Alison Mackey
Biographic Data
| ID | 969401 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Alison Mackey |
| GIVEN NAMES | Alison |
| FAMILY NAME | Mackey |
| SIGNATURE | MACKEY A |
| AFFILIATIONS | Georgetown University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1387-7835 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 34 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 155 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 33 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 9 |
Humanizing the Base of the Pyramid: Exploring the Influence of Resource (Dis)Advantages on Value Creation
Base of the pyramid (BoP) scholarship emphasizes the potential for enterprises to generate profits by enhancing the well-being of the impoverished, often by selling socially-beneficial products (SBPs). Yet, many such BoP enterprises have experienced mixed results. We argue that this may stem from insufficient attention to how BoP consumers value SBPs and other products. We frame SBPs as a type of human capital investment and thus use human capita…
Tasks and Interaction in Instructed Second Language Acquisition
This entry explores key components of tasks and interaction in instructed second language acquisition (ISLA), including the central role that tasks play in the process of learning a second language (L2) through their facility in promoting interaction. Interaction can provide opportunities for input, output, feedback, and negotiation for meaning. Decades of research have shown that interaction is important for L2 learning, likely due to its role i…
L2 learning outcomes of a research-based digital app for Japanese children – Addendum
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Narratives, Information and Manifestations of Resistance to Persuasion in Online Discussions of HPV Vaccination
There are both theoretical accounts and empirical evidence for the fact that, in health communication, narratives (story telling) may have a persuasive advantage when compared with information (the provision of facts). The dominant explanation for this potential advantage is that narratives inhibit people’s resistance to persuasion, particularly in the form of counterarguing. Evidence in this area to date has most often been gathered through lab …
Research methods for IDs and TBLT: A substantive and methodological review
As part of ongoing efforts to characterize the extent to which tasks and interaction-driven language learning are influenced by individual differences (IDs), task-based researchers have thus far examined variables like learners’ levels of L2 anxiety, motivation, cognitive creativity, working memory capacity, and aptitude. Building on a tradition of prior syntheses in task-based language teaching (TBLT, e.g., Plonsky & Kim, 2016), we carried out a…
L2 learning outcomes of a research-based digital app for Japanese children
Digital educational game-based apps can be effective in helping young children develop language skills, particularly when paired with formal instruction. However, we need to know more about how educational games benefit learning in the absence of formal instruction, given children’s proficiency with and willingness to use mobile devices anytime, anywhere. This study uses a randomized controlled trial design to investigate the impact of a digital …
Inducing Corporate Social Responsibility: Should Investors Reward the Responsible or Punish the Irresponsible
Research Methodology in Second Language Studies: Trends, Concerns, and New Directions
The field of second language studies is using increasingly sophisticated methodological approaches to address a growing number of urgent, real-world problems. These methodological developments bring both new challenges and opportunities. This article briefly reviews recent ontological and methodological debates in the field, then builds on these insights to consider some of the current dilemmas faced by researchers of second language teaching and…
Second Language Research: Methodology and Design
In this second edition of the best-selling Second Language Research, Alison Mackey and Sue Gass continue to guide students step-by-step through conducting the second language research process with a clear and comprehensive overview of the core issues in second language research. Supported by a wealth of data examples from actual studies, the book examines questions of what is meant by research and what defines good research questions, covering su…
Advancing Methodology and Practice: The Iris Repository of Instruments for Research into Second Languages
Instruments for Research into Second Languages is an accessible introduction to understanding and evaluating existing and emerging methodologies in L2 research. The book provides an introduction to the data collection materials available in the IRIS database. IRIS is an open access, searchable repository of instruments used to elicit data for research into second and foreign language learning and teaching. The book is aimed at graduate students, …
Creativity and EFL Students’ Language Use During a Group Problem-Solving Task
Stimulated Recall Methodology in Second Language Research
Iris: A new resource for second language research
IRIS is a digital database of materials used to collect data for second language research that went fully live in August 2012. At the time of writing (May 2013), there have been over 3,300 downloads of materials held on the site, and almost 11,000 visits, demonstrating a clear need for the resource. IRIS has the potential to make a step-change in the way our field works, impacting the nature and rate of second language (L2) research. Here we outl…
Practice and progression in Second Language Research methods
Since its inception, the field of second language research has utilized methods from a number of areas, including general linguistics, psychology, education, sociology, anthropology and, recently, neuroscience and corpus linguistics. As the questions and objectives expand, researchers are increasingly pushing methodological boundaries to gain a clearer picture of second language learning. At one end for example, we see measures of cognition (e.g.…
Bridging the Gap: Cognitive and Social Approaches to Research in Second Language Learning and Teaching
For some, research in learning and teaching of a second language (L2) runs the risk of disintegrating into irreconcilable approaches to L2 learning and use. On the one side, we find researchers investigating linguistic-cognitive issues, often using quantitative research methods including inferential statistics; on the other side, we find researchers working on the basis of sociocultural or sociocognitive views, often using qualitative research me…
Interaction Approach in Second Language Acquisition
The interaction approach to second language acquisition posits that learners can benefit from taking part in interaction because of a variety of developmentally helpful opportunities, conditions, and processes which interaction can expose them to. These include input, negotiation, output, feedback, and attention.
