Second language acquisition of grammatical rules

Bilingualism: Language and Second language acquisition of grammatical
Cognition
rules: The effects of learning condition, rule
cambridge.org/bil difficulty, and executive function
Marta Rivera , Daniela Paolieri , Antonio Iniesta , Ana I Pérez
Research Article and Teresa Bajo
The current research was completed thanks to Mind, Brain, and Behavior Research Center (CIMCYC), Department of Experimental Psychology, University of
financial aid provided by the Sistema Nacional Granada, Granada, Spain.
de Garantía Juvenil y del Programa Operativo
de Empleo Juvenil de la Junta de Andalucía to
Marta Rivera and grants from the Ministerio de
Abstract
Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades-Fondos Learning a new language is an important goal that many individuals find difficult to achieve,
Feder to Dr. Teresa Bajo (PGC2018-093786-B- particularly during adulthood. Several factors have related this variability to different extrinsic
I00) and Dr. Daniela Paolieri (A-SEJ-416-UGR20
and PID2019-111359GB-I00/AEI/10.13039/
(learning condition, difficulty of the materials) and intrinsic (cognitive abilities) factors, but
501100011033), A-CTS-111-UGR18- the interaction between them is barely known. In two experiments, participants learned
Feder.Andalucía, P20.00107 Agencia de English grammar rules in intentional (Experiment 1) or explicit (Experiment 2), and inciden-
Desarrollo e Innovación de Andalucía to Dr. tal learning-contexts. Overall, results of this study indicated that intentional-explicit condi-
Teresa Bajo and MSCA-COFUND Athenea3i-
tions benefitted rule-learning, as compared to incidental conditions. This benefit was
2018 grant to Dr. Ana I. Pérez (754446).
mainly present when participants were learning an easy-rule; explicit and incidental learning
Cite this article: Rivera M, Paolieri D, Iniesta A, did not differ in the case of participants learning a difficult rule (Experiment 2). Moreover,
Pérez AI, Bajo T (2023). Second language individual differences in executive functioning predicted successful learning in interaction
acquisition of grammatical rules: The effects of with difficulty. When learning an easy-rule, proactive control facilitated intentional learning.
learning condition, rule difficulty, and
executive function. Bilingualism: Language and In contrast, when participants were learning a complex-rule, incidental learning was enhanced
Cognition 26, 639–652. https://doi.org/10.1017/ by lower involvement of proactive control.
S1366728922000815
Received: 26 January 2022

Revised: 14 October 2022 Introduction
Accepted: 4 November 2022
First published online: 18 January 2023 Learning a second language (L2) is a great challenge and an important accomplishment, par-
ticularly when the L2 is mastered during adulthood. There are large individual variations in
Keywords: learning pace. Some learners easily achieve high proficiency, while others struggle to achieve
second language learning; individual
differences; context of learning; proactive
minimum proficiency. During the previous few decades, research has related this variability
control; rule difficulty; executive functions to several factors that are either extrinsically or intrinsically related to the learner. For example,
the condition of learning (Bell, 2017; Hulstijn, 2005; Lichtman, 2020) or the relative difficulty
Address for correspondence: Marta Rivera, of the material (DeKeyser, 2005; Ullman, 2016) are extrinsic variables affecting learning,
Mind, Brain and Behavior Research Center
(CIMCYC), Profesor Clavera s/n, 18011
whereas individual differences in cognitive abilities (Luque & Morgan-Short, 2021) such as
(Granada, Spain). Email: martarivz@ugr.es working memory (Atkins & Baddeley, 1998; Faretta-Stutenberg & Morgan-Short, 2018;
Miyake & Friedman, 1998), metalinguistic abilities (Brooks & Kempe, 2013), or variation in
declarative or procedural learning/memory (Morgan-Short, Faretta-Stutenberg, Brill-Schuetz,
Carpenter & Wong, 2014), are factors intrinsically related to the learners that also contribute
to learning success. However, the complex interaction between learning conditions and indi-
vidual differences during L2 learning is still an open question. Accordingly, the main goal of
this study is to investigate this interaction.
Second language learning context

During childhood – particularly for a child living within a bilingual context – the first and
second languages are acquired by simple exposure without awareness of the learning process.
When language is acquired by simple exposure, it becomes possible for individuals to detect
grammatical errors; they may not, however, be able to explain which rule is being violated
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by (Williams, 2009). In contrast, the process of L2 acquisition during adulthood is generally
Cambridge University Press. This is an Open more complex; language can either be unconsciously ACQUIRED or consciously LEARNED
Access article, distributed under the terms of
(DeKeyser, 1995). Language ACQUISITION in adults may sometimes resemble the implicit child-
the Creative Commons Attribution licence
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), hood learning process where learners do not need conscious awareness of language regularities
which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution in order to acquire them. Other times, it may involve explicit intention to learn and to be
and reproduction, provided the original article instructed through the language rules, consciously developing metalinguistic knowledge as a
is properly cited. result. Both types of learning have been investigated in the context of vocabulary (Bisson,
van Heuven, Conklin & Tunney, 2013, 2014, 2015) and grammar learning (Bell, 2017; Ellis,
1993). Overall, it has been found that when participants have intention to learn, performance
is far better than when they are not conscious of the learning process (DeKeyser, 2005;
Robinson, 1996; Tagarelli, Ruiz, Vega & Rebuschat, 2016; see Goo, Granena, Yilmaz &
https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728922000815 Published online by Cambridge University Press

