3. Formal and Informal Linguistic Environments in Language Acquisition and Language Learning

The question of the optimal linguistic environment for the adult second language student has been approached empirically in the last few years in a number of studies. It is a question of obvious importance to the teacher and language student and has also become a matter of concern to the psycholinguist interested in the nature of primary linguistic data, or linguistic input necessary for language acquisition to occur.

In these studies, two sorts of linguistic environments are contrasted: artificial, or formal environments, found for the most part in the classroom, and natural or informal environments. Krashen and Seliger (1975) have noted that all language teaching systems utilized for the adult use activities in which linguistic rules are presented one at a time and in which some sort of feedback (error correction and/or error detection) is present. Other features of formal instruction (e.g. deductive presentation of rules ) are not common to all teaching methods and, while their presence may sometimes be catalytic, are not necessary for learning to take place. Krashen and Seliger also note that these features (rule isolation and feedback) do not seem to be present in informal environments.

Several studies, which will be considered in some detail below, suggest that adults can not only increase their second language proficiency in informal environments, but may do as well as or better than learners who have spent a comparable amount of time in formal situations. Other studies present evidence that seems to indicate that "exposure" has little or no effect on increasing adult second language proficiency. In the literature review that follows, it will be argued that these studies are not definitive. Even taken as a group, they do not

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