Prompted Production
Prompted production refers to language use that occurs in tasks which encourage, or “prompt,” participants to produce particular linguistic structures. Prompted production tasks are widely used in language research (including child language development, second language research, psycholinguistics, and sociolinguistics) and represent a convenient way of collecting linguistic data. In contrast to naturalistic data collection procedures (e.g., class…
Older Learners in SLA Research: A First Look at Working Memory, Feedback, and L2 Development
A great deal of research into second-language (L2) development focuses on the role of cognitive factors and other individual differences. Studies of children and prime-of-life adult L2 learners suggest that differences exist in the learning processes of these groups. However, to date, little empirical work has been conducted with older adult learners. In this article we argue that older adults' L2 learning aptitudes, processes, and outcomes merit…
Task-Based Interactions in Classroom and Laboratory Settings
This study was originally motivated by claims by a few classroom researchers (e.g., Foster, 1998, see Foster & Ohta, 2005) that the findings of laboratory-based studies of second-language interaction cannot automatically be applied to classroom language learning settings. Instead of simply accepting this assumption, we treated it as an empirical question. Our study was designed to examine the impact of setting-classroom and laboratory-on task-bas…
Exploring the Relationship Between Modified Output and Working Memory Capacity
This study examines the relationship between learners' production of modified output and their working memory (WM) capacity. The task-based interactions of 42 college-level, native English-speaking learners of Spanish as a foreign language were examined. A relationship was found between learners' WM test scores and their tendency to modify output. Specifically, greater processing capacity was related to greater production of modified output durin…
Task Familiarity and Interactional Feedback in Child ESL Classrooms
In this article we report on a study undertaken with ESL children between 7 and 8 years old. They carried out communicative tasks in pairs in second language classrooms. We examined patterns of their task‐based conversational interactions while we manipulated their familiarity with the procedure and content of the tasks. We found that learners working through unfamiliar tasks (in terms of both content and procedure) produced more clarification re…
Feedback, Noticing and Instructed Second Language Learning
Second language acquisition researchers have claimed that feedback provided during conversational interaction facilitates second language (L2) acquisition. A number of experimental studies have supported this claim, connecting interactional feedback with L2 development. Researchers have suggested that interactional feedback is associated with L2 learning because it prompts learners to notice L2 forms. This study explores the relationships between…
Input, Interaction and Output: An Overview
This paper presents an overview of what has come to be known as the Interaction Hypothesis , the basic tenet of which is that through input and interaction with interlocutors, language learners have opportunities to notice differences between their own formulations of the target language and the language of their conversational partners. They also receive feedback which both modifies the linguistic input they receive and pushes them to modify the…
The impact of planning time on children’s task-based interactions
Responses to Recasts: Repetitions, Primed Production, and Linguistic Development
Although a number of studies have associated recasts with second language development, the actual mechanisms by which recasts work to impact learning are still little understood. In particular, researchers have sought to gain a deeper understanding of the connections among recasts, learners' responses to recasts, and subsequent development. To this end, the current study examines the impact of recasts and different types of responses on English a…
Bridging the Gap: Cognitive and Social Approaches to Research in Second Language Learning and Teaching
For some, research in learning and teaching of a second language (L2) runs the risk of disintegrating into irreconcilable approaches to L2 learning and use. On the one side, we find researchers investigating linguistic-cognitive issues, often using quantitative research methods including inferential statistics; on the other side, we find researchers working on the basis of sociocultural or sociocognitive views, often using qualitative research me…
Task-Based Interactions in Classroom and Laboratory Settings: Language Learning Vol. 55, No. 4