640 Marta Rivera et al.
Novella, 2015; Norris & Ortega, 2000; Spada & Tomita, 2010, for these studies have focused on procedural and declarative memory
meta-analyses; see DeKeyser, 2008; Hulstijn, 2005; Williams, skills during L2 learning (Fu & Li, 2021; Morgan-Short et al.,
2009, for reviews), despite the fact that some learning does indeed 2014; see Kidd, Donnelly & Christiansen, 2018, for a review).
occur under unintentional conditions. For example, in a study by For instance, Morgan-Short and colleagues (2014) found that bet-
Robinson (1997), participants learned a grammatical rule under ter declarative memory skills were related to better learning as
four different learning conditions. In the first condition, and assessed by immediate tests, whereas better procedural memory
before training, participants received instructions to learn skills were related to better learning as assessed by delayed tests
together with metalinguistic information about the specific rule (see Hamrick, 2015 for similar pattern under incidental condi-
to be learned (explicit condition). In contrast, participants were tions). Hence, it is apparent that different cognitive profiles can
not informed about the rule in the other three conditions. be related to learning, and that different learning conditions
Thus, in the second condition, participants were told that all may potentially be useful depending on the learner’s cognitive
the training sentences followed a specific rule and that they should abilities (see Rebuschat, 2015; Goo et al., 2015, for metanalysis
try to find and learn the rule while answering questions about the on the field; Dörnyei, 2005; Norris & Ortega, 2000, for a review).
meaning of the sentences (intentional condition; no metalinguis-
tic information). In the third condition, participants were told
Role of individual differences
that their task was just to answer questions about the meaning
of the sentences (incidental condition); whereas in the fourth con- A wide range of individual differences has been related to lan-
dition, participants were asked to answer questions about the guage learning success, and these differences include aptitude
form of the sentences (implicit condition). In all conditions, par- (Carroll, 1990; Doughty, 2019), emotion (Miller & Godfroid,
ticipants completed a Grammatical Judgement Test (GJT) after 2019), motivation (Dörnyei, 2005), thinking styles (Xie, Gao &
training, and this included previously studied sentences, new King, 2013), general intelligence (Kempe, Brooks & Kharkhurin,
grammatical sentences, and new ungrammatical sentences. The 2010), working memory (Faretta-Stutenberg & Morgan-Short,
results showed that – in comparison with the rest of the groups – 2018; Tagarelli, Borges-Mota & Rebuschat, 2015; Villegas &
the explicit condition group was more accurate in judging the Morgan-Short, 2019) and declarative/procedural learning/mem-
grammaticality of the sentences. Additionally, the incidental ory ability (Fu & Li, 2021; Morgan-Short et al., 2014; see Kidd
group judged fewer ungrammatical sentences as grammatical et al., 2018, for a review).
(showed fewer false alarms (FA) to new ungrammatical sentences) Although executive functioning (EF) has been in the spotlight
than participants in the implicit condition, although they did not of bilingualism/multilingualism research (Antón, Carreiras &
differ from the incidental condition. This suggested that when Duñabeitia, 2019; Jylkkä, Laine & Lehtonen, 2021), it has only
processing is directed to find the regularities and/or understand begun to be empirically explored as providing factors modulating
the meaning, rule-learning also occurs under incidental condi- L2 learning during adulthood (Kapa & Colombo, 2014). EFs refer
tions. Rule-learning in intentional and incidental conditions has to a domain-general set of cognitive and brain mechanisms
been found with different paradigms (Guillemin & Tillmann, related to the prefrontal cortex (PFC); these mechanisms are trig-
2020; Morgan-Short, Sanz, Steinhauer & Ullman, 2010; gered to control cognition and action with the purpose of attain-
Williams & Kuribara, 2008). It is important to note in this context ing a specific goal (Miyake & Friedman, 2012). While cognitive
that the terms intentional/explicit and incidental/implicit learning control has traditionally been related to better performance in
can be theoretically charged and that they may convey different many cognitive domains at the adult age – including memory,
meanings depending on the theoretical approach. For example, attention, and L1/L2 processing (Cragg & Nation, 2010;
incidental-implicit and intentional-explicit types of learning Dörnyei, 2005), the relationship between language learning and
have been related to the procedural and declarative memory sys- EFs is more controversial.
tems respectively (declarative/procedural model; Ullman, 2001, Very few studies indicate a positive relationship between lan-
2004), indicating that the type of acquired knowledge differs in guage learning and cognitive control (Darcy, Mora & Daidone,
nature. However, in the present paper, we used the terms inten- 2016; Kapa & Colombo, 2014). In fact, other studies have not
tional, explicit, and incidental to label our different learning con- found such a relationship (Linck & Weiss, 2015). Furthermore, it
ditions by using Robinson’s (1997) terminology. One goal of our has also been suggested that high levels of executive control may
experiments was to assess how differences in the learning condi- bring about some of the difficulties in L2 acquisition during
tions can shape learning success. Thus, intentional in our experi- adulthood (Chrysikou, Hamilton, Coslett, Datta, Bikson &
ments refers to the condition where participants are instructed to Thompson-Schill, 2013; Smalle, Panouilleres, Szmalec & Möttönen,
learn a rule, although they are not told about the rule (Experiment 1); 2017). Hence, it is possible that, under some conditions, reduced
explicit refers to the condition where participants received explicit cognitive control may facilitate language learning by giving the
information about the specific rule/rules that they should learn learner the possibility of spontaneously and implicitly acquiring
(Experiment 2); incidental refers to the condition where partici- recurring patterns from the environment (Thompson-Schill,
pants are asked to pay attention to the meaning, and they do Ramscar & Chrysikou, 2009). This idea is based on the observation
not receive information about the presence or the type of rule of the ease of language learning in children (Newport, 1990), but it is
(Experiment 1 and 2). Hence, across Experiments 1 and 2, we also based on specific empirical findings from transcranial mag-
compare intentional (Experiment 1) or explicit (Experiment 2) netic stimulation (TMS; Smalle et al., 2017) and transcranial direct
to incidental learning conditions (Experiment 1 and 2). In add- current stimulation (tDCS; Friederici, Mueller, Sehm & Ragert,
ition, we aimed to investigate if the effectiveness of the learning 2013) in adults. The modulating role of EFs in language learning
conditions was modulated by individual differences in cognitive has been explored in the context of artificial language learning.
skills. For example, Kapa and Colombo (2014) asked participants to
Interestingly, a number of studies point to the relevance of intentionally learn a grammatical rule through animated videos
individual differences in cognitive abilities, although most of and sentences. Participants were then asked to produce similar

Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 641
sentences in different videos. The EFs profile of the participants was Thus, the goal of Experiment 1 was to examine the process of learn-
assessed by using a set of classical inhibitory (Fan, McCandliss, ing a grammar rule under intentional and incidental conditions, as
Sommer, Raz & Posner, 2002), updating (Heaton & PAR staff, well as to explore the role of individual differences in successful
2003), and switching tasks (Monsell, 2003). Results indicated that learning. In Experiment 2, the goal was to test the role of difficulty
better inhibitory control was associated with better learning in in the interaction between condition of learning and individual
adults. In a second experiment, using the same procedure with differences. Finally, to rule out possible explanations based on pre-
pre-scholar children, switching abilities predicted L2 learning vious knowledge of English, we conducted Experiment 3 with an
(Kapa & Colombo, 2014). Children who were able to switch their untrained control group to provide an untrained baseline condition
attention between different stimuli were better at language learning to which to compare actual learning from training.
than children with lower switching abilities. The authors concluded
that inhibition and the capacity of switching played a role in L2
Experiment 1
learning, depending on the developmental characteristics of the
group (Kapa & Colombo, 2014). However, the majority of the The aim of the present experiment was to examine the influence
studies on the role of individual differences in EFs have focused of individual differences in EFs. To do so, Experiment 1 entailed
on intentional or explicit learning (Faretta-Stutenberg & presenting participants with the dative rule used by Robinson
Morgan-Short, 2018; Villegas & Morgan-Short, 2019; Wang, (1997). To test the learning success, participants were asked to
Schweizer & Ren, 2019), and there are fewer studies on the role of perform an untimed GJT with sentences previously shown during
executive control on incidental learning (Ruiz, Tagarelli & the learning phase as well as with new sentences (grammatical
Rebuschat, 2018). Hence, we aim to explore the relationship and ungrammatical). This task has been found to be a valid
between executive control and L2 learning in incidental and tool to measure learning outcomes (Ellis, 2005; Godfroid et al.,
intentional-explicit learning conditions. Importantly enough, the 2015; Gutierrez, 2013).
relative difficulty of the materials to be learned has also been The test was performed immediately after the learning phase,
found to be a modulatory factor in the relation between learning as well as both 24-hours and 1-week after the learning phase. A
context and individual differences in cognitive abilities. rule-learning d’ index was calculated, representing the ability to
discriminate between new-grammatical and new-ungrammatical
sentences (Tagarelli et al., 2016). This index reflects the extent
The role of rule difficulty
to which participants generalized the rule, so that – when presented
The difficulty is understood as both the property of the linguistic with a new grammatical sentence – they were able to detect the
feature intended to be learned (easy/difficult grammatical rule) rule and discriminate between grammatical and ungrammatical
and as the potential requirement to use cognitive resources to sentences that were never presented. Hence, this was the critical
learn and process this feature (Housen & Simoens, 2016). In parameter in our experiments, as it indicated rule generalization
this sense, Tagarelli et al. (2016) measured the interaction between beyond the specific examples presented during the study. Overall,
rule difficulty and individual differences in EFs within different in line with previous research (e.g., Spada & Tomita, 2010), it
learning contexts. They manipulated the difficulty of the learning was expected that individuals in the intentional condition would
materials by introducing three different rules varying in difficulty. have better learning performance as indexed by the rule-learning
A semi-artificial language (English lexicon on a German syntax) d’ than people in the incidental condition. Two additional testing
was used to create easy sentences and make them vary in difficulty periods were included, since some theoretical accounts (Ullman,
by adding complements to the easy structure (easy, difficult 1, and 2004, 2006) assume that rule-learning under incidental conditions
difficult 2 structure). Participants in the incidental context were may potentially last longer in comparison to learning under inten-
asked to read the sentences and try to understand their meaning, tional conditions, where part of the declarative information may
whereas participants in the explicit context (instructed by the decline with time (Morgan-Short et al., 2014). It was expected
authors) were explicitly informed about the rule system (metalin- that this rule-learning index would remain stable over the three
guistic information). After training, all participants completed a testing intervals (immediate, 24-hours, and one week) for the inci-
GJT where they had to judge the grammaticality of the presented dental condition, but that some decline would occur with time
sentences according to the rule system. In addition to this, they under intentional conditions.
measured individual differences in Working Memory (WM; read- To explore the role of individual differences, participants were
ing span task; Daneman & Carpenter, 1980) and procedural asked to perform the AX-CPT task (Braver & Barch, 2002) to dis-
learning abilities (alternating serial reaction time task; Howard play individual differences in proactive/reactive control (BSI
& Howard, 1997). Results indicated that performance in the index; Braver, 2012; see Cooper, Gonthier, Barch & Braver,
GJT task was predicted by the type of learning exposure (inciden- 2017 for a psychometric study on the task). Proactive control
tal/ explicit) for the easier sentences. Thus, for easy sentences, can be understood as anticipatory selection and maintenance of
participants in the explicit context showed better performance goal-relevant information; this operates in a top-down manner,
in the GJT task than participants in the incidental context. which minimizes interference before a potentially distracting
However, for the more difficult sentences, the type of exposure event occurs (Braver, 2012). On the contrary, reactive control
was not predictive of GJT performance, and procedural learning can be understood as a late correction mechanism operating in
skills predicted performance independently of the type of expos- a bottom-up manner; this transiently recalls goal information
ure (see Gao & Ma, 2021 for similar results). Therefore, because whenever a task-relevant or interferential stimulus occurs.
difficulty may have a role in modulating individual differences Proactive control has the advantage of an ahead-of-time adaptable
in learning success, we also varied the difficulty of the materials behavior that is in line with the context to achieve the goal; its dis-
across experiments. advantage, however, is that it is very demanding of Working
In sum, the aim of the present study was to examine the influ- Memory (Unsworth, Redick, Heitz, Broadway & Engle, 2009).
ence of individual differences in EF in different contexts of learning. Proactive control seems to be especially relevant in intentional

learning contexts where attention to the relevant task features is the same rule (although they were not informed of the rule).
critical. However, its role in incidental learning contexts is not evi- Then, participants were asked to perform a GJT. Thirty sentences
dent. Hence, it was expected that proactive control would be were randomly presented one at a time, and participants were
linked with successful learning in the intentional context, whereas asked to respond with yes or no as to whether the sentences
its role in the incidental context may be reduced. were grammatically correct. The sentences remained on the screen
until the participant responded. For the GJT, 10 sentences had
been previously studied during the training phase (grammatical
Method
sentences), 10 were new sentences that followed the learned rule
Participants (new-grammatical sentences), and 10 were new sentences that
did not follow the rule (new-ungrammatical sentences).
A total of 78 Spanish native-speakers from Granada (Spain)
participated in the present study (range of 18–30 years of age;
AX-CPT task
M = 22.84; SD = 3.39). All participants had formal education
This task was used to measure proactive/reactive control strategies
(M = 18.3; SD = 4.79) including English learning (information
(Locke & Braver, 2008). In this version of the task (Ophir, Nass &
extracted from the LEAP-Q questionnaire (Marian, Blumenfeld
Wagner, 2009) a set of five letters was shown in the middle of the
& Kaushanskaya, 2007), but their English proficiency was very
screen following a specific presentation order, the first and last let-
basic (participation requirement: proficiency level lower than or
ters were printed in red, and the three middle letters were printed
equal to B1 level in the European Language Framework; self-rated
in white. There were four different conditions: a) AX-pattern,
language skill: M = 4.3; SD = 1.37, on a scale from 1 to 7).
where the first red letter presented was an ‘A’ and the last red let-
Participants were randomly distributed into two groups regarding
ter presented was an ‘X’; b) AY-pattern, where the first red letter
the condition of learning: an INTENTIONAL CONDITION (n = 39) and
presented was an ‘A’ but the last red letter presented was not an
an INCIDENTAL CONDITION (n = 39); there were no differences in age,
‘X’; c) BX-pattern, where the first red letter presented was not an
years of formal education, and self-rated language skills between
‘A’ but the last red letter presented was an ‘X’; d) BY-pattern,
groups. T-test comparisons showed no differences between con-
when the first letter was not an ‘A’, and the last letter was not
text groups on WM measured (Dot Counting task, Wechsler,
an ‘X’. The proportion of the patterns was as follows: 70% for
1997) nor on intelligence, measured with the Raven’s matrices
the AX and 10% for each of the other patterns (AY, BX, or BY)
task (Raven, 1989) (all ts (77) < 1; ps > .05). Participants were
from a total of 100 trials. Participants were instructed to press
rewarded with 15€ for their participation.
the ‘yes’ button when the first red letter presented was an ‘A’
(cue) and the last red letter presented was an ‘X’ (probe;
Materials AX-pattern). They were to press the ‘no’ button in any other situ-
ation (AY, BX, or BY patterns). They also were to press the ‘no’
Experimental tasks: learning and grammaticality judgment
button during the middle letters (printed in white). Participants
test
had to answer as accurately as they could and as soon as possible.
Grammatical rules and learning materials They did one practice block (10 trials) which included trials repre-
A total of 55 sentences following a simplification of the Dative senting the four experimental conditions; during this practice
rule were presented during this phase (a rule usually unknown block, participants were given feedback. Once they completed
by English learners; see Robinson, 1997). In accordance with the practice trials, they began the experimental block (100 trials)
this rule, monosyllabic verbs (with one syllable in the stem, e.g., with trials randomized for each participant. The letters were pre-
give) could take the ‘to-object’ construction or the dative alterna- sented for 300 ms in the center of the screen. Between the presen-
tion (Marta gives her keys to Antonio/Marta gives Antonio her tation of the cue and the probe (printed in red), there was
keys) – however, disyllabic verbs (with two syllables, e.g., provide) 4900 ms where the three distractor-letters (printed in white)
can only occur with ‘to-object’ constructions (Marta provides food were presented for 300 ms with 1000 ms of interval time between
to Antonio). Following Robinson (1997) for this experiment, 3 them. There was a delay of 1000 ms between trials.
sentences were included containing monosyllabic verbs in
‘to-object’ construction (Marta gives her keys to Antonio); 3 sen-
Procedure
tences containing disyllabic verbs in ‘to-object’ construction
(Marta donated her house to Antonio); and 4 sentences containing The experiment was divided into 3 sessions. The first session
monosyllabic verbs in dative alternation (Marta gives Antonio her started with the syntactic learning task. Participants in the inci-
keys). Each sentence was presented from 1 to 10 times (see supple- dental context group were asked to read some sentences in
mentary materials for the experimental materials)1. Different from English and answer simple yes/no comprehension questions
Robinson (1997), during the training phase, the sentences had a red about each of them. Participants in the intentional context
box highlighting the verb (formed for one or two syllables in the group were explicitly asked to pay attention to the rule while read-
stem) and the ‘to’ of the ‘to-object’ formation. For both the inten- ing the same set of sentences and to answer the same yes/no com-
tional and incidental contexts, participants were told to read each prehension questions about it. For both incidental and intentional
sentence and then answer a comprehension question about it. In contexts, the sentence appeared and remained on the screen for 5
the intentional context, participants were additionally told that all seconds after a fixation point (300 ms). Then, the comprehension
sentences followed the same grammatical rule and that they needed question appeared and remained on the screen until the partici-
to learn it by paying attention during sentence presentation. pant responded. Sentences were presented randomly. After the
learning task, participants were told that all sentences were gram-
Grammaticality judgment test (GJT) matically correct, and asked to perform an immediate GJT,
Following training, all participants were told that all the studied including grammatically correct and incorrect sentences. Each
sentences were grammatically correct and that they all followed sentence appeared on the screen until the participant made a

