Developing L2 learners’ metaphoric competence: a case study of figurative motion constructions Beatriz Martín-Gascón Universidad Complutense de Madrid beatma22@ucm.es ORCID: 0000-0003-2962-8339 Abstract This study compares two instruction methods (cognitive and traditional) for teaching complex metaphorical motion constructions in Spanish and developing A2+ learners’ metaphoric competence in the L2. The cognitive instruction combined insights from the Conceptual Metaphor Theory with multimodal content and cognitive parameters, whereas the traditional package followed a communicative and formalist approach to language based on most current L2 textbooks. A group of 33 university students from a North American-based College participated in the experiment. Assessment tests were designed inspired by cognitive linguistics tenets and measured learners’ general metaphor comprehension (Task 1) and original production (Task 2), as well as performance in the comprehension (Task 3) and production (Task 4) of change-of-state constructions, thus breaking with the pervading assessment typology for empirical studies in applied cognitive linguistics. The cognitive methodology proved to be significantly more beneficial for all 4 tasks. Although students who received a traditional instruction improved over time, those from the cognitive group showed statistically higher performance in metaphoric competence and in the comprehension and production of the target constructions. These findings clearly suggest that a cognitive-based instruction, when followed by a consistent assessment, is an effective approach to teaching and learning difficult constructions in the L2. 1 Introduction Metaphorical or figurative language is ubiquitous in our daily communicative exchanges, especially when conveying psychological experiences related to mental states and emotions (Kövecses 2010, 2020; Kövecses, Palmer and Dirven 2003; Lakoff and Johnson 1999). In line with this pervasiveness, metaphor and figurative thinking have been found to be crucial for communicative competence (Bachman 1990; Littlemore and Low 2006). Metaphors have the power to ease the understanding and expression of inner and shared experiences that are more abstract and therefore harder to apprehend. Linguistic utterances such as Los niños saltaban de alegría (‘The kids jumped for joy’), José cayó en depresión (‘José fell into depression’) or Carmen se puso de buen humor (‘Carmen got in a good mood’) are enriched by metaphors that involve verbs of motion to convey different emotions. For purposes of delimitation, this investigation will focus on the last motion verb, ponerse ‘putCL’, followed by an adjectival phrase, which is a frequent construction used for describing spontaneous and temporary change of emotional state in Spanish (e.g., Elena se puso roja, ‘Elena turned red’). Motion and emotion thus merge in this type of metaphorical construction, as the former, being based on our bodily, motor, and physical experience, enhances our understanding of the latter. Recent years have seen a proliferation of empirical studies on the conceptualization and expression of motion events comparing different languages with Spanish (e.g., Andria and Hijazo-Gascón This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by De Gruyter in International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, vol. 61, no. 1 (2023), pp. 79-109. available at: https://doi.org/10.1515/iral-2022-0043 https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/iral-2022-0043/html It is deposited under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way. If you wish to use this manuscript for commercial purposes, please contact rights@degruyter.com. mailto:beatma22@ucm.es 2018; Ibarretxe-Antuñano and Hijazo-Gascón 2012; Montero-Melis and Bylund 2017; Muñoz and Cadierno 2019). Motion events are understood as situations containing either “movement or the maintenance of a stationary location” (Talmy 1985:85). An example of a basic motion event is “The bottle floated into the cave”, as offered by Talmy (2000). However, there is little research on the teaching of motion event construal, let alone on the teachability of motion in Spanish as a second language (L2), especially when said motion is non-literal or figurative. Considering this and given that effective communication in an L2 requires the ability to use metaphors, enhancing L2 Spanish learners’ metaphoric competence through motion constructions becomes of prime importance. To date no investigation to our knowledge has focused on innovative cognitive-based pedagogical techniques to teach and assess change-of-state constructions, where motion occurs in an imaginary manner and the experiencer metaphorically moves from one emotional state to another. Hence, in the present study we analyze whether this can be overcome with the help of a conceptual metaphor-based instruction that aims at developing metaphoric and communicative competences in L2 Spanish. 2 Motivation Due to its complex linguistic nature, the figurative motion verb ponerse, along with other change- of-state verbs in Spanish (convertirse en, lit. ‘convert in’, idiomatic ‘become’; hacerse, lit. ‘make oneself’, idiomatic ‘become’; ‘turn’; transformarse en, lit. ‘transform in’, idiomatic ‘become’; llegar a (ser), lit. ‘arrive to (be)’, idiomatic ‘become’; volverse, lit. ‘turn around’, idiomatic ‘become’; quedarse, lit. ‘stay’, idiomatic ‘remain’) is difficult to be accounted for and, as a result, it represents a challenge for L2 teachers and learners. This difficulty can also be derived from the way this phenomenon is presented in the L2 Spanish classroom (Cheikh-Khamis 2019; Gómez Vicente 2012; Martín Bosque 2012), normally following a focus-on-communication approach where the binomial form-meaning is disregarded. In the Spanish language, a change in someone’ state can be expressed using various verbs based on nuances in the specificity of the change (e.g., radicality in volverse, short-temporality and spontaneity in ponerse, completion and long-temporality in quedarse). With regard to ponerse, findings from an analysis of the British National Corpus have shown the prevalence of the motion verbs get and go to convey the same metaphorical meaning as ponerse (Martín-Gascón 2021). Complexities in Spanish change-of-state verbs might also be compounded by the heterogeneity in the structure required by each of these verbs. In line with this, the Plan Curricular del Instituto Cervantes (PCIC) does not recommend their presence in the L2 Spanish classroom until higher levels of proficiency (B1-C2). Still, in terms of pedagogical impact, the inclusion of change-of- state verbs at an earlier stage (e.g., A2/A2+) focusing on the contrast with the learners’ L1 as well as on their literal vs. non-literal motion meaning could be advantageous for a more meaningful assimilation. Furthermore, an examination of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) shows that contemporary notions about metaphoric competence are almost non-existent and relegated to C1 and C2 levels (see Nacey 2013: 40-55). Low (1988) already called for applied measures to adjust metaphor theory to the four walls. A few decades later, Boers (2014) continued to emphasize the need for transfer from metaphor theory to textbooks and contended that metaphor scholars should provide convincing evidence for the importance of figurative or metaphorical language. 