Feedback from L1 users – a potential facilitator of L2 use¹

1 We thank the two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments.

ABSTRACT

In bilingual settings, the communication between majority and minority language speakers usually takes place in the majority language. This paper examines whether majority language speakers, who receive positive feedback from minority language speakers when accommodating to them, use the minority language more frequently for authentic purposes. We propose positive feedback from L1 users as a potential facilitator of L2 use. We report the development and the properties of the scale we utilised to assess L1 user feedback (L1FB). We embedded L1FB into the socio-contextual model of L2 communication and tested four hypotheses regarding the effect of L1FB on L2 use among majority language speaking high school students in bilingual Finland. All the hypotheses were supported by the data. Most importantly, L1FB significantly moderated the effect of L2 confidence on L2 use. L2 confidence had a larger effect on L2 use among those who received positive feedback. In the absence of positive L1FB, however, confident L2 learners used their L2 as little as their more anxious and less competent peers did. We discuss the relevance of L1FB with regard to authentic L2 use in general and the promotion of lesser used languages, in particular.

KEYWORDS:

• Bilingualism
• bilingual interaction
• minority language
• L1 user
• feedback

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Enikő Marton http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0396-9197

Notes

1 We thank the two anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments.

2 The authors sincerely thank the school directors for their support. Our special thanks go to the class teachers who helped with the administering of the questionnaires and to the participating students.

3 The authors sincerely thank Anne Huhtala and Hanna Lehti-Eklund from the Department of Finnish, Finno-Ugrian and Scandinavian Studies at the University of Helsinki as well as Minna Lehtola and Anna Storgårds from the Swedish School of Social Science at the same institution for their insightful comments.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Ella and Georg Ehrnrooth Foundation; Nylands Nation Foundation.