response. The second session was 24 hours after participants per- Table 1. Mean rates (SD) for d’ scores. T-test reports for rule-learning d’ and
formed the task, and they were told to complete a second GJT. episodic-recognition d’ on immediate and 24-hour GJT tests.
The third session was one week after the second, and participants d’ score Incidental (n = 37) Intentional (n = 36)
were again asked to perform the GJT. During the three GJTs, the
same sentences were presented. Unfortunately, a number of par- Rule Learning
ticipants (n = 8) did not return to the laboratory for the third ses- Immediate .79 (.11) 1.59 (.11)
sion, and it was not possible to replace them due to the COVID
pandemic. In order to maintain a bigger sample to maximize t-test t(36) = 12.04, p < .001, t(35) = 7.62, p < .001,
95% CI [.33, .46] 95% CI [.21, .37]
the effect size, and because a preliminary analysis including the
three GJT times indicated that the one-week test did not change 24-hours .69 (.11) 1.09 (.11)
our conclusions, data from the last GJT were not included in t-test t(36) = 7.75, p < .001, t(35) = 6.56, p < .001,
the analyses. During the sessions, participants did also the 95% CI [.25, .42] 95% CI [.16, .32]
AX-CPT and the global-local task. Results from the global-local
task are not reported in this paper since they were collected
with a different aim, and they are the subject of another
investigation. p = .25, μ = .02, nor the interaction between condition and time,
F (1, 73) = .04, p = .84, μ = .0005, were significant (see Figure 1).
The role of EFs during learning was also explored in a Multiple
Data analysis
Linear Regression analysis for the Rule-learning d’ Index for
Grammaticality Judgement Task incidental and intentional conditions, respectively. BSI was
Performance was calculated through discrimination d’ scores added as fixed factor (continuous variable). These analyses in-
(Macmillan & Creelman, 2004). Participants with a FA rate dicated no significant main effects of BSI, for the incidental con-
above 89% (2DT above the mean) – a sign of poor performance – dition, F (1, 72) = .0001, p = .99, adjusted R2 = −.01 (see Figure 2).
at the immediate test were removed from the analysis (6.4%). However, for the intentional condition, BSI was a significant
The extent to which participants generalized the rule to new sen- predictor of language learning, F (1, 70) = 4.366, p = .04, adjusted
tences was assessed by calculating d’ for hits on new-grammatical R2 = .04; β = 1.58, t = 2.09, p = .04. More precisely, participants
sentences ( judging grammatical sentences as grammatical) – FA had better discrimination (d’ = 1.46) if they showed higher BSI
on new-ungrammatical sentences ( judging ungrammatical sen- scores (more proactive).
tences as grammatical) (Rule-learning d’), indicating more
abstract representation of the rule. Differences from chance
were calculated using one-sample t-test between hits and FA
Discussion
(Table 2).
Rule-learning was significantly better for participants in the
AX-CPT task intentional condition, both immediately and after 24-hours.
For EFs tasks, the data below 100ms and 2’5 SD over each partici- These results are in line with previous results indicating better
pant mean were filtered (Zirnstein, van Hell & Kroll, 2018), clean- performance in intentional learning contexts rather than in inci-
ing 3.6% of the data. In addition, 5.1% of the participants did not dental contexts (Hulstijn, 2005). Additionally, no differences were
complete the task. Missing scores in the AX-CPT were substituted found between time of tests, nor was an interaction found
by the mean of the group in order to maximize the number of between condition and time. This suggested that the initial inten-
observations per condition. Note, however, that we also per- tional advantage remains for at least 24 hours. Hence, in contrast
formed these analyses without missing-value substitution, and to prior predictions of lower GJT performance after a delay, the
they revealed the same pattern (we report them as supplementary information extracted from intentionally studying the exemplar
material). was still available after 24 hours.
The BEHAVIORAL SHIFT INDEX (BSI) was calculated as a combin- More importantly, individual differences predicted partici-
ation of AY and BX trials (between errors and Response Time, pants’ performance only in the intentional group: positive BSI
RT; Braver, Paxton, Locke & Barch, 2009). The BSI index goes (towards proactivity) was related to higher Rule-learning d’ scores.
from −1+1, where scores near 0 show a balance between proactive This pattern is consistent with results reported by Kapa and
and reactive control (1 more proactive/−1 less proactive). Colombo (2014), where strong cognitive control predicted better
performance during intentional learning. According to prior pre-
dictions, individual differences may also modulate success for the
Results
incidental learning process, although they might do so in different
For the rule-learning d’ scores, results indicate that participants ways (it is possible that lower control might be preferred for inci-
discriminated between grammatical (new/studied) and ungram- dental learning; Kaufman, DeYoung, Gray, Jiménez, Brown &
matical sentences beyond chance (see means and t-tests in Mackintosh, 2010; Morgan-Short et al., 2014). However, no
Table 1). type of relation between the EFs and incidental learning was
As mentioned, the aim was to assess the effects of learning found.
condition and time of testing on rule-learning. Results of the Since incidental learning has been found to be useful for
ANOVA indicated that the main effect of condition was signifi- acquiring difficult structures and patterns (Ullman, 2001), one
cant, F (1, 73) = 8.08, p < .001, μ = .10 Participants on the inten- possible variable that may have influenced the results is the rela-
tional condition were significantly better (M = 1.13; SD = .09) tive difficulty of the learning materials. It is possible that individ-
than those on the incidental condition (M = 0.75; SD = .09). ual differences in EF may play a larger role when learning more
However, neither the main effect of time, F (1, 73) = 1.29, difficult rules as it was found by Tagarelli et al. (2016). Hence,

