[Japanling] RFL 34(1) is now online

Mon Apr 25 21:13:22 UTC 2022

The April 2022 issue (Volume 34, Number 1) of the electronic journal *Reading
in a Foreign Language* (RFL) is now online and can be read at:

https://nflrc.hawaii.edu/rfl

This issue of *RFL *will be the last to appear under the co-editorship of
Richard Day, who has decided to step down after 22 years in the role.
Richard’s contribution to scholarship in the field of foreign and second
language learning has been enormous, and is most well-known in relation to
extensive reading. His article with Julian Bamford on the top ten
principles for ER must surely be one of the most-cited articles ever.
However, his interests extend well beyond ER and this journal would not
enjoy the reputation it does today without his discerning eye and guiding
hand.

It is fitting, therefore, that this issue contains a wealth of material of
interest to both researchers and teachers. The seven research articles
address questions of reading in languages other than English, and forms of
reading other than extensive.

In the first article, Yuya Arai takes up the perennial question of
‘pleasure’ in ER. From the perspective of flow theory, he explores the
relationship between perceived book difficulty and pleasure experiences and
suggests flow associates more with reading at *i *+ 1 than *i – *1.

In the second article, Min Gui, Xiaokan Chen, & Xiangli Cheng shift the
focus to reading in academic contexts. They consider the role of
discipline-specific vocabulary in L2 textbook reading by Chinese chemistry
major undergraduates, and demonstrate how important that knowledge is to
successful reading.

Yukino Kimura considers the effect of relevance instructions on EFL
readers’ text processing and memory in the third research article. While
the role of relevance instructions has previously been investigated in L1
reading, this study extends our understanding to reading in a foreign
language, where text factors appear to play a greater part than is the case
in the L1.

Next, Michael Markey investigates the strategy use of Irish students
learning French. How bilingual students, as opposed to monolingual students
learning a foreign or second language, approach reading in a new language
is a relatively new area of investigation and one that is sure to continue
to attract future research.

In the fifth article, Shingo Nahatame considers the role of causal and
semantic relations in second language text processing. This extends his
previous research with a focus on more authentic reading, and provides more
evidence for the importance for comprehension of causal relations in
reading texts.

The sixth article takes us to Spanish-speaking university students in
Argentina, where Soledad Pampillo & Sandra Lauría provide a useful reminder
of the many challenges that language learners face as they reflect on the
role of L2 proficiency, cross linguistic influence and cognates on the
decoding and acquisition of pre-modified noun phrases.

The final research article addresses another enduring challenge, at least
for alphabetic L1 learners of a non-alphabetic language. Qiaona Yu
considers how five different forms of text presentation affects reading
efficiency in Chinese for both language learners and native speakers.

In this issue, the Discussion section contains three contributions. The
first two continue an exchange of views that began in Volume 33, Issue 1, a
year ago. This exchange of views is an excellent illustration of the ways
in which ideas evolve through debate and critical challenge. In the first
of these Tom Cobb demonstrates how Morpholex has developed since it was
first launched, partly in response to the critique of authors such as
Stuart McLean and Tim Stoeckel. They, in turn, respond to Cobb in the
second contribution to this section, and include an impressive manual
re-analysis of three texts that have provided data in this exchange.

The editors would note, however, that, while we expect the exchange of
views has not ended, the discussion in this journal is now closed.

The third contribution in this section, by Tom Robb, returns attention to
extensive reading and another perennial, difficult question: how to
establish ER in schools?

There are two reviews in the Reviews. The first review may help teachers
wanting to establish ER in schools and will find Raed Alzahrani’s review of
L2 reading websites extremely helpful. In the second review, Betsy
Gilliland critiques *Teaching ESL/EFL Reading and Writing*, Second edition
by I.S.P. Nation and John Macalister.

*RFL* is sponsored by the National Foreign Language Resource
Center (NFLRC). There is no subscription fee to readers of the journal.
It is published twice a year, in April and October. Detailed information
about subscription to Reading in a Foreign Language can be found at
https://nflrc.hawaii.edu/rfl/subscribe/.

Aloha,

Lin Chen & Jia Kang

Assistant Editor
Reading in a Foreign Language
http://nflrc.hawaii.edu/rfl

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