlations are inflated in bivariate correlation and CFA, the discriminant validity of the constructs is often unattainable. In these methods, the size of the correlation can be very large and biased. We discuss the reasons for this variation and suggest the type of correlation that researchers should select and report.

Impostor Phenomenon and L2 willingness to communicate: Testing communication anxiety and perceived L2 competence as mediators.

The Impostor Phenomenon (IP) describes experiences of perceived intellectual fraudulence despite the existence of objectively good performances, and it is a robust predictor of experiences and outcomes in higher education. We examined the role of the IP in the domain of second language (L2) acquisition by testing its relations with a robust predictor of L2 use, willingness to communicate (WTC). We collected self-reports of 400 adult Iranian L2 learners and tested the associations between the IP and WTC. As expected, we found a negative association between IP and WTC (r = -0.13). When testing a mediation model with perceived competence and communication anxiety as parallel mediators, we found evidence for full mediation via perceived competence. Our findings show the importance of considering self-evaluations in the domain of L2 acquisition. Further implications and limitations are discussed.

A Longitudinal Study of Foreign Language Enjoyment and L2 Grit: A Latent Growth Curve Modeling.

In line with the dynamic shift in SLA domain and the need for the development of suitable methods to explore the dynamics of emerging concepts in the field such as grit and enjoyment, in the present research, we intended to investigate the growth of foreign language enjoyment (FLE) and L2 grit over time. To do this, we used a bivariate latent growth curve model (LGCM) to examine the covariance between 437 EFL learners' initial and growth levels of L2 grit and FLE in four measurement occasions of 2 week intervals. The data were collected via the original foreign language enjoyment scale and the L2 grit scale. The model including the covariance between intercepts and slopes of FLE and L2 grit was tested via Mplus 7. The findings indicated an increasing trend in the association between the growth levels of both variables. That is, the means of both L2 grit and FLE were larger at their growth level than their initial level. Also, analyzing the co-variations in the model showed that the covariances between the intercepts and slopes of FLE and L2 grit were statistically significant. This would point to the existence of a parallel process (co-development) of FLE and L2 grit. This result also implied that an increase in the level of FLE among the participants was strongly correlated with an increase in the level of L2 grit during the whole course. The findings were discussed with reference to previous studies in the literature and the implications were also provided.

Perceived Functions of Playfulness in Adult English as a Foreign Language Learners: An Exploratory Study.

Influenced by the flowering of positive psychology in the field of foreign language acquisition research in recent years, the present study aimed to explore the perceived functions of playfulness, as a personality construct, among English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. To this aim, an initial sample of 38 EFL learners were selected randomly from the private language institutes of Mashhad, the second largest city in Iran. They were interviewed about any perceived functions of playfulness in the EFL learning context. A qualitative content analysis of the collected data led to the extraction of four categories: Fun and laughter, creativity, mastery orientation, and cultivating relationships. A further in-depth analysis of the categories and comparison with the functions of adult playfulness in psychology (primarily Proyer's 2014 and 2017 works of research) revealed that these four categories can be subsumed under two of the four structural components of adult playfulness; namely, other-directed playfulness and intellectual playfulness. The ability of EFL learners to turn language learning situations, tasks, and environment into enjoyable ones via their playfulness can have implications for the quality of their interpersonal interactions in class and eventually their language proficiency. The findings of this study can pave the way for the translation of the adult playfulness construct from developmental and personality psychology and family relations into the second language acquisition (SLA) domain and its conceptualization in future research in this domain.

An Ecological Study of Identity in Teaching English as a Foreign Language in Light of the Dynamic Systems Model of Role Identity.

Influenced by the growing urge of investigating the combined nature of teacher identity with the dynamic teacher professional learning processes in recent years, the present study aimed to cast an ecological look at identity role construction and change in L2 teaching. To this aim, Dynamic Systems Model of Role Identity (DSMRI) meta-theoretical framework was employed with the centrality of social-cultural roles in framing an EFL teacher's experiences and guiding actions. In a single-case study, a Chinese EFL teacher's dynamic construction of identity (as a single-case design) was traced in three phases: before a practicum (teacher professional development program), during the practicum, and during the first year of teaching. A triangulation of data was used to ensure the adequacy and representativeness of the required data. The data were analyzed qualitatively to find traces of change and development in the teacher's ontological beliefs, goals, self-perceptions, and action possibilities. The DSMRI-oriented analysis of pre-, mid-, and post-practicum data emphasized the traces of role identities of the teacher trainee in her professional development process, that also created both emerging patterns and emerging challenges in her role, fostering a more negotiated, adaptive and realistic teacher role identity. This study substantiated the usefulness of the DSMRI for viewing language teachers' professional development and the dynamic identity development processes as several temporal and situated factors contribute to the alignment or misalignment of a teacher's ontological beliefs, goals, self-perceptions, and action possibilities.

The Dynamics of Foreign Language Enjoyment: An Ecological Momentary Assessment.

Following the recent shift from negative psychology to positive psychology, interest in foreign language enjoyment (FLE) has grown noticeably in second language acquisition. Given the fact that learners are "persons-in-context" and are not "ergodic ensembles," the particular learner-context ecosystem goes through ongoing momentary changes with respect to individual differences like FLE. Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) contributes to our understanding of the dynamics of this ecosystem in terms of the interaction between individual learners and their learning environments. In this study, using a time-based sampling scheme of EMA, we explored the dynamism of different facets of FLE across different timescales including seconds, minutes, weeks, and months in a course of intermediate English as a foreign language. To do this, we applied open-ended interviews with two intermediate English language learners in a private English language institute across months, journals across weeks, enjoymeters across minutes, and the idiodynamic approach across seconds. Findings indicated that enjoyment in foreign language fluctuates in terms of a hierarchy of temporal scales, from moment-to-moment changes to the ones over months. The emerging patterns of enjoyment across different timescales in terms of the tenets of complex dynamic systems theory are discussed.

A Meta-analysis of L2 Willingness to Communicate and Its Three High-Evidence Correlates.

Willingness to communicate (WTC) has been considered an important part of the language learning and communication process, playing a pivotal role in the development of language learners' communicative competence. Many studies have been conducted on the relationship between WTC and related variables in learning English as a foreign language. However, there is a lack of a comprehensive meta-analysis concerning the effect sizes of these studies. Thus, the present meta-analysis investigated the overall average correlation between L2 WTC and three key variables influencing foreign/second language learners' WTC, specifically perceived communicative competence, language anxiety, and motivation. The results of the meta-analysis indicated that all three variables were moderately correlated with L2 WTC, with perceived communicative competence having the largest effect. Finally, tests of the heterogeneity of the effect sizes indicated the possibility of the presence of the moderators which might play an influential role in the relationship of WTC with anxiety, perceived communicative competence, and motivation.