While there is general agreement that conversational interaction can facilitate interlanguage development, much of the research on interaction has been conducted in experimental aboratory settings. Questions have been raised about the generalizability of the benefits observed in the laboratory to the classroom setting. The current research compared interaction in classrooms and laboratories. Seventy-four university-level students learning Spanish…
Research Methodology in Second Language Studies: Trends, Concerns, and New Directions
The field of second language studies is using increasingly sophisticated methodological approaches to address a growing number of urgent, real-world problems. These methodological developments bring both new challenges and opportunities. This article briefly reviews recent ontological and methodological debates in the field, then builds on these insights to consider some of the current dilemmas faced by researchers of second language teaching and…
Interactional Input and The Incorporation of Feedback: An Exploration of NS-NNS and NNS-NNS Adult and Child Dyads
Given the documented benefits of participation in communicative interaction (e.g., Gass & varonis, 1994; Mackey, 1999), the present study investigated the effects of interlocutor type on the provision and incorporation of feedback in task-based interaction. The interactions of 48 dyads, evenly divided among adults and children, and native speaker-nonnative speaker and nonnative speaker-native speaker, were analyzed to assess the effect of interlo…
Exploring the Relationship Between Modified Output and Working Memory Capacity
This study examines the relationship between learners' production of modified output and their working memory (WM) capacity. The task-based interactions of 42 college-level, native English-speaking learners of Spanish as a foreign language were examined. A relationship was found between learners' WM test scores and their tendency to modify output. Specifically, greater processing capacity was related to greater production of modified output durin…
Responses to Recasts: Repetitions, Primed Production, and Linguistic Development
Although a number of studies have associated recasts with second language development, the actual mechanisms by which recasts work to impact learning are still little understood. In particular, researchers have sought to gain a deeper understanding of the connections among recasts, learners' responses to recasts, and subsequent development. To this end, the current study examines the impact of recasts and different types of responses on English a…
Interactional feedback and children’s L2 development
Older Learners in SLA Research: A First Look at Working Memory, Feedback, and L2 Development
A great deal of research into second-language (L2) development focuses on the role of cognitive factors and other individual differences. Studies of children and prime-of-life adult L2 learners suggest that differences exist in the learning processes of these groups. However, to date, little empirical work has been conducted with older adult learners. In this article we argue that older adults' L2 learning aptitudes, processes, and outcomes merit…
The Effects of Task Repetition on Linguistic Output
This article explores form/meaning relationships, focussing on the use learners make of their internal L2 linguistic resources as a function of focus on meaning. Native speakers ofEnglish watched video segments 4 times while recording their own on-line rendition in Spanish. One group watched the same video 3 times and the other group watched different videos each time. At Time 4 both experimental groups saw a new video. A control group saw videos…
Communicative Tasks, Conversational Interaction and Linguistic Form: An Empirical Study of Thai 1
Second language acquisition (SLA) research suggests that some of the processes that occur during conversational interaction may facilitate second language learning. Carrying out communicative tasks designed to promote these processes can provide learners with the opportunity to focus on linguistic form in the context of meaning. Much of the SLA research on conversational interaction and communicative tasks has been carried out with the more commo…
Creativity and EFL Students’ Language Use During a Group Problem-Solving Task
The impact of planning time on children’s task-based interactions
Interactional tasks and English L2 learning by immigrant children in Singapore
Task Familiarity and Interactional Feedback in Child ESL Classrooms
In this article we report on a study undertaken with ESL children between 7 and 8 years old. They carried out communicative tasks in pairs in second language classrooms. We examined patterns of their task‐based conversational interactions while we manipulated their familiarity with the procedure and content of the tasks. We found that learners working through unfamiliar tasks (in terms of both content and procedure) produced more clarification re…
Conversational Interaction and Second Language Development: Recasts, Responses, and Red Herrings?