3 Theoretical background 3.1 Non-figurative and figurative motion Newborn infants have been shown to be sensitive to visual motion through rapid responses to moving objects (Craighero et al. 2020). These findings suggest that our perception of motion is embodied even before we start crawling. Apart from being among the earliest human experiences, the conceptualization of motion, and more specifically, the linguistic expressions that describe physical motion, are distinguished for their high frequency and are among the first acquired by native speakers (Miller and Johnson-Laird 1976:527). According to these authors, spatial organization and expression are crucial to human cognition and reasoning, and therefore, space and motion are pervasive when talking about basic events such as changes in one’s psychological state. With regard to this, research has found that six-month infants concentrate more on changes of state than on spatial changes without corresponding state changes (Woodward 1998). Motion and space (literal and non-literal or figurative) are therefore central to human experience and, as such, omnipresent in our communicative interactions. Due to their experiential basis and pervasiveness, these two phenomena have attracted the attention of linguists in the field of functional and cognitive (psycho)linguistics (Slobin 2004; Talmy 1985, 2000) and L2 acquisition (Alghamdi, Daller and Milton 2019; Andria and Hijazo-Gascón 2018; Cadierno 2017; Laws, Attwood and Treffers-Daller 2021; Montero-Melis and Bylund 1017). Yet, research into the teachability of motion in any language is rather scarce. In this respect, two recent investigations (Alghamdi et al. 2019; Laws et al. 2021) shed light on the challenges that L2 learners and instructors might face. In Alghamdi et al.’s (2019), the authors explore the influence of first language (L1)-Arabic patterns when describing motion events with boundary crossings (e.g., manner verbs) in L2 English. Results from two groups of Arab intermediate and advanced L2 English learners show how, diverging from English native speakers’ use of manner verbs, Arab speakers avoid recurring to manner verbs and use path verbs instead. This has clear pedagogical implications, as learners do produce grammatical sentences (which veer, however, from native speakers’ actual use), and thus will not receive negative feedback and will rely on incidental learning. To overcome L1 influence, the authors recommend explicitly teaching the difference in motion event construal between the two languages. Laws et al. (2021) highlight the same challenge (i.e., unlearning the L1 boundary-crossing constraint and conflating motion and manner in the main verb as in L2 English) and seek to identify an effective pedagogical approach to help instructors teach motion events in English. Their findings reveal that input-only instruction, based on the principles of Processing Instruction, is effective and enables learners to restructure their interlanguage. Talmy’ (2000:25) definition of motion and motion taxonomy help understand the concept of figurative motion, which is at stake here. The author defines motion as a situation containing movement, and the continuation of a stationary location alike, as a motion event. He distinguishes three types of motion: factive, fictive and metaphorical. Factive corresponds to real or actual motion (e.g., ‘I went from the night club to the hospital’). Fictive or imaginary motion describes a situation where there is no actual motion, but the moving scene can be possible in our mind. Take as an example: ‘The route goes through the rainforest’, where “the route” takes on animate properties that involve imagination. Finally, metaphorical motion is undertaken by an abstract or non-physical entity that acts as a moving object (e.g., ‘The noise came from the street’). The target motion constructions with the verb ponerse (e.g., Jose se puso nervioso, lit. ‘Jose put himself nervous’) are non-actual motion instantiations, that is, they are both imaginary and metaphorical to a certain extent. Yet, the moving entity (i.e., the experiencer, in this case, Jose) is an animate being, intrinsically and naturally able to move. Additionally, the animate entity is a self-mover and, therefore, the metaphorical or imaginary motion (change of state), is not necessarily caused by an external stimulus or dynamic force. Figurative motion can also be explained by means of Lakoff’s (1993) rich and complex EVENT STRUCTURE metaphor, which accounts for the understanding of abstract concepts such as state or change. As one of the founding fathers of the Conceptual Metaphor theory (CMT), Lakoff (1993:220) contends that aspects of event structure like states or changes are characterized cognitively through metaphor in terms of space and motion. According to the author, we talk about being in or out of a state, going into or out of it, getting to a state or emerging from it. In the normal version of the metaphor, emotional states are regarded as locations, in which bounded regions in space refer to states (‘She was in love’: state; ‘She went crazy’: change of state). Let us consider, for instance, the following metaphorical construction with ponerse: Se pone contenta (‘She gets excited’) where motion occurs in an imaginary manner and the experiencer metaphorically moves from/to spatial positions or locations in a spontaneous and momentary manner (i.e., from a previous emotional state to a sudden state of happiness). Here, the complex metaphor A SPONTANEOUS AND TEMPORARY CHANGE OF STATE IS A SPONTANEOUS AND TEMPORARY CHANGE OF LOCATION is at play (Martín-Gascón 2022a, 2022b). The cognitive mechanism of metaphor and its linguistic expression allow the linkage between both physical and abstract space and motion. In the dual version of the EVENT STRUCTURE metaphor, the changing entity no longer moves metaphorically and is regarded as a possessor of a physical entity (emotional states) which moves and corresponds to the new state, and which then becomes a possession. Expressions like ¿Tienes nervios? (lit. ‘Do you have any nerves?’, idiomatic ‘Are you nervous?’) or ¿Se puso nerviosa? (lit. ‘Did she put herself nervous?’, idiomatic ‘Did she get nervous?’) present the possessed entity (i.e., nervousness) as the dual of the location in the normal version and the possessor (i.e., the experiencer of that nervousness) as the dual of the changing entity. Emotional states are therefore regarded as objects located in the real space surrounding the possessor of said emotions. This mapping can be named EMOTIONAL STATES/EMOTIONS ARE PHYSICAL (POSSESSABLE) OBJECTS and when the experiencer spontaneously assumes or owns a new temporary emotional state, the mapping can be named EMOTIONAL STATES/EMOTIONS ARE CLOTHES which gives rise to entailed submetaphors such as PUTTING ON ONE’S EMOTIONS IS PUTTING ON ONE’S CLOTHES (Me pongo ansiosa, lit. ‘I put myself anxious’, idiomatic ‘I get anxious’). 