Page 15 [15]
Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
——o—
Traditionally, research investigating second language acquisition has been
classroom-centered; however, recently, there has been a growing interest and
research in the fields of language pedagogy and applied linguistics in everything
happening outside the classroom, too. One of the reasons is that owing to
English language media (films, series, songs, video games, news, etc.) becom¬
ing widely accessible to a wider audience, English as a Foreign Language (EFL)
learners can now be exposed to the English language outside the classroom as
well, thus they are surrounded by a wide array of authentic content without
having to travel or relocate to a target language country. What is more, as
Sundgvist and Olin-Scheller (2013) underscore, young learners and thus teen¬
agers are prosumers (both producers and consumers) of L2, usually English
language content (Lam 2000, Thorne et al. 2009, Yi 2008). This prosumer
phenomenon means that learners are often required to compose texts, consume
content, and communicate with others in their digital environment. This com¬
munication often occurs through the English language. As a result, leisure
time activities may be closely associated with a possible L2 development
(Sundqvist 2009) and, therefore, may be considered an important resource for
EFL learning and teaching, which also necessitates the investigation of learn¬
ers’ leisure time interests.
Research in different countries and regions, such as Scandinavia (Piirainen¬
Marsh-Tainio 2009, Simensen 2010, Sundqvist—Sylvén 2016), Belgium (Kuppens
2010), Germany (Grau 2009), and Hungary (Jözsa-Imre 2013) has shown that
there is a positive relationship between primary and secondary school students’
L2 English proficiency and their English out-of-school activities, or in other
words extramural English activities (henceforth EE activities).
In addition, as learners mainly but not exclusively engage in EE activities
for entertainment, EE activities may also be closely associated with L2 learn¬
ing motivation as learners may develop a positive attitude towards the English
language and wish to make more effort to acquire it. Since individual learner
differences, such as L2 learning motivation, play a crucial role in second lan¬
guage acquisition and determine the ultimate success of L2 acquisition (Dôrnyei
2005), there is a great deal of research (e.g., Dornyei 2005, Dornyei—Ryan 2015,
Mercer et al. 2012, Pawlak 2012) on the relationship between classroom-based
+13 +