This article examines the effects of negotiated interaction on the production and development of question forms in English as a second language (ESL). The study focused on one feature of interaction, recasts, which have recently been the topic of interactional work in the SLA literature (Long, 1996; Long, Inagaki, & Ortega, this issue; Lyster & Ranta, 1997; Oliver, 1995). The study compared groups of learners who received interactionally modified…
Input, Interaction, and Second Language Development: An Empirical Study of Question Formation in ESL
This study examines the relationship between different types of conversational interaction and SLA. Long's (1996) updated version of the interactionist hypothesis claims that implicit negative feedback, which can be obtained through negotiated interaction, facilitates SLA. Similar claims for the benefits of negotiation have been made by Pica (1994) and Gass (1997). Some support for the interaction hypothesis has been provided by studies that have…
The Effects of Task Repetition on Linguistic Output
This article explores form/meaning relationships, focussing on the use learners make of their internal L2 linguistic resources as a function of focus on meaning. Native speakers ofEnglish watched video segments 4 times while recording their own on-line rendition in Spanish. One group watched the same video 3 times and the other group watched different videos each time. At Time 4 both experimental groups saw a new video. A control group saw videos…
Communicative Tasks, Conversational Interaction and Linguistic Form: An Empirical Study of Thai 1
Second language acquisition (SLA) research suggests that some of the processes that occur during conversational interaction may facilitate second language learning. Carrying out communicative tasks designed to promote these processes can provide learners with the opportunity to focus on linguistic form in the context of meaning. Much of the SLA research on conversational interaction and communicative tasks has been carried out with the more commo…
A Social Actor Conception of Organizational Identity and Its Implications for the Study of Organizational Reputation
The objective of this article is to clarify the conceptual domains of organizational identity, image, and reputation. To initiate this theory development process, we present a “social actor” conception of organizational identity. Identity-congruent definitions of image and reputation are then specified and an integrated model proposed. With the aid of this model, a structural flawin the organizational reputation literature is identified and suita…
Interactional feedback and children’s L2 development
Interactional Input and The Incorporation of Feedback: An Exploration of NS-NNS and NNS-NNS Adult and Child Dyads
Given the documented benefits of participation in communicative interaction (e.g., Gass & varonis, 1994; Mackey, 1999), the present study investigated the effects of interlocutor type on the provision and incorporation of feedback in task-based interaction. The interactions of 48 dyads, evenly divided among adults and children, and native speaker-nonnative speaker and nonnative speaker-native speaker, were analyzed to assess the effect of interlo…
Interactional tasks and English L2 learning by immigrant children in Singapore
Task-Based Interactions in Classroom and Laboratory Settings: Language Learning Vol. 55, No. 4
While there is general agreement that conversational interaction can facilitate interlanguage development, much of the research on interaction has been conducted in experimental aboratory settings. Questions have been raised about the generalizability of the benefits observed in the laboratory to the classroom setting. The current research compared interaction in classrooms and laboratories. Seventy-four university-level students learning Spanish…
Feedback, Noticing and Instructed Second Language Learning
Second language acquisition researchers have claimed that feedback provided during conversational interaction facilitates second language (L2) acquisition. A number of experimental studies have supported this claim, connecting interactional feedback with L2 development. Researchers have suggested that interactional feedback is associated with L2 learning because it prompts learners to notice L2 forms. This study explores the relationships between…
Input, Interaction and Output: An Overview
This paper presents an overview of what has come to be known as the Interaction Hypothesis , the basic tenet of which is that through input and interaction with interlocutors, language learners have opportunities to notice differences between their own formulations of the target language and the language of their conversational partners. They also receive feedback which both modifies the linguistic input they receive and pushes them to modify the…
The impact of planning time on children’s task-based interactions
Responses to Recasts: Repetitions, Primed Production, and Linguistic Development
Although a number of studies have associated recasts with second language development, the actual mechanisms by which recasts work to impact learning are still little understood. In particular, researchers have sought to gain a deeper understanding of the connections among recasts, learners' responses to recasts, and subsequent development. To this end, the current study examines the impact of recasts and different types of responses on English a…
Task Familiarity and Interactional Feedback in Child ESL Classrooms
In this article we report on a study undertaken with ESL children between 7 and 8 years old. They carried out communicative tasks in pairs in second language classrooms. We examined patterns of their task‐based conversational interactions while we manipulated their familiarity with the procedure and content of the tasks. We found that learners working through unfamiliar tasks (in terms of both content and procedure) produced more clarification re…
Exploring the Relationship Between Modified Output and Working Memory Capacity
This study examines the relationship between learners' production of modified output and their working memory (WM) capacity. The task-based interactions of 42 college-level, native English-speaking learners of Spanish as a foreign language were examined. A relationship was found between learners' WM test scores and their tendency to modify output. Specifically, greater processing capacity was related to greater production of modified output durin…
Task-Based Interactions in Classroom and Laboratory Settings
This study was originally motivated by claims by a few classroom researchers (e.g., Foster, 1998, see Foster & Ohta, 2005) that the findings of laboratory-based studies of second-language interaction cannot automatically be applied to classroom language learning settings. Instead of simply accepting this assumption, we treated it as an empirical question. Our study was designed to examine the impact of setting-classroom and laboratory-on task-bas…
Interaction Approach in Second Language Acquisition
The interaction approach to second language acquisition posits that learners can benefit from taking part in interaction because of a variety of developmentally helpful opportunities, conditions, and processes which interaction can expose them to. These include input, negotiation, output, feedback, and attention.