Table 2. Mean rates (SD) for d’ scores for dative and pseudoclefts rules. T-test reports for Rule-learning d’ and Episodic-recognition d’ on immediate, 24-hour and
1-week GJT tests.
Incidental condition Explicit condition

d’ score
Rule
Learning Dative Pseudoclefts Dative Pseudoclefts
Immediate 1.07 (.72) .74 (.71) 2.13 (1.13) .45 (.98)

t-test t (38) = 5.89, p < .001, t (63) = 8.42, p < .001, t (63) = 14.5, p < .001, t (38) = 3.19, p < .001,
95% CI [.19, .39] 95% CI [.20, .32] 95% CI [.56, .74] 95% CI [.06, .26]
24-hours 2.21 (1.05) 1 (.88) .89 (.7) .94 (.73)
t-test t (38) = 6.94, p < .001, t (63) = 7.19, p < .001, t (63) = 15.05, p < .001, t (38) = 9.53, p < .001,
95% CI [.19, .35] 95% CI [.27, .40] 95% CI [.58, .75] 95% CI [.26, .40]
One week .95 (.72) .89(.87) 2.16 (1.11) .7 (1.01)
t-test t (38) = 9.23, p < .001, t (63) = 8.43, p < .001, t (63) = 14.5, p < .001, t (38) = 3.19, p < .001,
95% CI [.24, .38] 95% CI [.20, .39] 95% CI [.52, .73] 95% CI [.06, .26]
what Robinson (1997) termed “explicit condition”. Finally, we

again included three testing sessions (immediate, 24-hours,
1-week) with the hope that online participation would make it
easier for participants to engage in the experiment for the third
time, and we were able to assess learning under longer-delayed
conditions.
Method
Participants
Due to restrictions as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, all
tasks were programmed, and the experiment was run using
Gorilla.sc, an online platform for behavioral experiments
(Anwyl-Irvine, Massonnié, Flitton, Kirkham & Evershed, 2020).
Fig. 1. Rule learning d’ as a function of time (immediate and hours) x condition To ensure that the experiment was not underpowered – as
(INC-incidental and INT-intentional). some of the effects were close to significance in Experiment 1 –
the expected power of fixed-effects a priori was calculated in
difficulty was manipulated in Experiment 2 to test the role of this Experiment 2 by using the simr package in R (Brysbaert &
variable in the interaction between condition of learning and indi- Stevens, 2018). The effect-size was planned on a pilot study
vidual differences. with 12 participants, and the minimum requirement was esti-
mated through powerCurve function (alpha = 0.4). With 1,000
simulations, the simulation showed a sample size of 80 to achieve
Experiment 2 80% statistical power. A total of 146 native Spanish speakers par-
ticipated in the experiment – however, 11% of them (n = 17) did
The goal of this experiment was to capture the possible interaction not perform the AX-CPT task due to a programming error. These
between learning condition, difficulty of the materials, and indi- participants were subsequently removed from the experiment.
vidual differences. The difficulty of the rule-learning task was A total of 129 participants (age range 18–30 years; M = 24.32;
increased in Experiment 2 relative to Experiment 1 by including SD = 8.55) completed the experiment. They all had formal educa-
an additional rule. Thus, in Experiment 2, participants were pre- tion ( years: M = 18.05; SD = 3.8), and English learning during
sented with two rules (two blocks of trials). We decided on this school, but their English level was lower than B1 (self-rated
type of presentation and number of rules based on the results Language skill: M = 3.9; SD = 1.31; information extracted from
of a previous pilot study where we added three different rules the LEAP-Q). Participants were rewarded with 0.3 credits as stu-
that were randomly presented during the learning phase in an dents at the University of Granada, or with a raffle ticket for a 50€
intentional or incidental learning condition. Results from the card from an online shopping website.
pilot study indicated that intermixing the three rules was very dif-
ficult for the participants who showed a low level of performance
and no significant effects, in any condition2. For this reason, we Materials
reduced the number of rules to two and we blocked their presen-
Experimental tasks: learning and grammaticality judgment
tations (see Robinson, 1996, 1997). Additionally, in Experiment 2,
test
we added metalinguistic explanations of the rules, instead of the
simple intentional condition in Experiment 1 (providing infor- Grammatical rules, learning materials, and procedures
mation about the presence of the rule, but not about the rule Participants were exposed to two different rules: the dative rule (as
itself). Hence, in this experiment participants were exposed to in Experiment 1) and the pseudoclefts OF LOCATION rule. The

Fig. 2. Rule-learning d-prime scores associated with BSI for incidental (INC) and intentional (INT) conditions. Highlighted areas represent Standard Error.
correct structure of a pseudocleft rule is as follows: where – subject AX-CPT task

– to be [correct conjugation] – subject – adverbials of location; the The same task was used as described in Experiment 1.
verb must agree with the subject (i.e., Where Alba and Tania live
is in Granada). Additionally, a second location can be contrasted
within the same sentence by joining the two locations with a not Procedure
particle (i.e., Where Alba and Tania live is in Granada not in The condition of learning (incidental/explicit) was manipulated
Krakow). A total of 60 sentences that followed four versions of within-subjects. Thus, during the first session, participants
the rule were created: (1) 12 sentences with two adverbials of loca- learned both rules through different contexts of learning. To
tion clauses (i.e., Alba swims in the pool and Tania swims in the ensure the incidental nature of the first learning task, partici-
sea); (2) 12 sentences with a singular subject that need to agree pants were told that the aim of the first task was to measure
with two forms of the verb to be (i.e., Where Alba is is in the their basic English level. They were also told that they were
swimming pool not in the beach); (3) 12 sentences with plural sub- going to be presented with English sentences followed by com-
jects, which need an agreement with the main verb to be (i.e., prehension questions. Immediately after this, they were asked to
Where Alba and Tania are is in the pool); and (4) 12 sentences perform the incidental learning context task (i.e., read the sen-
with singular subjects which need an agreement with the two tence and answer a comprehension question). After incidental
main verbs (i.e., Where Tania lives is in Granada not in learning, an immediate GJT was taken, followed by the
Madrid). Each type was represented by two sentences, and each LEAP-questionnaire (e.g., as a distractor task separating the
sentence was presented 3 times (see supplementary material for two learning blocks; this took approximately 15 minutes).
the experimental materials). Before the experiment, data were col- Secondly, they explicitly learned the other rule on the explicit
lected from 4 judges regarding the difficulty of the rules; 75% learning context task, which was the metalinguistic explanation
selected the dative rule as the easiest and judged the difficulty of the rule (see Figure 3). This was presented on the screen until
with 4 on a scale from 1–7, whereas the pseudocleft rule was they felt ready to answer metalinguistic questions about sen-
rated with a mean level of difficulty of 4.62. The sentences corre- tences following the rule (M = 61302 ms (1’21’’); SD = 1021 ms
sponding to each rule were blocked for presentation and followed (3’’). Finally, participants performed the immediate GJT test,
by the GJT for the rule. The order of the rules was counterba- corresponding to the rule they were supposed to learn. For
lanced across participants. While most details of the sentence both incidental and explicit contexts of learning, the sentence
presentation were very similar to those of Experiment 1, boxes appeared and remained on the screen for 5 seconds after a fix-
highlighting the critical points in the sentences were not used ation point (300 ms). Then, the comprehension/metalinguistic
since they differed for the two rules. All other details regarding question appeared and remained on the screen until the
order and timing were identical to Experiment 1. participants responded. Sentences were randomly presented.
The second session was 20 to 24 hours after the first one, and
Grammaticality judgment test (GJT) the third session was 5 to 7 days after the second one. These ses-
For the dative rule, the same GJT was used as was used in sions included the AX-CPT and the global-local task. Since the
Experiment 1. Additionally, an additional GJT was created for experiment was run online, the Fullscreen mode was a requisite
the pseudoclefts rule, following the same structure as was used during the experiment. As in Experiment 1, results from the
in Experiment 1 (10 studied, 10 new-grammatical, and 10 new- global-local task are not reported in this paper since they are
ungrammatical sentences). the subject of another investigation.

