Chika Takahashi - Böcker

Through a mixed research synthesis of high-quality empirical studies, Jackson and Takahashi examine both widely reported and understudied psychological factors underlying foreign language learning in Japan, with an ecological approach framing the analysis. The book foregrounds its research with an analysis of Japan’s additional language education system and its effects on multi-systemic ecological levels, from public policy to individual learners. It then delves into a deeper look at psychological factors and individual differences impacting foreign language learning, with an emphasis on Japanese learners. The focused mixed research synthesis that follows, including quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods studies conducted between 2014-2024, assesses the psychological factors, additional languages, and school settings covered. It identifies gaps in research and provides reflections on issues within the Japanese system, as well as implications for improvement at the institutional and classroom levels to aid more effective language learning.A critical perspective and insightful outlook towards the additional language education system in Japan, this volume will be of interest to psycholinguistics and language education scholars focusing on Japan, as well as graduate students and teacher educators in the areas of language development, language education, and learner psychology.

This book provides rare insights into motivation among extremely successful learners of English and languages other than English (LOTEs) through the analysis of a longitudinal study and the examination of the factors involved in becoming multilingual in a non-multilingual environment. Based on sixteen interview sessions, conducted over the course of nine years while the learners progressed from high school to the world of work, this book offers the story of how two learners persist in English/LOTE learning. The study illuminates the long-term processes through which the interviewees develop ideal English/LOTE selves in an environment where multilingualism is not emphasized and where both English and LOTEs can still be described as foreign languages. Educators and researchers will learn from this study, which stretches our understanding of motivation beyond the recent theorizing of L2 motivation and contributes to the limited research in long-term motivational trajectories and LOTE learning motivation, which is particularly scarce in non-European contexts. The book will be of interest not only to readers in Japan but also to those in other contexts as it offers an example of successful learners who go beyond the pragmatic and instrumentalist view of language learning to hold a more holistic view, thus revealing the factors which can sustain multiple language learning, even in foreign language contexts.