Prompted Production
Prompted production refers to language use that occurs in tasks which encourage, or “prompt,” participants to produce particular linguistic structures. Prompted production tasks are widely used in language research (including child language development, second language research, psycholinguistics, and sociolinguistics) and represent a convenient way of collecting linguistic data. In contrast to naturalistic data collection procedures (e.g., class…
Older Learners in SLA Research: A First Look at Working Memory, Feedback, and L2 Development
A great deal of research into second-language (L2) development focuses on the role of cognitive factors and other individual differences. Studies of children and prime-of-life adult L2 learners suggest that differences exist in the learning processes of these groups. However, to date, little empirical work has been conducted with older adult learners. In this article we argue that older adults' L2 learning aptitudes, processes, and outcomes merit…
Stimulated Recall Methodology in Second Language Research
Iris: A new resource for second language research
IRIS is a digital database of materials used to collect data for second language research that went fully live in August 2012. At the time of writing (May 2013), there have been over 3,300 downloads of materials held on the site, and almost 11,000 visits, demonstrating a clear need for the resource. IRIS has the potential to make a step-change in the way our field works, impacting the nature and rate of second language (L2) research. Here we outl…
Practice and progression in Second Language Research methods
Since its inception, the field of second language research has utilized methods from a number of areas, including general linguistics, psychology, education, sociology, anthropology and, recently, neuroscience and corpus linguistics. As the questions and objectives expand, researchers are increasingly pushing methodological boundaries to gain a clearer picture of second language learning. At one end for example, we see measures of cognition (e.g.…
Bridging the Gap: Cognitive and Social Approaches to Research in Second Language Learning and Teaching
For some, research in learning and teaching of a second language (L2) runs the risk of disintegrating into irreconcilable approaches to L2 learning and use. On the one side, we find researchers investigating linguistic-cognitive issues, often using quantitative research methods including inferential statistics; on the other side, we find researchers working on the basis of sociocultural or sociocognitive views, often using qualitative research me…
Second Language Research: Methodology and Design
In this second edition of the best-selling Second Language Research, Alison Mackey and Sue Gass continue to guide students step-by-step through conducting the second language research process with a clear and comprehensive overview of the core issues in second language research. Supported by a wealth of data examples from actual studies, the book examines questions of what is meant by research and what defines good research questions, covering su…
Advancing Methodology and Practice: The Iris Repository of Instruments for Research into Second Languages
Instruments for Research into Second Languages is an accessible introduction to understanding and evaluating existing and emerging methodologies in L2 research. The book provides an introduction to the data collection materials available in the IRIS database. IRIS is an open access, searchable repository of instruments used to elicit data for research into second and foreign language learning and teaching. The book is aimed at graduate students, …
Psychology (27 works) · EFL/ESL Teaching and Learning (24 works) · Linguistics (20 works) · Mathematics education (17 works) · Computer Science (16 works) · Second Language Learning and Teaching (16 works) · Cognitive psychology (13 works) · Second Language Acquisition and Learning (11 works) · Language acquisition (10 works) · Task (project management) (9 works)