Principal Investigator: Yolanda Rankin
CoPrincipal Investigator(s):
Organization: Florida State University

Abstract:
The ability to effectively communicate in more than one language is not only an educational goal, but a required life skill for this generation of students who must be able to compete and function in a global workforce. Communicative competence—knowing what to say, when to say it and how to say it— is one of the primary challenges that foreign language students struggle to achieve. Second language research reveals that foreign language students are less likely to communicate verbally in the classroom setting when they lack confidence in their ability to carry a conversation with native speakers. This project develops language learning technology that provides scaffolded opportunities for second language students to acquire vocabulary words and conversational phrases while simultaneously developing listening comprehension skills and speaking capabilities in the targeted language. The goal of this research is to explore the progression of second language students’ communicative competence through iteratively designing, developing and evaluating a mobile game that features intelligent, conversational computer generated game characters. Speech-based interactions with game characters will enable second language students to increase their vocabulary acquisition, listening comprehension skills and speaking capabilities in the targeted language, Spanish. Results of this research will inform the design of more sophisticated language learning technology that facilitates communicative competence in any foreign language.

This research program seeks to iteratively design computer generated conversational game characters known as Non Player Characters (NPCs) that engage foreign language students in social interactions that facilitate second language acquisition in Spanish. Research questions include: How do we strategically design conversational NPCs to scaffold novices’ proficiency in the targeted language? How do novices’ proficiency change over time as a result of social interactions with conversational NPCs during gameplay? What do these in-game social interactions suggest about creating meaningful gameplay experiences that improve novices’ proficiency in the targeted language? The results of this exploratory research will inform a new genre of language learning technology specifically designed to increase foreign language students’ proficiency in the targeted language as a supplement to traditional classroom instruction. The project will involve developing and evaluating the efficacy of the Game-based Social Interaction Model (GSIM), a conceptual framework that links in-game social interactions between native and non-native speakers to successful vocabulary acquisition in the targeted language. The GSIM will motivate the NPCs’ verbal behaviors during gameplay, enabling the NPCs to emulate human-like interactions that facilitate novices’ proficiency in the targeted language. In the context of a mobile game, the project will iteratively design conversational NPCs to provide scaffolded opportunities for second language students to increase their vocabulary acquisition, listening comprehension and speaking capabilities in the targeted language. This research will also examine how African American women perceive and interact with conversational NPCs in the targeted language during gameplay, thus identifying crucial design elements that positively influence learning outcomes specific to this particularly understudied population.