3.2 Figurative motion through change of state in the L2 classroom Although motion, by means of embodied activities since early stages of life, is among the most basic and earliest human experiences and its expression is one of the first acquired by native speakers, this does not necessarily imply that motion verbs are easy in the context of L2 acquisition. The last two decades have witnessed an increase in research focusing on the conceptualization and expression of motion events comparing different languages (e.g., Cadierno 2004, Cadierno 2017 for a review; Montero-Melis and Bylund 2017). Cadierno (2004) and Cadierno and Ruiz (2006) have provided evidence of how adult intermediate and advanced learners with L1 Danish and L2 Spanish develop L2 patterns in the course of time. More specifically, students in their study adopted manner of motion in L2 Spanish, although for path descriptions, they revealed more elaborated patterns common to their L1. Calle-Bocanegra’s (2019) study on deictic motion verbs acquisition by Czech learners of L2 Spanish has shown a correlation between a more native-like performance and proficiency, which suggests a gradual acquisition of patterns in the L2. The author calls for efficient methods for teaching deixis in the L2. With regard to the teaching of motion in the L2 classroom, this area has, however, received little attention. Colassaco’s (2019) empirical study is one of the few investigations exploring motion with learners of Spanish. In her study, the author compared two pedagogical approaches, cognitive and traditional, to the teaching of deictic motion verbs to Italian and German learners of L2 Spanish. Her results showed better performance in the use of motion verbs in students who received a cognitive instruction that combined cognitive grammar principles and those of processing instruction. Likewise, very few studies have focused on figurative motion conveyed through change-of-state verbs in the L2 classroom. With regard to L2 English, Rah and Kim (2018) carried out an empirical investigation where Korean native speakers were instructed following a construction-based approach paying attention to the networking relationship between the resultative construction and the change of path in the caused-motion construction. Their findings revealed that a constructional instruction was more effective than a non-constructional form- centered approach and that students performed better when being presented with the resultative construction in a network relationship with its family constructions. In the field of L2 Spanish, Ibarretxe-Antuñano and Cheikh-Khamis’ (2019) constructional approach offered a motivated explanation for a list of change-of-state verbs, focusing on hacerse ‘makeCL’ and volverse ‘turnCL’, which is already a significant pedagogical step forward. In a later study, Cheikh-Khamis (2020) examined how L2 Spanish textbooks and grammar books approach the teaching of change-of-state verbs and concluded that the explanations offered are insufficient, imprecise and heterogenous to clarify their complex meaning. Gómez Vicente’s (2020) corpus-based study on narratives by francophone learners of L2 Spanish showed an anomalous use of the verbs volverse ‘turnCL’ and ponerse ‘putCL’ and proposed a pedagogical approach based on learning the verbal lexicon through polysemy. Recent work by Martín-Gascón (2022a, 2022b) explored the cognitive motivation of the ‘ponerse + adjective’ construction along the lines of lexical-constructional and metaphorical accounts of meaning focusing on A SPONTANEOUS AND TEMPORARY CHANGE OF STATE IS A SPONTANEOUS AND TEMPORARY CHANGE OF LOCATION and EMOTIONS ARE CLOTHES conceptual metaphors. Such an insight offered preliminary options for the design and implementation of a CMT-based material for the L2 Spanish classroom. When designing classroom interventions, there are several factors that need to be considered. Marsden and Torgerson (2012) illustrate some of the problems that can influence findings from pre- and post-test research design. For instance, after re-analyzing data from a prior classroom experiment using Processing Instruction in Marsden (2004), the authors found how pre-test scores were plotted against gain scores to show regression to the mean effects and that learners with higher baseline scores made smaller gains. Based on these findings, new lines of research still need to attest the effectiveness of teaching figurative motion constructions aiming, concomitantly, at enhancing the L2 learners’ metaphoric and communicative competences. By drawing students’ attention to the literal versus figurative meaning of motion, i.e., between the source domain of movement, space and location and the target domain of emotional states, learners could be one step closer to understanding and producing metaphorical motion in change-of-state constructions. 3.3 Metaphoric competence Metaphoric competence involves the awareness, comprehension, retention, and production of everyday metaphors in the different language skills (O’Reilly and Marsden 2021:26). It can therefore be defined as the ability to comprehend and use metaphors in a given language. Metaphors are part of our reasoning and are linguistically represented in our everyday language. This contemporary view of metaphor, based on the observation that language is figuratively rich and systematic, contends that regularities in how we speak figuratively about a domain inform us about how the domain is conceptualized (Lakoff 1993). The idea that metaphors are related to cognition was first studied in experimental research by Johnson (1991). More recent work on metaphor interpretation and production has suggested that metaphoric thinking reflects underlying mental processes (see Evans and Green 2006). Recent years have seen a growing interest in teaching metaphor to L2 learners, most of which were focused on linking the ability to understand and produce metaphors to L2 proficiency (Achard and Niemeier 2008; Acquaroni Muñoz and Suárez Campos 2019; Boers and Lindstromberg 2008; Lantolf and Bobrova 