(Big) Language Survey Going On

[LunaMoonsilver]

I don't think I've seen this posted here yet, but Marissa, a language learner particularly active on Instagram, is running a survey to get an idea of the make-up of the language learning community. Insofar as that's possible, of course.

It looks a bit like a mini-census for us!

If you want to take part, you can do it here - it'll take you to a Google Form to fill out the survey and all answers are anonymous. (You can enter your email at the end to receive the results in ~June but they'll also be publicly available on her site.)

Hope someone finds this useful!

[Querneus]

Interesting survey. The title "Identities in Language Learning" is a good summary of it. Its focus is on personal sexual/gender identities and related experiences with language learning apps.

I wish the "I first started learning a language (that WASN'T a native language) because...." question had had a space to write in a reason under "Other". "I was forced to by my parents" (as in my case) and "I was forced to by the education system" are very common reasons around the world, outside the English-speaking world. The emphasis on high school also reflects a more American/Canadian experience with foreign languages... Many of us are forced to learn English when we're little.

An interesting question was the high school popularity one. I'm not sure whether the concept translates well into other cultures either. I can't say I really saw much of the sort myself. At the schools I went to, there were simply a bunch of small groups ("cliques", but not necessarily so tight-knit), and I'd be hard-pressed to point out one that was more "popular", as in "admired and sought by the rest", as the stereotype goes...

[Cavesa]

A nice one, well above the usual standard. Thanks for sharing it here..

I struggle with some of the questions. I understand "The best label to describe me as a LEARNER is *", but I simply don't find any of these fitting. I don't think I am "casual", I am too successful and serious for that. "Hobbyist" implies no professional need, but that is not true either. Multilingual sounds to me too much like bilingual, which are people with two native languages. But I am not a polyglot, nor am I a professional in the sense described in the answers (but I use languages at work). So, why is there no "none of the above" option? Multilingual is the closest, but it still doesn't seem right. Also, there is no option for people, who have learnt "just" one language solidly, unless they accept the terms with negative connotations.

"Now, my current reasons for learning a language are now...." Hmm, I think there are some options missing, such as "out of spite"or "to prove myself I can do it" or "bragging rights". People actually learn for their egos too, and it is not inherently wrong or not worth mentioning, I'd say.

I like the questions about representation in language learning resources and I think it is a subject, that should be explored much more. I find that today's resources partially adhere to the old stereotypes, but also partially create new ones, which seem forced and not authentic at all.

It is in general a very good survey about our identities represented within the community, but I think some big groups are still missing. For example people with a health condition. A person with mobility or sensory issues won't find any representation, and nothing of the typical topics important for their issues (which the "healthy" population should probably know about too).

I agree that the questions about HS popularity and feelings towards languages are extremely good! There are some things that seem to be rather common among us, so it is nice somebody is trying to put some numbers to this. But the questions are still rather "incomplete". Grades are much less important than interest. I didn't have different grades from most, but I had a different level of interest. And I saw it everywhere. The main language learning difference in this age group is not whether they get the grades, but whether they learn outside the classes. And we could follow with questions on whether the people were supported by their families in the external learning efforts, or whether they had examples of language learners as kids and teens. It's not just about native languages spoken at home. But it might be nice to know, whether it is really that common to learn languages, because your family does, or whether it is more common to learn languages in spite of your family doesn't do it.

Perhaps there will be follow up projects after this one, as the author even asks permission to send follow up questions.

[chove]

More to Less are in reverse order from one question to the next, which could lead to misclicking.

[IronMike]

What's her IG name?

[thevagrant88]

Man, I really am a basic white man.

[Querneus]

For example people with a health condition. A person with mobility or sensory issues won't find any representation, and nothing of the typical topics important for their issues (which the "healthy" population should probably know about too).

This jumped at me recently when encountering a Latin learner who was very hard-of-hearing... It's not something I remember much when it comes to language learning.

Another interesting one is age. There's a couple Latin places online that skew older, and I find I can't stand their more austere and formal (and cordial!) ambience. It is true I need a place to be a bit less serious, a little "juvenile"... It's not like they don't welcome me, but it's interesting to find myself not able to stand it. I imagine a lot of those senior or just older middle-aged members must feel the same way when trying to be at more juvenile places... seeing, painfully, young people wasting their life bickering online... Some are young at heart of course, but I think I see a visible trend.

[LunaMoonsilver]

What's her IG name?

@multilingualmarissa - she posts lots of language memes and stuff haha, though also about representation etc. so I wasn't super surprised to see this come from her.

I've sent her the link to this thread too, just so she knows it's been shared here already (esp. as the forum was mentioned on the survey already). It does seem like she'll be looking to work on it again in future - because yeah, there are definitely some groups missing plus what chove added about the options switching (I did mis-click and had to go back and change my answers so good catch to mention it (I also instantly forgot lol)).

An interesting question was the high school popularity one. I'm not sure whether the concept translates well into other cultures either. I can't say I really saw much of the sort myself. At the schools I went to, there were simply a bunch of small groups ("cliques", but not necessarily so tight-knit), and I'd be hard-pressed to point out one that was more "popular", as in "admired and sought by the rest", as the stereotype goes...

I agree that the questions about HS popularity and feelings towards languages are extremely good! There are some things that seem to be rather common among us, so it is nice somebody is trying to put some numbers to this. But the questions are still rather "incomplete". Grades are much less important than interest. I didn't have different grades from most, but I had a different level of interest. And I saw it everywhere.

Yeah, I am interested in seeing how 'popularity' feeds into this because it's so subjective, definitely varies across cultures (very different even for me in the UK compared to my impressions and understanding from friends in the US/Canada) and I think our opinions and understanding of how popular we were in school changes as we age - or it has for me, at least! So, idk, I'm just waiting for the results on that.

But thanks everyone who's taken part - hopefully we'll get an interesting picture of ourselves as a group out of it!

edit: preposition correction

[Lemus]

I would be very curious to see what she finds on the popularity/social kinds of questions.

I have suspected that there are two kinds of major polyglots in the world. Some who are more extroverted then normal who love talking to people and pick up their languages primarily through tutors, conversations, and other person-to-person methods. Others are more introverted than normal and prefer grammar books, programs, etc.

Venturing further, I would also suspect that this forum represents the latter a little better.

All baseless speculation on my part though and I would love to see what real data comes out of this!

[lysi]

They just released the first insights based on the survey. It had a total of 2600 participants.

https://relearnalanguage.com/who-are-language-learners/