Development of English as a Second Language in the Context of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games

This dissertation examined the affordances of commercially developed massively multiplayer online (role-playing) games (MMOGs) for second language (L2) development. It comprises three self-contained but related studies. The first study, as a scoping review, synthesized 32 empirical papers, which investigated different aspects of L2 development in the context of these games. It sought to find out what aspects of L2 learning have been examined and how, and what the findings suggest regarding L2 learning opportunities and outcomes. This study highlighted that empirical research in this area is mainly qualitative and that L2-related affective factors, vocabulary, and communicative competence have been the most widely investigated topics. It concluded that MMOGs afford socially supportive and emotionally safe environments, which encourage L2 learners to use multiple opportunities for enriching their L2 vocabulary and enhancing their communicative competence in the target language. The second study was an exploratory research. It adopted an interactionist approach to characterize the nature of the negotiations of meaning that occurred in the conversational exchanges between native (NES) and non-native English speakers (NNESs) playing World of Warcraft. The data consisted of 63 hours of audio-recorded, in-game conversations over a 5-month period. The participants consisted of an NES and 6 NNESs who were divided into two groups (low and high intermediate) according to their English language proficiency. This study identified and characterized the most frequently occurred triggers, indicators, responses and reaction to the responses in three types of dyadic conversational exchanges. The third study examined L2 development through ―usage-based‖ theories of language learning. It was a time-series (longitudinal) research that examined the trend of changes in the linguistic complexity of the NNESs‘ spoken discourse during a 5-month period of gameplay. This examination involved repeated (in three equally-distributed time intervals) calculations of fourteen syntactic complexity indices and the indices associated with three components of lexical complexity (diversity, sophistication, and density). Overall, the results turned out to be more promising for the low intermediate than the high intermediate group of the NNESs. More detailed findings are presented and discussed in light of the current literature

Development of English as a Second Language in the Context of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games

This dissertation examined the affordances of commercially developed massively multiplayer online (role-playing) games (MMOGs) for second language (L2) development. It comprises three self-contained but related studies. The first study, as a scoping review, synthesized 32 empirical papers, which investigated different aspects of L2 development in the context of these games. It sought to find out what aspects of L2 learning have been examined and how, and what the findings suggest regarding L2 learning opportunities and outcomes. This study highlighted that empirical research in this area is mainly qualitative and that L2-related affective factors, vocabulary, and communicative competence have been the most widely investigated topics. It concluded that MMOGs afford socially supportive and emotionally safe environments, which encourage L2 learners to use multiple opportunities for enriching their L2 vocabulary and enhancing their communicative competence in the target language. The second study was an exploratory research. It adopted an interactionist approach to characterize the nature of the negotiations of meaning that occurred in the conversational exchanges between native (NES) and non-native English speakers (NNESs) playing World of Warcraft. The data consisted of 63 hours of audio-recorded, in-game conversations over a 5-month period. The participants consisted of an NES and 6 NNESs who were divided into two groups (low and high intermediate) according to their English language proficiency. This study identified and characterized the most frequently occurred triggers, indicators, responses and reaction to the responses in three types of dyadic conversational exchanges. The third study examined L2 development through ―usage-based‖ theories of language learning. It was a time-series (longitudinal) research that examined the trend of changes in the linguistic complexity of the NNESs‘ spoken discourse during a 5-month period of gameplay. This examination involved repeated (in three equally-distributed time intervals) calculations of fourteen syntactic complexity indices and the indices associated with three components of lexical complexity (diversity, sophistication, and density). Overall, the results turned out to be more promising for the low intermediate than the high intermediate group of the NNESs. More detailed findings are presented and discussed in light of the current literature

Negotiations for meaning in the context of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game