2014; Littlemore and Juchem-Grundmann 2010; Niemeier 2017; Suárez Campos and Hijazo-Gascón 2019). Overall, these investigations have found that raising learners’ awareness about the existence of conventionalized expressions used unconsciously and emphasizing how conceptual metaphors structure linguistic expressions in the L2 can have a positive impact in terms of enhanced engagement and L2 assimilation and retention. Previous corpus studies have also succeeded in measuring L2 learners’ production of metaphor in written texts (Hoang and Boers 2018; Nacey 2013). Studies looking into both metaphorical production and comprehension have been scarce. An example of an early investigation is Charteris-Black’s (2002) small-scale research of Malay learners of English. On the basis of his results, the author advises practitioners to highlight the differing source and target domains in the language classroom. MacArthur and Littlemore (2011) also examined L2 comprehension and production of figurative language in a study that examined spoken interaction in English. They observed that both native and L2 speakers use metaphor in spoken discourse and that non-conventional metaphorical language produced by L2 speakers does not lead to misunderstanding. The authors emphasize the need for training in enhancing the metaphorical potential of L2 vocabulary. A more recent study by Pawelczyk et al. (2017) looked at schizophrenia patients’ comprehension and production of metaphors. Although the population differs from the one targeted in this study, it is worth mentioning that results revealed that comprehension was easier than production of written metaphors. This finding suggests that both processes, although intertwining (Pickering and Garrod 2013), are not of same difficulty. This is in line with research that claims that comprehension of oral language precedes the active production in language development (e.g., Benedict 1979). A small number of studies have focused their efforts on developing tests that measure fluency of interpretation and original metaphor production. Littlemore’s (2001) study is one of the few that develops tests to assess comprehension and creativity of L2 metaphoric use. In her investigation, Littlemore (2001) operationalized metaphoric competence looking at intermediate to upper- intermediate L2 English learners’ speed in finding meaning in metaphor and originality of metaphor production. In light of the evidence presented, there are still a number of unanswered questions regarding the effectivity of introducing L2 students to change-of-state constructions at earlier learning stages as well as of explicitly teaching metaphors in the L2 Spanish classroom. For that reason, the purpose of this investigation was to examine the effect of teaching metaphorical motion on lower intermediate level L2 Spanish learners’ performance with regard to metaphor comprehension and production. 4 The study The present research was designed to accomplish two objectives: a more general one and a more specific one. The general objective was to assess the development of learners’ L2 metaphoric competence (i.e., metaphor comprehension and production). More specifically, the study aimed to compare the effects of two approaches for teaching the metaphorical motion construction ‘ponerse + adjective’ to L2 Spanish learners with L1 English. The two instructional methods were an innovative cognitive-based instruction following the tenets of the CMT and a traditional communicative method based on current L2 Spanish textbooks. With this in mind, the current study addressed two research questions: RQ1. Does the learners’ L2 metaphoric competence (interpretation and original production) improve after instruction? Which approach is more effective, a cognitive linguistics-based one or a traditional and communicative one? RQ2. Do the learners’ interpretation and production of the target metaphorical construction improve after instruction? Which approach is more effective? Considering the previously reviewed literature, the following hypotheses were posited: H1. A cognitive linguistics-inspired pedagogical approach will render better results than a traditional pedagogical approach in students’ general metaphoric competence; H2. A cognitive linguistics- inspired pedagogical approach will evidence enhanced results by comparison with a traditional one in students’ interpretation and production of metaphorical motion constructions. 5 Methodology 5.1 Participants A group of 33 students from a university in North America, who were A2+ learners of Spanish and whose L1 was English participated in the study as they learned how to conceptualize and express their emotions. The initial pool consisted of 36 participants from different A2+ level course sections. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the three research groups. This initial group was reduced to the final group of 33 participants based on three criteria: not being heritage speakers, having attended all three sessions and not achieving scores of equal or above 55% in tasks that examined comprehension and production of the target metaphorical constructions in the pretest. The two experimental groups: COG (n=13) and TRAD (n=10) were taught using a cognitive and a traditional teaching method, respectively, and the control group (CON) (n=10) received no instruction. 5.2 Materials Two instruction packages (traditional and cognitive) and data collection instruments were designed for and implemented during a 75-minute session. Both packages were aimed at teaching different forms of the “ponerse + adjective” construction (i.e., ponerse contento / triste / nervioso / furioso / histérico / rojo (de rabia) / rojo (como un tomate) / enfermo). The traditional instruction sequence (Appendix A) was inspired by how linguistic content is introduced in most L2 Spanish textbooks in the market, that is, following a communicative approach. The material started with a brainstorming activity about the expression of different emotions, positive and negative, and with visual cues and different contextual situations. It was followed by the explicit introduction of the change-of-state verb ponerse and attention was given to its temporary and spontaneous nature. Students were offered a list of adjectives that co-occur with this verb to denote positive and negative emotions, which were introduced in different colors, as well as some examples. Finally, in assembly, students were asked to produce a few sentences using the target constructions (see sample in Figure 1). Attention was given in particular to highlighting the contrast between English and Spanish, color, and the spontaneous and temporal nature of the construction. Figure 1: Sample of activity in traditional package. The cognitive instruction package (Appendix B) was designed