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From: Paul.Atkins@mrc-apu.cam.ac.uk (Paul Atkins)
Subject: Experiences of RElearning a language
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I am currently investigating whether relearning a part of a foreign
language vocabulary enhances  a person's ability to remember the rest
of that vocabulary.  Many people appear to believe that a language
'comes flooding back' when they begin to relearn it.  The question is:
is this restricted solely to vocabulary that is explicitly relearned,
or is there some general facilitation of memory for the entire
vocabulary?

To illustrate: I learned basic French ten years ago.  If I am now
tested there will be some (very few) words that I can remember.
If I am then retaught a list of, say 100 words, will that
improve my memory for other UNRELEARNED words?  Please note that
I am only referring here to vocabulary - not other more general
aspects of language learning such as grammar or pronunciation.

If you have any experiences, intuitions or references on this idea I
would be very interested to hear from you.  If there is sufficient
interest I will post a summary (incl my results so far).  I am
particularly interested in references to any work that has been done on
this.  Although it seems many people have intuitions about it, I have
been unable to find any published studies.

Regards,
Paul


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Paul Atkins,                    email: paul.atkins@mrc-apu.cam.ac.uk
MRC Applied Psychology Unit,    phone: +44 1223 355 294 x202
15 Chaucer Rd,                  fax:   +44 1223 359 062
Cambridge, CB2 2EF, U.K.
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