Fig. 3. Metalinguistic explanations used in the explicit context for the dative alternation and pseudoclefts rules.
Data analyses words, differences in the type of learning were only evident for
the easier dative rule which showed an explicit advantage imme-
As in Experiment 1, performance in the GJT was calculated
diately, as well as both 24 hours later and a week later (see
through discrimination d’ scores. Participants with a FA rate
Figure 4).
above 89% (2DT above the mean) at the immediate test were
As in Experiment 1, the role of BSI was explored in four
removed from the analysis (26%; n = 34). For the AX-CPT task,
Multiple Linear Regression analyses for each (Dative and pseudo-
data below 100 ms and 2’5 SD over each participant mean; 5%
cleft) Rule-learning d’ Index for incidental and explicit conditions,
of the data was removed. An additional 10% (n = 14) of the par-
respectively. Results indicated that there was a significant effect in
ticipants was removed from the analysis because they had BY
the incidental condition for BSI, β = −1.12, t = −3.59, p <.001 at
errors = 1, showing that they did not understand how to answer
the pseudocleft rule, F (1, 142) = 12.9, p =.001, adjusted
to this task.
R2 = .08; Participants had 1.12 worse discrimination if they had
As in Experiment 1, overall statistics are reported for the d’
greater scores in BSI (more proactive), suggesting that learning
index corresponding to rule-learning (new-grammatical versus
was enhanced if people were less proactive in the pseudocleft
new-ungrammatical sentences).
rule-learning. That was not significant for the dative rule
F (1, 106) = 1.025, p = .31, adjusted R2 = .0002; β = −.37, t = −1.01,
Results p = .314 (see Figure 5).This effect was not significant for the
explicit condition for the dative, F (1, 143) = 1.728, p = .19,
adjusted R2 = .005; β = .55, t = 1.31, p = .2 or the pseudocleft
Grammatical judgment test
rule, F (1, 106) = .24, p = .6, adjusted R2 = −.007; β = −.23, t = −.49,
For the critical rule-learning d’ scores, results indicate that parti-
p = .624.
cipants discriminated between grammatical (new/studied) and
ungrammatical sentences beyond chance both on the dative and
pseudoclefts rules (see means and t-tests in Table 2).
Discussion
ANOVA analyses of the effects of learning condition, type
of rule, and time indicated a significant effect of condition, Results of Experiment 2 showed an explicit learning advantage
F (1, 166) = 48.8, p < .001, μ = .22 (explicit better than incidental), when learning the easier dative rule. However, this advantage was
and rule, F (1, 85) = 75.52, p < .001, μ = .47 (the dative rule show- not evident when participants learned the more complex pseudo-
ing better performance than the pseudocleft rule). The interaction cleft rule. These results suggest that intentionality and metalinguistic
of condition and rule was also significant, F (1, 146) = 17.4, information benefits rule-learning when the information to be
p < .001, μ = .11, although this interaction was qualified by a learned is relatively not difficult (e.g., the dative rule in both experi-
higher order interaction of condition, rule and time, F (4, 336) ments). However, when the rule to be learned is more difficult, both
= 2.45, p = .04, μ = .03. This interaction indicated that for the eas- the explicit and incidental conditions seem to produce similar learn-
ier dative rule, there was a main effect of condition, F (1, 85) = ing levels. These results are similar to those reported by Tagarelli
9.86; p < 0.001; μ = .34 at all testing times with better rule-learning et al. (2016) and Gao and Ma (2021). We can conclude that the
for the explicit (M = 2.16; SD = .11) than incidental condition probability of explicitly detecting patterns would decrease for highly
(M = .97; SD = .13). In contrast, the more difficult pseudocleft difficult rules, and learning would therefore depend on procedural
rule produced no differences in the GJT performance between memory; this factor, in turn, is not dependent on the nature of
the incidental and explicit conditions, with some variations pro- the learning task, hence the explicit advantages disappear (see
duced by the times of testing, F (1, 168) = 7.43, p <.001, μ = .08. Ullman, 2016, for similar conclusions).
Participants had better rule-learning after 24 hours (M = .98; More importantly, Experiment 2 also showed that, when learn-
SD = .09) as opposed to immediately afterwards (M = .62; ing a difficult rule, individual differences in EFs are related to inci-
SD = .09), t (167) = 3.68; p <.001, 95% CI [.17, .55]. In other dental learning. Thus, BSI significantly predicted discrimination