based on previous findings from an analysis of the EMOTIONAL STATES ARE CLOTHES metaphor and the spontaneous and temporary nature of the ‘ponerse + adjective’ change-of-state construction (Martín-Gascón 2022a, 2022b). Based on these results and following studies that show how multimodal input (e.g., audiovisual media exposure) can enhance motion restructuring (Bylund and Athanasopoulos 2015), the didactic sequence was inspired considering metaphorical GIFs and cognitive and communicative parameters. It also drew attention to the source domains that motivate the target motion constructions and to similarities and differences in the metaphorical expression of emotions in the learners’ first and L2 (see sample in Figure 2 and 3). Following Charteris-Black’s (2002) recommendations, the differing source and target domains in English and Spanish were highlighted. Figure 2: Sample of activity in cognitive package using GIFs of human emotions personified in Pixar’s movie Inside Out as visual cues as well as metaphorical emotion expressions in English and Spanish. Figure 3: Sample of activity in cognitive package using GIFs and focusing on source and target domains in Spanish. With regard to data collection and assessment tools, a pretest (Appendix C) and two post-tests (post, delayed) were designed (Appendices D and E, respectively) to be filled in 20 minutes. However, instead of using traditional assessment tasks (e.g., correct vs. incorrect options: grammaticality judgement, fill in the blanks, multiple choice), which has been the norm in previous empirical studies measuring the impact of a cognitive linguistics approach versus a traditional one, our tests were elaborated in coherence with the methodology of the cognitive-based instruction. This cutting-edge idea of transforming the way in which L2 learners are evaluated has been vindicated by Llopis-García (2018, 2019, 2021, 2022) who advocates that novel instruction asks for novel data collection types. The empirical validity of applied cognitive linguistics has been so far explored in two recent investigations. One was conducted by Martín-Gascón et al. (2022), presenting two empirical studies for another complex construction in Spanish, the psych-verb. The authors examined whether a cognitive-based approach to teaching and assessing the complex Spanish psych-verb construction resulted in greater learning outcomes than a traditional one. Results from both a pilot study and a larger-scale replication indicated that after instruction the cognitive group significantly outperformed the traditional in comprehension and production tasks. Similar results were found in another study by Martín-Gascón (2022c), in which the author explored the potential benefits of explicitly teaching metaphor in the L2 classroom targeting metaphoric constructions related to tactile constructions of emotion (e.g., tocar fondo ‘hit rock bottom’). In her study, two pedagogical approaches (cognitive and traditional) were also compared, and cognitive-based assessment tests were used. Findings revealed that the cognitive group was significantly better at interpreting and producing metaphors in general and the target tactile constructions in particular than the traditional group. Inspired by these two investigations, the assessment tests here were meaning-based and focus-on- form for motivated meaning, and they included, emojis, GIFs and excerpts with emotional scenes from both TV shows and Almodóvar’s films, where visual representation helped the understanding of the target form. There were also questions to raise the learners’ metaphoric awareness and reflect upon their experiential knowledge, as well as to draw attention to the similarities with their L1. Each test contained four types of tasks with the same number of instances: on the one hand, Task 1 (metaphor interpretation, 4 items) and Task 2 (original metaphor production, 3 items) were inspired and adapted from Littlemore’s (2001) study in which she assesses metaphoric competence (see Figures 4 and 5, respectively); on the other, Task 3 (12 items) and Task 4 (7 items) (see Figures 6 and 7) examined students’ interpretation and production of the target metaphorical motion construction. Figure 4: Sample in task 1 Figure 5: Sample in task 2 Figure 6: Sample in task 3 Figure 7: Sample in task 4 5.3 Procedure The intervention sessions and tests took place during normal class days for the three participating groups. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, all sessions were delivered online via Zoom and the tests were administered through Wufoo (by SurveyMonkey). Three meetings with each group were scheduled over one week and a half. All groups completed the tests on the same day. On the first day, students were informed in general terms about the study being conducted and guided through the different steps during a five-minute presentation that also served to answer questions. After the presentation, students were required to fill in an informed consent and state whether they agreed to participate or not. Then, they completed the pretest. After three days, the experimental groups were given the instruction session for one hour and immediately after they were asked to complete the posttest (the control group received no instruction on the target form). The following week, all three groups completed the delayed posttest. Participants from the two experimental conditions were told to not revise the constructions between each test. 6 Results: scores, analysis, and discussion The scores obtained by students for each test were equivalent to the number of correct answers (1 point for a correct answer, 0 for an incorrect one). For the statistical analysis, the scores were first submitted to ANOVAS. In line with the non-homogeneity of the variances of the samples assessed, non-parametric tests Mann-Whitney and Wilcoxon signed-rank, along with their extensions (Kruskal-Wallis and Friedman, respectively) were conducted. 