This study investigated negotiations for meaning as conditions for second language (L2) learning in the context of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game, World of Warcraft (WoW) (Blizzard Entertainment, 2004). Varonis and Gass’s (1985) and Smith’s (2003a) models were used to identify negotiation episodes during on-task and off-task talks among the participants while playing WoW. The participants were six non-native (NNS) and one native English speaker (NS). The NNSs were divided into two teams of three: Team 1 (T1) pre-intermediate and Team 2 (T2) upper-intermediate. The NS played the game with both teams. The study lasted for six months and resulted in 59.96 hours of recorded audio and nine hours of screen-recorded gaming sessions. Negotiation patterns were compared across the L2 proficiency levels and three different types of dyads. The results revealed that (a) T1 encountered more communication breakdowns, but T2 engaged in more negotiations, (b) T1 engaged in more complex negotiations, (c) breakdowns and negotiations occurred more during off-task talk, and (d) breakdowns were triggered more by the NS’s utterances in T1 and by NNSs’ utterances in T2. The results also showed the participants’ abundant L2 use to undertake authentically contextualized game-driven tasks, meticulous involvement in bi- and multi-lateral negotiations, and creative strategies to resolve incomprehension

Development of English as a Second Language in the Context of Massively Multiplayer Online Role-playing Games

This dissertation examined the affordances of commercially developed massively multiplayer online (role-playing) games (MMOGs) for second language (L2) development. It comprises three self-contained but related studies. The first study, as a scoping review, synthesized 32 empirical papers, which investigated different aspects of L2 development in the context of these games. It sought to find out what aspects of L2 learning have been examined and how, and what the findings suggest regarding L2 learning opportunities and outcomes. This study highlighted that empirical research in this area is mainly qualitative and that L2-related affective factors, vocabulary, and communicative competence have been the most widely investigated topics. It concluded that MMOGs afford socially supportive and emotionally safe environments, which encourage L2 learners to use multiple opportunities for enriching their L2 vocabulary and enhancing their communicative competence in the target language. The second study was an exploratory research. It adopted an interactionist approach to characterize the nature of the negotiations of meaning that occurred in the conversational exchanges between native (NES) and non-native English speakers (NNESs) playing World of Warcraft. The data consisted of 63 hours of audio-recorded, in-game conversations over a 5-month period. The participants consisted of an NES and 6 NNESs who were divided into two groups (low and high intermediate) according to their English language proficiency. This study identified and characterized the most frequently occurred triggers, indicators, responses and reaction to the responses in three types of dyadic conversational exchanges. The third study examined L2 development through ―usage-based‖ theories of language learning. It was a time-series (longitudinal) research that examined the trend of changes in the linguistic complexity of the NNESs‘ spoken discourse during a 5-month period of gameplay. This examination involved repeated (in three equally-distributed time intervals) calculations of fourteen syntactic complexity indices and the indices associated with three components of lexical complexity (diversity, sophistication, and density). Overall, the results turned out to be more promising for the low intermediate than the high intermediate group of the NNESs. More detailed findings are presented and discussed in light of the current literature

Negotiations for meaning in the context of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game

This study investigated negotiations for meaning as conditions for second language (L2) learning in the context of a massively multiplayer online role-playing game, World of Warcraft (WoW) (Blizzard Entertainment, 2004). Varonis and Gass’s (1985) and Smith’s (2003a) models were used to identify negotiation episodes during on-task and off-task talks among the participants while playing WoW. The participants were six non-native (NNS) and one native English speaker (NS). The NNSs were divided into two teams of three: Team 1 (T1) pre-intermediate and Team 2 (T2) upper-intermediate. The NS played the game with both teams. The study lasted for six months and resulted in 59.96 hours of recorded audio and nine hours of screen-recorded gaming sessions. Negotiation patterns were compared across the L2 proficiency levels and three different types of dyads. The results revealed that (a) T1 encountered more communication breakdowns, but T2 engaged in more negotiations, (b) T1 engaged in more complex negotiations, (c) breakdowns and negotiations occurred more during off-task talk, and (d) breakdowns were triggered more by the NS’s utterances in T1 and by NNSs’ utterances in T2. The results also showed the participants’ abundant L2 use to undertake authentically contextualized game-driven tasks, meticulous involvement in bi- and multi-lateral negotiations, and creative strategies to resolve incomprehension