Fig. 4. Rule learning d’ index as a function of time (immediate and hours), condition (INC-incidental and EXP-explicit), and rule (dative and pseudoclefts).
between new-grammatical and new-ungrammatical sentences in participants might have tested the hypothesis for a specific rule
the rule-learning d’ index. In simple terms, a less proactive profile every time that a sentence was presented. Morgan-Short,
predicted better rule-learning. Hence, as suggested by Chrysikou Steinhauer, Sanz, and Ullman (2012) found WM to be highly
et al. (2013; see also Smalle et al., 2017), reduced EFs might pro- related to successful learning in a condition where metalinguistic
duce better learning under specific conditions. As mentioned, explanations were not provided, and they concluded that this
proactive control involves a costly goal maintenance mechanism pattern might be due to the increments in WM demands in
oriented to goal-relevant information in order to avoid interfer- conditions where analysis of the information is required
ence from irrelevant information (Braver, 2012). This mechanism (Morgan-Short et al., 2012). However, further investigation is
may potentially be advantageous in situations where the informa- needed to assess these possible explanations.
tion needed to achieve the goal is easy to keep and maintain active Finally, an alternative explanation for the pattern of results in
while checking for possible regularities. However, when the infor- both experiments might relate to the possibility that participants
mation is difficult or there is not a clear goal, lower proactivity were using their previous knowledge of English (instead of the
may better facilitate learning. This is in line with the results by learned rule), to make their grammaticality judgments.
Kapa and Colombo (2014), whose study with children reflected Although for all conditions in Experiments 1 and 2, we tested
incidental learning processes facilitating the acquisition of a new those participants who were performing above chance, suggesting
language during childhood. that learning had occurred, it was possible that this above-chance
Contrary to findings from Experiment 1, proactivity did not performance was due to inferences from previous English knowl-
significantly enhance explicit learning; this may be due to differ- edge. In order to rule out this interpretation, we decided to run an
ences in procedure between the two experiments. In Experiment additional untrained control group from which we could compare
2, the learning context within participants was manipulated, and trained versus untrained performance and reduce uncertain inter-
the explicit condition was always presented after the incidental pretation (Hamrick & Sachs, 2018).
block. Thus, explicit learning was always performed after exposure Therefore, Experiment 3 was conducted to provide an
to a different rule. It is possible that participants still maintained untrained group where we could assess the influence of our learn-
information from that previous rule in WM – since it needed to ing conditions in Experiments 1 and 2 on the GJT beyond the
be retrieved and coded during the GJT – together with the meta- possible influence of inferences from language knowledge.
linguistic information to learn the second rule, and this may have
overloaded WM and reduced the possibility of using proactive
Experiment 3
strategies. In favor of this interpretation, manipulation of WM
load reduces proactivity in the AX-CPT task (Mäki-Marttunen, In Experiment 3, we run the GJT and executive control tasks as in
Hagen & Espeseth, 2019) and healthy aging (Paxton, Barch, Experiments 1 and 2, but without a previous learning phase. In
Racine & Braver, 2008). In this way, previous studies have related this condition, we would expect that untrained participants
low capacity with worse goal-maintenance performance (Redick would have significantly lower d’ scores than participants in
& Engle, 2011; Wiemers & Redick, 2018). Nevertheless, these Experiments 1 and 2, indicating that both the incidental and
results can also be explained by the fact that participants in the intentional-explicit results were due to learning and no previous
first study were encouraged to find the regularities in the sen- knowledge of English. In addition, we expected no significant
tences while in the second study we explicitly told them the regu- effects of BSI in this untrained group, indicating that the obtained
larities and asked they pay attention to them. Hence it is possible BSI effects in Experiments 1 and 2 were due to learning experi-
that proactive control is recruited in learning conditions where ences and not to the use of previous language knowledge in the
hypotheses need to be tested. Thus, in the intentional condition, absence of learning.

Procedure
In this control experiment, participants did two GJTs, one for the
dative rule and one for the pseudocleft rule. Additionally, they
were asked to do the AX-CPT task to measure the implication
of proactive control on the test responses. All tasks were pro-
grammed, and the experiment was run using Gorilla.sc, the
same online platform for behavioral experiments (Anwyl-Irvine,
et al., 2020) that we used in Experiment 2. The experiment
started with the dative GJT where they were asked to answer
whether the sentences were grammatically correct or not in
English, followed by the AX-CPT task and finally, the pseudocleft
GJT. Since the experiment was run online, the Fullscreen
mode was required during the experiment and participants had
a maximum of 50 minutes to complete it (the experiment lasted
around 35 minutes).
Results
Data analyses
As in Experiments 1 and 2, performance was calculated through
discrimination d’ scores. For the AX-CPT task, data below
100 ms and 2’5 SD over each participant mean; .3% of the data
was removed. In addition, 17% of the participants (n = 12) were
removed from the final analysis following the same procedure
as the previous experiment.
Grammatical judgment test

For the rule-learning d’ scores, results indicate that participants
discriminated between grammatical (new/studied) and ungram-
matical sentences beyond chance both on the dative, t (69) =
5.52, p < .001 and the pseudocleft rule, t (69) = 3.73, p = .002; as
they had more hits than FAs in their responses. However, when
comparing their responses with those from the incidental groups
in Experiments 1 and 2, they performed significantly worse. For
the dative rule, we found that participants in the untrained con-
Fig. 5. Rule-learning d-prime associated with BSI for incidental (INC) and explicit trol group had significantly smaller d’ discrimination indexes
(EXP) conditions, for the dative (right) and pseudoclefts (left) rules. Highlighted (M = .57; SD = .67) than participants in the incidental condition
areas represent Standard Error. in Experiment 1 (M = 1.05; SD = .55), t (105) = −3.73; p < .001,
95% CI [−.74, −.22]. They also had smaller d’ than participants
in the incidental condition in Experiment 2 (M = .88; SD = .55),
Method t (104) = −3.13; p < .001, 95% CI [−.65, −.14]. For the pseudocleft
Participants rule, we also found that participants in the untrained control
group had significantly smaller d’ discrimination indexes
A total of 70 Spanish native-speakers from Granada (Spain) (M = .39; SD = .73) than participants in the incidental condition
participated in the present study (range of 18–30 years of age; in Experiment 2 (M = .88; SD = .70), t (116) = −3.64; p < .001,
M = 23.05; SD = 3.7). All participants had formal education and 95% CI [.38, .88]. Moreover, they also performed significantly
learning of English, but their English proficiency was basic worse compared to the intentional and explicit groups. For the
(participation requirement: level lower than or equal to B1 level dative rule, we found that participants in the untrained control
in the European Language Framework). All participants were group had significantly smaller d’ discrimination indexes
economically rewarded. (M = .57; SD = .67) than participants in the intentional condition
in Experiment 1 (M = 1.18; SD = .57), t (105) = −5.55; p < .001,
95% CI [−.99, −.47]. They also had smaller d’ than participants
Materials
in the explicit condition in Experiment 2 (M = 2.17; SD = 1.1),
t (117) = −10.39; p < .001, 95% CI [−1.18, −1.28]. For the pseudo-
Grammatical Judgment tasks cleft rule, we also found that participants in the untrained control
For the dative rule, the same GJT was used as in Experiments 1 group had significantly smaller d’ discrimination indexes
and 2 and for the pseudocleft rule, the same GJT was used as (M = .39; SD = .73) than participants in the explicit condition in
in Experiment 2. Experiment 2 (M = .7; SD = .95), t (105) = −2.14; p = .03, 95%
CI [−.61, −.02].
AX-CPT task As in Experiments 1 and 2, the role of BSI was explored using
The same task was used as in Experiments 1 and 2. Multiple Linear Regression analyses for each (Dative and

