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State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning

Gender plays an important role in various aspects of second language acquisition, including lexicon learning. Many studies have suggested that compared to males, females are less likely to experience boredom, one of the frequently experienced deactivating negative emotions that may impair language l...

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Autores principales: Wang, Hua, Xu, Yong, Song, Hongwen, Mao, Tianxin, Huang, Yan, Xu, Sihua, Zhang, Xiaochu, Rao, Hengyi
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9466644/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36106041
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.807558
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author Wang, Hua
Xu, Yong
Song, Hongwen
Mao, Tianxin
Huang, Yan
Xu, Sihua
Zhang, Xiaochu
Rao, Hengyi
author_facet Wang, Hua
Xu, Yong
Song, Hongwen
Mao, Tianxin
Huang, Yan
Xu, Sihua
Zhang, Xiaochu
Rao, Hengyi
author_sort Wang, Hua
collection PubMed
description Gender plays an important role in various aspects of second language acquisition, including lexicon learning. Many studies have suggested that compared to males, females are less likely to experience boredom, one of the frequently experienced deactivating negative emotions that may impair language learning. However, the contribution of boredom to gender-related differences in lexicon learning remains unclear. To address this question, here we conducted two experiments with a large sample of over 1,000 college students to explore the relationships between gender differences in boredom and lexicon learning. In Experiment 1, a cohort of 527 participants (238 males) completed the trait and state boredom scales as well as a novel lexicon learning task without awareness of the testing process. In Experiment 2, an independent cohort of 506 participants (228 males) completed the same novel lexicon learning task with prior knowledge of the testing procedure. Results from both experiments consistently showed significant differences between female and male participants in the rate of forgetting words and the state boredom scores, with female participants performing better than male participants. Furthermore, differences in state boredom scores partially explained differences in the rate of forgetting words between female and male participants. These findings demonstrate a novel contribution of state boredom to gender differences in lexicon learning, which provides new insights into better language-learning ability in females.
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spelling pubmed-94666442022-09-13 State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning Wang, Hua Xu, Yong Song, Hongwen Mao, Tianxin Huang, Yan Xu, Sihua Zhang, Xiaochu Rao, Hengyi Front Psychol Psychology Gender plays an important role in various aspects of second language acquisition, including lexicon learning. Many studies have suggested that compared to males, females are less likely to experience boredom, one of the frequently experienced deactivating negative emotions that may impair language learning. However, the contribution of boredom to gender-related differences in lexicon learning remains unclear. To address this question, here we conducted two experiments with a large sample of over 1,000 college students to explore the relationships between gender differences in boredom and lexicon learning. In Experiment 1, a cohort of 527 participants (238 males) completed the trait and state boredom scales as well as a novel lexicon learning task without awareness of the testing process. In Experiment 2, an independent cohort of 506 participants (228 males) completed the same novel lexicon learning task with prior knowledge of the testing procedure. Results from both experiments consistently showed significant differences between female and male participants in the rate of forgetting words and the state boredom scores, with female participants performing better than male participants. Furthermore, differences in state boredom scores partially explained differences in the rate of forgetting words between female and male participants. These findings demonstrate a novel contribution of state boredom to gender differences in lexicon learning, which provides new insights into better language-learning ability in females. Frontiers Media S.A. 2022-08-29 /pmc/articles/PMC9466644/ /pubmed/36106041 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.807558 Text en Copyright © 2022 Wang, Xu, Song, Mao, Huang, Xu, Zhang and Rao. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Wang, Hua
Xu, Yong
Song, Hongwen
Mao, Tianxin
Huang, Yan
Xu, Sihua
Zhang, Xiaochu
Rao, Hengyi
State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title_full State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title_fullStr State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title_full_unstemmed State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title_short State Boredom Partially Accounts for Gender Differences in Novel Lexicon Learning
title_sort state boredom partially accounts for gender differences in novel lexicon learning
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9466644/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36106041
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.807558
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