6.1 RQ1: Does the learners’ L2 metaphoric competence (interpretation and original production) improve after instruction? Which approach is more effective? RQ1 explored the change in students’ general metaphoric competence over time when being exposed to a cognitive linguistics-inspired approach and a traditional one to teaching figurative motion constructions. More specifically, it examined learners’ general metaphoric interpretation (Task 1) and general metaphoric original production (Task 2) gains across time. To answer this question, results obtained by each group condition (CON, COG and TRAD) in the three time periods (pretest, posttest and delayed) were compared. Table 1 displays the means, median, standard deviations (SD), and confidence intervals (CI) of Task 1 and Task 2 for all three conditions. Table 1. Descriptive statistics (means, median, SD, CI) for Task 1 and 2 for CON, COG and TRAD. Time Group Task 1 Task 2 Mean Median SD 95% CI Mean Median SD 95% CI Pre CON (n = 10) 1.60 2.00 1.26 [0.70, 2.50] 1.40 1.50 1.17 [0.56, 2.24] COG (n = 13) 1.69 3.00 1.65 [0.69, 2.69] 1.23 1.00 0.59 [0.87, 1.59] TRAD (n = 10) 1.10 0.00 1.59 [-0.04, 2.24] 1.40 1.00 0.84 [0.80, 2.00] Post CON (n = 10) 1.30 1.00 1.41 [0.29, 2.31] 0.50 0.50 0.52 [0.12, 0.88] COG (n = 13) 3.08 4.00 1.49 [2.17, 3.98] 2.46 2.00 0.51 [2.15, 2.78] TRAD (n = 10) 1.50 1.00 1.65 [0.32, 2.68] 1.40 1.00 0.84 [0.80, 2.00] Delayed CON (n = 10) 1.60 1.00 1.77 [0.33, 2.87] 1.50 2.00 0.70 [0.99, 2.01] COG (n = 13) 2.62 4.00 1.85 [1.50, 3.73] 2.69 3.00 0.63 [2.31, 3.07] TRAD (n = 10) 1.80 1.50 1.81 [0.50, 3.10] 1.60 2.00 0.96 [0.91, 2.29] Results of the Friedman test indicated that there was no significant difference in test scores across the three test situations (Pre, Post, delayed) for Task 1 and Task 2 in both the CON and TRAD groups. The results of the Friedman test showed that there was significant difference in test scores across the three tests situations (x2(2) = 12.500, p = .002) for Task 1 in the COG group (see Table 2). Table 2. Score differences for each group through time (Task 1 and 2). N Chi-Square df Sig. CON Task 1 10 0.437 2 0.804 Task 2 10 5.353 2 0.069 COG Task 1 13 12.500 2 0.002 Task 2 13 19.077 2 0.000 TRAD Task 1 10 1.625 2 0.444 Task 2 10 1.771 2 0.412 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level As Table 3 shows, Wilcoxon signed-rank tests revealed a statistically significant increase in test scores (Z = -2.565, p = .010), with large effect size (r = .50) for Task 1. The median score increased from pretest (3,00) to posttest (4,00) and remained the same in the delayed posttest. As for Task 2, results indicated that there was significant difference in test scores across the three tests, (x2(2) = 19.077, p = .00) (see Table 2 above). After running Wilcoxon signed-rank tests, a statistically significant increase in test scores was found (Z = -3.025, p = .002), with large effect size (r = .59). Indeed, the median score increased from pretest (1,00) to posttest (2,00), and further increased in the delayed test (3,00). Negative influence of time was not recorded since the scores on delayed tests remained the same time as, and sometimes higher than the scores on the posttests. Table 3. COG group. COG Z Sig. effect size Task 1 posttest_Interpretation - pretest_Interpretation -2.565b 0.010 0.503 delayed_Interpretation - posttest_Interpretation -1.289c 0.197 Task 2 posttest_Production - pretest_Production -3.025b 0.002 0.593 delayed_Production - posttest_Production -1.342b 0.180 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level A Kruskal-Wallis Test was run to examine whether there was a difference in the general metaphoric competence test scores between groups (i.e., based on different approaches implemented). Results showed a statistically significant difference in test scores between CON, TRAD and COG in the posttest for Task 1 and in the posttest and delayed test for Task 2 (Table 4). To determine between which two groups this difference appeared, a Mann-Whitney U was run (see Table 5). Results revealed a significant difference between test scores in the posttest situation (Task 1) between TRAD and COG groups, (Z = -2.383, p = .017). Posttest results were significantly higher in the COG group. Posttest results for Task 2 were also significantly higher in the COG group than in the TRAD group (Z = -2.931, p = .003). A Mann-Whitney U test revealed a significant difference between test scores in the delayed test situation (Task 2) between TRAD and COG groups (Z = -2.995, p = .003). Delayed test results were also significantly higher in the COG group. Results of the previous tests suggest that students in the COG approach group have better chances to obtain higher test scores on Task 1 and Task 2 than students from the TRAD approach group. Table 4. Differences between groups in Tasks 1 and 2. Chi-Square df Sig. pretest_Interpretation 0.808 2 0.668 posttest_Interpretation 8.363 2 0.015 delayed_Interpretation 1.577 2 0.455 pretest_Production 0.224 2 0.894 posttest_Production 19.501 2 0.000 delayed_Production 14.361 2 0.001 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level Table 5. Differences between TRAD and COG. Mann-Whitney U Wilcoxon W Z Sig. (2-tailed) posttest_Interpretation 28.5 83.5 -2.383 0.017 posttest_Production 20.5 75.5 -2.931 0.003 delayed_Interpretation 49.5 104.5 -1.028 0.304 delayed_Production 20.5 75.5 -2.995 0.003 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level 6.1.1 RQ1: Discussion of results The results of the statistical tests revealed that only the COG group improved significantly across time in both tasks, the general metaphor interpretation, and the original metaphor production. If we look at Table 2, this was not the case for the CON and TRAD groups in any of the two tasks. This finding indicates that explicitly teaching metaphor in the L2 classroom clearly yields statistically significant positive learning outcomes over time in the learners’ metaphoric competence, not only in their comprehension, but also in the production of novel metaphorical linguistic expressions. These findings align with previous research exploring metaphoric competence in the L2 classroom (e.g., Boers and Lindstromberg 2008; Charteris-Black’s 2002; Niemeier 2017; Suárez Campos and Hijazo-Gascón 2019). If we look at Table 1, which summarizes the comparisons between groups during each test, we can first observe that all three groups had similar scores on both tasks in the pretests. Furthermore, we can conclude that even though the COG group achieved a slightly lower score than both the CON and TRAD groups in the pretest for Task 2, this result did improve in the posttest and the delayed posttest, whereas the CON performed more poorly on the posttest as compared to the pretest and the TRAD showed no improvement. This latter did improve over time in Task 1, yet the increase in scores was not statistically significant. Both the COG and TRAD groups’ scores were higher at the delayed posttest for task 2. The effect seems to be stronger for the latter as a result of the assessment type (i.e., it was based on cognitive linguistics principles, with which the COG group was already familiar, but the TRAD was not). This could be an effect of the assessment choice instead of an effect of the intervention itself. To better understand our results, it is relevant to bear in mind that the two aspects being measured here are also part of general cognition, as supported by some authors (e.g., early experimental works by Johnson 1991; Evans and Green 2006). The idea that the ability to interpret and produce metaphors involves other cognitive skills could be related to the same tendency or ability in the L2, as suggested by Littlemore (2010: 292). This would partly explain why L2 learners participating in the study showed good results in the pretests and why the CON and TRAD groups, although receiving no explicit metaphor instruction, maintained their relatively high scores. Regarding the effects of type of instruction on the two experimental conditions (COG and TRAD), findings revealed that after the pedagogical intervention, the COG group performed significantly better than the TRAD in the metaphor comprehension task in the posttest, as well as in the production task in both the posttest and delayed posttest. These findings are consistent with the first hypothesis posited, as students performed more effectively in interpreting and producing metaphors after a cognitive teaching session than those who received traditional instruction. 