Pseudocleft) Rule-learning d’ Index respectively. We did not find 1 and 2), but it was not evident when participants learned the
significant interaction between BSI and d’ in our untrained group more difficult pseudocleft rule (Experiment 2) where explicit
when answering to the dative rule, F (1,56) = 2.617, p = .1, and incidental strategies produced similar levels of learning.
adjusted-R2 = .02; nor when answering to the pseudocleft rule; This interaction between learning condition and rule difficulty
F (1,56) = 2.25, p = .14, adjusted-R2 = .02. has also been reported by Tagarelli et al. (2016) and Gao and
Ma (2021). In their experiment, they introduced three different
rules varying in difficulty and manipulated the learning context
Discussion
(intentional/incidental). Similar to this study’s results, they
The goal of Experiment 3 was to test whether the pattern of reported an advantage for explicitly learning easier sentences.
results obtained in Experiments 1 and 2 was in fact due to learn- However, for the more complex sentences, the type of exposure
ing. Hence, we created an untrained control group (see Hamrick was not predictive of GJT performance. In this line, it has been
& Sachs, 2018 for nuances on this topic) where participants were argued that even though difficult rules can be taught, they are nat-
just asked to give an answer to the GJT for both the dative and urally too difficult for successful explicit learning Tagarelli et al.,
pseudocleft rules and we compared their performance with parti- (2016). For this reason, the probability of explicitly detecting pat-
cipants in Experiments 1 and 2. Participants in the untrained terns decreases as difficulty increases. This is most probably due
group answered beyond chance – however, their d’ scores were to an overload in cognitive resources. Learning in this case
significantly lower than those found in our groups in would depend on procedural memory to a larger extent
Experiments 1 and 2. Hence, we can conclude that the results (Ullman, 2016), where regularities are detected and stored with-
found in Experiments 1 and 2 were due to the learning phase, out intention (Declarative/Procedural Model; Ullman, 2001,
not to previous exposures to English. 2004, 2016). Furthermore, we can conclude that the pattern of
Additionally, no significant interactions between BSI and d’ results in the explicit condition for learning the pseudocleft rule
were found in this group. Since we also demonstrated that parti- (no differences between explicit/incidental conditions of learning)
cipants in the experimental conditions were significantly better was not due to an absence of learning, since scores in the experi-
than those in the untrained control group, we can then conclude mental groups were significantly higher than in the untrained
that the interaction between individual differences in proactive/ control group. Importantly, these results are found when testing
reactive control and learning, or the lack of it, was due to the the learned regularities in an untimed GJT (Ellis, 2005;
learning exposure manipulation nor previous exposure to the Godfroid et al., 2015; Gutierrez, 2013). Further research should
language. extend these findings to timed procedures.
Finally, the interactions between d’ scores and BSI could be In addition, individual differences have been recently found as
due to the interference associated with participants’ L1, hence factors modulating successful learning (Ullman & Lovelett, 2018).
to the Spanish dative rules (Cuervo, 2007; Pulido & Dussias, In particular, it has been found that better procedural memory
2020). However, if that were the case, we would find individual benefits grammar learning (Hamrick, 2015; Morgan-Short et al.,
differences guiding the scores in the dative GJT, where partici- 2014). Hence, gaining benefits from intentional-explicit or inci-
pants would try to solve the interference from the L1 in the L2. dental strategies seems to vary between individuals’ cognitive
characteristics (Wong, Vuong & Liu, 2017).
General discussion
Role of Individual Differences
Learning an L2 during adulthood is a challenge that is associated
with large individual variations in learning success. This study The role of proactive control in rule-learning was explored by
aimed to investigate the complex interaction between intrinsic including the AX-CPT task to assess proactive control (BSI
and extrinsic factors as possible sources of this variability in learn- index). Our results indicated that adults engage cognitive control
ing L2 rules. In the following subsections, evidence will be dis- in different ways during rule-learning, and this depends on the
cussed regarding the role of extrinsic (learning condition and condition and type of rule. Proactive control – which refers to
context’s difficulty) and intrinsic factors (individual differences anticipatory selection and maintenance of goal-relevant informa-
in EF) during L2 rule-learning. tion (Braver, 2012) – was positively related to rule-learning in the
intentional condition, when learning involved the easier dative
rule in Experiment 1. The relation between cognitive control
Role of Learning Conditions
and intentional learning was previously found by Kapa and
Altogether – and across the two experiments – the results indi- Colombo (2014). In their study, they found that better inhibitory
cated that both intentional and explicit conditions benefit rule- control – measured through a Flanker task – was associated with
learning relative to incidental conditions. This overall benefit better learning in adults. In this study, these results were extended
coincides with the results reported by Robinson (1997) and by showing that proactive control is a good strategy for rule-
many others (see Goo et al., 2015, for a review) where instructed learning under intentional conditions. In addition, these results
groups showed better grammatical learning performance than indicated that the relation between proactive control and rule-
groups exposed to the grammatical rules under incidental condi- learning did not hold for the explicit condition of Experiment
tions. Thus, during adulthood – where the declarative system is 2. As mentioned, participants learned two different rules in
fully developed and declarative learning processes are enhanced Experiment 2 (which changed in difficulty), the explicit condition
through many years of schooling – explicit learning processes was always presented in a second block after participants learned
seem to facilitate rule-learning (Ullman, 2001, 2004). However, the first rule under incidental condition. In this context, the rela-
the more interesting advantage of explicit learning strategies tion between proactive control and learning was not significant.
seems to be difficulty dependent. This was observed when parti- This suggested that the potential benefits of proactivity can be
cipants were learning the less difficult dative rule (Experiments masked by the overload in WM due to the learning context.

Participants during the second block (explicit learning block) had is no longer present when learning a complex rule, and incidental
to learn and maintain in WM the explicit rule, after having strategies seem to be enhanced by low levels of proactive control.
inferred the rule in the incidental condition of the first block. These results are significant, as L2 learning involves both easy and
Although this explanation might seem inconsistent with the fact difficult rules in contexts with different levels of difficulty.
that participants in Experiment 2 had better performance (higher Therefore, to achieve successful rule-learning, different learning
d’ scores) than participants in Experiment 1 when learning the strategies and flexible executive control must be implemented.
dative rule, we can assume that even if WM was overloaded by
Supplementary Material. For supplementary material accompanying this
having in memory the incidentally learned rule and the metalin-
paper, visit https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728922000815
guistic information of a different rule, the presence of these meta-
Supplementary material includes experimental material (learning and test-
linguistic explanations gave them a learning advantage that ing material) of Experiment 1 and 2.
manifested in better performance in the GJT. In addition, it is
also possible that proactive control is only recruited in learning Acknowledgement. Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Granada.
conditions where hypotheses need to be tested, as in
Experiment 1, where participants needed to test the hypothesis Data Availability Statement. The raw data supporting the conclusions of
this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.
for a specific rule for every sentence (see Morgan-Short et al.,
2012 for similar results), and therefore, the relation between BSI
and GJT was evident in Experiment 1 where metalinguistic infor- Notes
1
mation of the rule was not directly provided, but it was not in The number of presentations for the sentences exactly replicated the proced-
Experiment 2 where the rule was explicitly presented. Further ure by Robinson (1997), and just like in his experiment, we found no learning
investigation is needed to evaluate these possible explanations. differences depending on number of learning trials per studied sentence.
2
Interestingly, when learning a more difficult rule in We first conducted an experiment where three different rules were randomly
Experiment 2, participants’ performance was predicted by indi- presented during the learning phase. Results indicated that intermixing the
three rules was very difficult for the participants who showed low level of per-
vidual differences in the incidental condition. Less proactivity
formance and no significant effects. For this reason, we reduced the number of
produced better performance in the incidental condition. Even rules to two and we blocked their presentations.
if there were evidence of incidental learning (compared to the
untrained control group), its results were not found for
Experiment 1, nor the easy dative rule in Experiment 2. Hence, References
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Second language learning context

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Incidental condition Explicit condition

Immediate 1.07 (.72) .74 (.71) 2.13 (1.13) .45 (.98)

what Robinson (1997) termed “explicit condition”. Finally, we

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correct structure of a pseudocleft rule is as follows: where – subject AX-CPT task

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Grammatical judgment test

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