Effect of plant density on yield and physiological characteristics of six canola cultivars

An experiment was performed in the Seed and Plant Improvement Institute, Karaj, Iran to study the influence of plant densities on physiological traits of six canola cultivars. Treatment conditions included three different plant densities (40, 60, and 80 plants m-2) for triplicates of six canola cultivars, namely, Ahamadi, Opera, Okapi, L72, Karaj1, and Sw102. Results indicated that L72 cultivar exhibited the highest yield at the lowest plant density (40 plants m-2). For all cultivars, both plant densities of 60 and 80 plants m-2 resulted in lower relative water content than 40 plants m-2. Proline and carbohydrate content significantly increased with increasing plant densities. The highest proline content was obtained from L72 under the highest plant density, whereas the lowest was also detected in this cultivar at the lowest plant density. All cultivars grown at the lowest density showed higher amounts of photosynthetic pigments chlorophylls a and b than those at the highest density. Glucosinolate increased with increasing plant densities, with L72 yielding the highest quantity when grown at the highest density. In conclusion, a density of 40 plants m-2 is recommended for growing L72 in this region.&nbsp

Teaching emotional intelligence nonformally an experimental study in : an Iranian public bank

This study tends to develop EI of employees of five branches of a Public Iranian bank. In each branch the training program was held for eight 120- minute nonformal friendly sessions. Using ECI test, participants’ EI was measured before and after the program. Results show that employees’ EI has improved

Second language learning in the context of massively multiplayer online games: A scoping review

This review examines the second language acquisition (SLA) literature with regard to the role of “massively multiplayer online games” (MMOGs) in second language (L2) learning. It focuses on commercially developed off-the-shelf (COTS) MMOGs only (some of them modified for educational purposes such as Reinders’ & Wattana’s work). It surveys the current empirical research to find out which aspects of L2 learning have been investigated, how they were studied, and what the findings suggest in relation to L2 learning opportunities and outcomes within and beyond MMOG contexts. We synthesized the findings of 31 studies reporting empirical evidence about the role of MMOGs in L2 learning. We observed that the empirical research in this area is mainly qualitative and that L2-related motivational and affective factors, L2 vocabulary, and learners’ communicative competence (or discourse management strategies) are the most widely investigated topics. Based on the findings, our paper presents a model that depicts hypothetical interrelationships among (a) MMOG designed settings, (b) the social and affective affordances provided in these settings, (c) L2 learning opportunities, and (d) the L2 learning outcomes achieved. We conclude that MMOGs provide socially supportive and emotionally safe (i.e. low-language-anxiety) environments that afford multiple opportunities for L2 learning and socialization, which, in turn, help L2 learners to enrich their L2 vocabulary repertoire and enhance their communicative competence in the target language

Complexity, accuracy, and fluency improvements through massively multiplayer online gaming: a longitudinal mixed-methods case study

Many English as a foreign language (EFL) learners worldwide spend hours playing commercial-off-the-shelf massively multiplayer online games. They engage in a multitude of different interactions with the game environment and possibly with other gamers, using English as the predominant medium of communication. This raises the question of whether playing such games improves these learners’/gamers’ speaking performance over time. Drawing on usage-based theories of language learning, this longitudinal mixed-methods case study addressed this question by measuring six EFL gamers’ speaking performance in terms of complexity, accuracy, and fluency (CAF) over the course of six months and exploring their perceptions relating to the gaming environment and their language learning. The participants played in two teams: Team 1 with low-intermediate and Team 2 with high-intermediate proficiency. Each team comprised three EFL gamers and a native English speaker. Overall, the results appeared positive for the EFL gamers on both teams but in different ways. Their speaking performance showed improvements in 50% of the CAF indices. These results are discussed in light of the gamers’ perceptions about the dynamics of in-game communication, the game’s socio-affective environment, and the development of their speaking performance