6.2 RQ2: Do the learners’ interpretation and production of the target metaphorical construction improve after instruction? Which approach is more effective? RQ2 examined learners’ interpretation (Task 3) and production (Task 4) of the target metaphorical motion constructions. To assess whether there was an improvement over time in the interpretation and production of the target forms according to each teaching approach, we compared the test scores across the three test situations (pretest, posttest and delayed) for each task (Task 3 and Task 4) in each group (CON, TRAD, and COG). Table 6 shows the means, median, SD and CI of Task 3 and Task 4 for each condition. Results from posttest and delayed in the production task for CON were not taken into consideration, since all test scores were equal to zero. Table 6. Descriptive statistics (means, median, SD, CI) for Task 3 and 4 for CON, COG and TRAD. Time Group Task 3 Task 4 Mean Median SD 95% CI Mean Median SD 95% CI Pre CON (n = 10) 1.90 2.00 1.28 [0.98, 2.82] 0.30 0.00 0.94 [-0.38, 0.98] COG (n = 12) 3.58 3.50 1.56 [2.59, 4.58] 0.33 0.00 0.65 [-0.08, 0,75] TRAD (n = 8) 4.50 4.50 1.51 [3.24, 5.76] 0.13 0.00 0.35 [-0.17, 0.42] Post CON (n = 10) 2.70 2.50 1.70 [1.48, 3.92] 0 COG (n = 12) 10.83 11.00 1.26 [10.03, 11.64] 5.67 6.00 1.61 [4.64, 6.69] TRAD (n = 8) 5.63 5.00 2.72 [3.35, 7.90] 1.50 0.00 2.50 [-0.60, 3.60] Delayed CON (n = 10) 3.80 4.00 2.39 [2.09, 5.51] 0 COG (n = 12) 10.00 11.00 2.48 [8.42, 11.58] 5.33 6.00 1.43 [4.42, 6.25] TRAD (n = 8) 4.50 4.00 2.87 [2.09, 6.91] 2.13 0.00 2.99 [-0.38, 4.63] In line with findings from general metaphoric competence, results of the Friedman test indicated that there was no significant difference in test scores across the three test situations for comprehension and production of the target metaphoric constructions in both the CON and the TRAD groups. As displayed in Table 7, results for the COG group showed a significant difference in test scores across the three test situations (x2(2) = 18.476, p = .000) for Task 3. Results from the Wilcoxon signed-rank tests (see Table 8) revealed a statistically significant increase in test scores (Z = -3.077, p = .002), with large effect size (r = .63). The median score indeed increased from 3,50 in the pretest to 11,00 in the posttest and remained the same in the delayed test. The COG also performed significantly better in Task 4 (x2(2) = 18.957, p = .000). Wilcoxon signed-rank tests were then run and revealed a statistically significant increase in test scores (Z = -3.088, p = .002), with large effect size (r = .63) for original metaphor production. The median score increased from pretest (0,00) to posttest (6,00) and, as in the comprehension task, remained the same in the delayed test. Previous analyses have shown that a cognitive approach has a stronger impact on tests scores than a traditional one. Like in general metaphoric competence, negative influence of time was not recorded for the target motion constructions, since the scores on delayed tests remained the same as the scores on posttests. Table 7. Score differences for each group through time (Task 3 and 4). N Chi-Square df Asymp. Sig. CON Task 3 10 4.514 2 0.105 Task 4 10 2 2 0.368 COG Task 3 12 18.476 2 0.000 Task 4 12 18.957 2 0.000 TRAD Task 3 8 1.742 2 0.419 Task 4 8 5.636 2 0.060 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level Table 8. COG group. COG Z Asymp. Sig. (2-tailed) Effect size Task 3 posttest_Interpretation - pretest_Interpretation -3.077b 0.002 0.628 delayed_Interpretation - posttest_Interpretation -1.807c 0.071 Task 4 posttest_Production - pretest_Production -3.088b 0.002 0.63 delayed_Production - posttest_Production -.893c 0.372 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level To explore whether there was a change in the interpretation and production of the target form test scores between different approaches, Kruskal-Wallis tests were conducted. These latter showed a statistically significant difference in test scores between CON, TRAD and COG in the posttest and delayed test situations in the two tasks (Table 9). To determine which two groups showed this difference, a Mann-Whitney U test was run. Results indicated that there was no significant difference between test scores for Task 3 and Task 4 in the pretest situation between TRAD and COG. A Mann-Whitney U test (see Table 10) revealed significant difference between test scores in the posttest situation (Task 3) between TRAD and COG groups (Z = -3.302, p = .001). Posttest results were significantly higher in the latter. Posttest results for Task 4 were also significantly higher in the COG group than in the TRAD group (Z = -3.150, p = .002). A Mann-Whitney U test showed significant difference between test scores in the delayed test situation (Task 3) between TRAD and COG groups (Z = -3.150, p = .002). Delayed test results were also significantly higher in the COG group. Similarly, delayed test results for Task 4 were significantly higher in the COG group than in the TRAD group (Z = -2.285, p = .022) Results of the previous tests suggest that students in the cognitive approach group have better changes to get higher test scores on Task 3 and Task 4 than students from the traditional approach group. Table 9. Differences between groups in Tasks 3 and 4. Chi-Square df Asymp. Sig. pretest_Interpretation 9.914 2 0.007 posttest_Interpretation 21.949 2 0.000 delayed_Interpretation 16.062 2 0.000 pretest_Production 0.835 2 0.659 posttest_Production 21.919 2 0.000 delayed_Production 18.546 2 0.000 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level Table 10. Differences between TRAD and COG. Mann- Whitney U Wilcoxon W Z Sig. (2-tailed) posttest_Interpretation 6 42 -3.302 0.001 posttest_Production 8.5 44.5 -3.15 0.002 delayed_Interpretation 7.5 43.5 -3.15 0.002 delayed_Production 19 55 -2.285 0.022 *0.017 *Bonferroni corrected alpha level 6.2.1 RQ2: Discussion of results The statistical tests conducted for RQ2 revealed