The phenomenon of rapid language acquisition in LDS missionaries has been a topic of study in a small corner of applied linguists worldwide for a number of years. Lynne Hansen, a recently-retired BYU–Hawaii linguistics professor, has been especially interested in the topic for decades. Two of her non-LDS colleagues from the Netherlands took a particular interest in the subject after hearing Hansen present at both the International TESOL and American Association for Applied Linguistics conventions. After attending General Conference of the Church in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 2002 – coincidentally the same weekend as the conventions – her colleagues, one a representative of John Benjamins, a prestigious academic press, suggested that many people believe LDS missionaries to be excellent language learners and that a book on missionary language acquisition would likely be quite popular among such an audience. Hansen agreed and set to work gathering research for the book.
Fortunately, her missionary research had begun in the mid 90’s, about the same time as the Student Research Associateship program at BYU–Hawaii. Through the program, Hansen was able to staff her team of researchers with qualified students who were interested in furthering their knowledge of linguistics. “It’s not a coincidence that my research began when this program did,” Hansen asserts. “All the studies that I’ve done on mission language have depended heavily on the help of the students and could only have been done because of the [Student Research Associateship] program here at BYU–Hawaii.”
Students were involved in collecting data from missionaries and from returned missionaries who had been back from their missions for a varying number of years. George Lo, a recently-graduated student researcher, worked with Hansen for the past two years on gathering data and administering tests regarding gradual language attrition, specifically vocabulary loss, in returned missionaries who had been given the same tests a decade earlier.
Once the data had been collected, Dr. Ronald Miller, assistant professor of psychology at BYU–Hawaii, helped with the statistical analyses. Lo was among the student researchers who presented the findings in Hanoi, Vietnam at the Asia TEFL Conference in July 2010. “It was a very good opportunity for students like me to go to a conference like this and learn from other schools,” Lo states. “It was a great way to connect BYU–Hawaii with other universities.”
Now, after nearly a decade of research, the manuscript for the book has been given to the publisher and is expected to be completed this year. However, Hansen’s research was always focused on more than statistics and publishing the book. “I made a resolution early on that every student that worked with me would have the opportunity to go to a professional conference and would have a publication.” Her focus on the “journey” has had an impact, both personally and professionally, on many student researchers. From personal experience, Lo states, “If students are given an opportunity to participate in research, they should value it, cherish it, and look at it as an opportunity to learn…it really helped to enhance and build more on the foundation that we learned from classes.”
The book is anticipated to attract a variety of audiences, especially because it offers suggestions as to how learners can best acquire a new language abroad and then maintain it after returning home. In addition to directors of study abroad programs, the hope is that our missionaries and mission language program developers will become aware of the findings and use them to improve foreign language learning and retention. “The book is dedicated to the missionaries – past, present, and future – and we hope that what is found in these pages will be helpful to them,” says Hansen.