a significant difference over time in both tasks, comprehension and production of the target metaphorical motion constructions, for the COG group, as can be derived from Table 7. The CON and TRAD groups, on the contrary, did not show a statistically significant improvement across time in neither Task 3 nor Task 4. Furthermore, if we look at Table 6, we can observe how students in the TRAD group were better than the COG group at interpreting and producing the metaphorical motion constructions prior to instruction, yet their learning gains after the intervention were not significantly improved. It is relevant to mention that the two experimental conditions acted in a similar fashion for Task 3. In other words, the two groups that received instruction performed better in the comprehension task in the posttest, but their scores fell slightly in the delayed posttest. This can be due to immediate testing effects, as students had just received instruction on the target form. Results for the comprehension task in the CON group revealed an unexpected trend, for this latter showed an improvement in the comprehension of motion constructions across time. This could be explained by the fact that the testing might have heighten learners’ awareness of subsequent items and thus affected their responses to the posttest and delayed posttest. Furthermore, participants from the two experimental conditions were explicitly told to not revise the target constructions between each test, whereas participants in the control condition were not. These two factors might have affected results in the CON group for Task 3. Overall, results were higher in the comprehension task than in the production one, this being in line with results from metaphoric competence in RQ1 and with previous findings (Pawelczyk et al. 2017). The statistical tests comparing results between the groups that received instruction revealed that students in the CMT-based intervention performed significantly better than those in the traditional one in both tasks immediately after instruction and in the delayed test. These findings are in line with the second hypothesis, for they show how applying a cognitive-based pedagogical approach for teaching complex motion constructions results in significantly better learning outcomes than the traditional pervading one based on most L2 Spanish textbooks in the market. 7 Conclusions The results presented in this study indicate that a cognitive linguistics-based pedagogy, when followed by coherent data collection tools, is a productive approach for teaching and learning complex constructions as well as for learners’ metaphoric competence enhancement in the L2. This innovative empirical method for teaching and assessing yields better learning gains for all students, but more so for the cognitive group, which corroborates Llopis-García’s claim (2018, 2019, 2021, 2022) and findings in recent experimental research (Martín Gascón 2022c; Martín- Gascón, Llopis-García and Alonso-Aparicio 2022). Compared to students who received a textbook-based instruction that lay within a communicative and formalist approach to language, students exposed to a cognitive linguistics one, and more specifically, to a CMT-inspired method, not only improved their general metaphor comprehension and production, but they also showed a clearly superior performance in the comprehension and production of the target figurative motion constructions. These findings are in line with Bachman (1990), who already highlighted three decades ago the crucial role of metaphor and figurative thinking on communicative competence. Our findings must be however interpreted in light of the inevitable drawbacks. First, small sample size does not allow the idiosyncratic differences associated with each participant to be “ironed out” (Dörnyei 2007: 27). The absence of statistical significance between groups might have been due to the lack of statistical power. The low number of students and the fact that the COG group had the largest number are indeed limitations to be considered. Second, due to the situation derived from the COVID-19 pandemic, the study had to be redesigned to online teaching and assessing procedures. Further empirical investigations providing a larger database, and in which in-class conditions are implemented could help corroborate our promising findings. Furthermore, future studies contemplating longer intervals between testing periods could shed light on students’ development of metaphoric competence. More research comparing metaphoric competence in the L1 and L2 could also help understand whether there are cognitive and linguistic components at play. So far, research on applied cognitive linguistics has used traditional assessment tasks based on correct vs. incorrect answers (e.g., fill in the blanks, multiple choice, or grammaticality judgment) for all group conditions (CON, COG and TRAD). Yet, while the cognitive instruction introduced new and innovative ways of processing and understanding target forms, the traditional assessment used did not evaluate them at all. The cognitive condition has faced hitherto several limitations. Not only are traditional tests the companions of learners in regular classroom evaluation, but also students are not yet familiarized with learning the L2 from a cognitive approach. This study, along with research conducted by Martín-Gascón et al. (2022) and Martín-Gascón (2022c), is considered a first step towards changing the prevalent assessment design in applied linguistics. Future research should consider implementing an evaluation that matches the type of instruction received. Yet, this is the first study, to our knowledge, which has investigated the effects of a CL-inspired method to teaching and assessing metaphoric competence and figurative motion constructions. Departing from recommendations by the PCIC and the CEFR, which relegate the inclusion of metaphors and change-of-state verbs to higher levels, our study with A2+ learners, in agreement with Low (1985) and Boers’ (2014) claims, attests the importance of teaching metaphor and figurative language at earlier stages. In spite of the need for further research in the domain, our results are encouraging. Furthermore, this work should be added to previous investigation that has examined the positive outcomes of teaching motion events from a) a cognitive linguistics perspective in the L2 Spanish classroom (e.g., Colassaco, 2017), b) investigations linking metaphorical competence to L2 assimilation and retention (Achard and Niemeier 2008; Acquaroni Muñoz and Suárez Campos 2019; Suárez Campos and Hijazo-Gascón 2019, among others) and c) studies examining both metaphorical production and comprehension (Charteris-Black 2002; MacArthur and Littlemore 2011). 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