See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/363541176

Engagement in Task Based Language Teaching

Chapter · March 2023

DOI: 10.4324/9781003227267-7

CITATIONS READS
20 2,478

2 authors:

Phil Hiver Janice Wu

Florida State University Florida State University
114 PUBLICATIONS 3,401 CITATIONS 3 PUBLICATIONS 332 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

All content following this page was uploaded by Phil Hiver on 24 October 2022.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

5. Engagement in TBLT
Phil Hiver
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2004-7960

Janice Wu
https://orcid.org/ 0000-0002-4746-4916

Abstract

This chapter explores task engagement as a construct relating to how individuals focus on, interact
within, and learn from tasks in the language classroom. The chapter first defines task engagement
and provides a brief overview of existing work on the topic. This review shows that task
engagement is the level and quality of a learner’s integrated mental and physical activity, as well
as their affective experience, within a task. The chapter then compares task engagement with task
motivation, another framework for looking at students’ involvement in task-based language
learning. The chapter ends with suggestions and ideas for task engagement research that treats
individuals’ task engagement as a holistic, situated, adaptive, and momentary phenomenon. The
stance taken throughout the chapter is that confusion in understanding task engagement may arise
when macro-level information (i.e., general engagement tendencies in a collective of learners
across a course of task-based language learning) is used to capture micro-level insights about the
time (momentary), task (an individual task), and agent (the individual learner). The chapter
proposes ways to reconfigure the unit of analysis and the level of granularity at which task
engagement is conceptualized, observed, and measured.

Introduction
Task-based approaches to second language (L2) instruction have become de rigueur in many
learning contexts, and learners routinely encounter tasks in the course of regular L2 instruction.
The reality of many instructed L2 contexts is that the same task or sequence of tasks can provoke
varying responses when presented to students within the same group or classroom. Engagement
is a useful lens for L2 researchers seeking to understand how and why individuals focus on,
interact within, and learn from tasks. Task engagement can vary across students who are doing
the same task, even if that task is highly stimulating. In addition, there may be important
differences in how individual engagement manifests among students who have the same
overarching level of engagement; these differences have implications for L2 learning and for
researching tasks.

1
 This chapter is divided into three parts. In the first part, we define task engagement and
provide a brief overview of existing work on the topic. As our review shows, task engagement
represents the level and quality of a learner’s integrated mental and physical activity, as well as
their affective experience, within a task. In the second part, we compare task engagement with
task motivation, another framework for looking at students’ involvement in task-based language
teaching (TBLT). We emphasize that task motivation can be thought of as either a precursor of
task engagement or as the by-product of engaging in a task. We end our chapter by suggesting
ideas for task engagement research that treats individuals’ task engagement as a holistic, situated,
adaptive, and momentary phenomenon. Our position is that confusion in understanding task
engagement may arise when macro-level information (i.e., general engagement tendencies in a
collective of learners across a course of task-based language learning) is used to capture micro-
level insights about the time (momentary), task (an individual task), and agent (the individual
learner). In response, we propose ways to reconfigure the unit of analysis and the level of
granularity at which task engagement is conceptualized, observed, and measured.

Tasks
Tasks are workplans that “create a context for the communicative use of the L2” (Ellis et al.,
2020, p. 10). The necessary features of such workplans include: (1) a primary focus on meaning,
(2) a clearly-defined communicative outcome, (3) a gap of some kind that engenders meaningful
interaction, and (4) the opportunity for learners’ to rely on their own linguistic and other semiotic
resources in attempting to meet that outcome (see also Ellis & Shintani, 2014).
Tasks are used in the classroom, primarily, to provide opportunities for learners to engage
in using the language (Kim, 2015; Van den Branden, 2016). Of course, the language use or
activity that results from a task should be seen as separate from definitions of the task itself
(Ellis, 2018; Ellis et al., 2020). This is because a task, when implemented, may result in different
types of interaction and language use. Despite the lack of a common standard for grading or
sequencing, tasks can be classified in various descriptive ways relating to what type of language
processing they require of learners (input-based, output-based), the outcomes they afford (closed,
open; convergent, divergent), the type of interaction they promote (one-way, two-way;
reciprocal, non-reciprocal), the type of linguistic features they orient learners to (focused,
unfocused), or the scope of the task within the curriculum (pedagogic, real-world) (Long, 2015).

2
Task Engagement
Task engagement can be defined as deliberate actions on the part of learners in the service of
completing a pedagogic task (e.g., peer interaction). Task engagement is an important concern
for TBLT researchers for several reasons. Primarily, TBLT is founded on the assumptions of a
cognitive-interactionist paradigm which views participatory action (e.g., L2 interaction) as the
vehicle for learning and the medium through which learning occurs (Long, 2015). From this
perspective, task-based interaction both drives learning and is the site where learning can best be
observed (Lambert, 2017; Philp & Duchesne, 2016). Work on task engagement also links
broadly to research on academic engagement (Reschly & Christenson, 2022; Fredricks et al.,
2019) and L2 classroom engagement (Hiver, Al-Hoorie, & Mercer, 2021; Oga-Baldwin, 2019).
As with the cognitive-interactionist approach, in which language use drives development, these
bodies of research see active student involvement as central to learning.
Some of the earliest work on task engagement (e.g., Dörnyei & Kormos, 2000)
positioned it as the degree of students’ participation in language learning tasks, suggesting that
task engagement is related primarily to the quantity of learners’ on-task behavior and should be
measured through actual language output. Scholars noticed almost immediately, however, that
this limited perspective did not integrate broader understandings about engagement—and indeed
the learning resulting from it—as multidimensional in nature with different facets operating
interdependently. For instance, Platt and Brooks (2002) noted that thinking of task engagement
as a “construct in numerical treatment of performance data” (p. 368) or related more to language-
as-object and language-related activity (see e.g., Ohta, 2001; Storch, 2008) can obscure
important qualitative information about the process of development that results from it. Instead,
for Platt and Brooks (2002), task engagement was a means for seeing the ways in which learners
“appropriate [language] resources in specific situations” (p. 369) and construct meaning
“throughout a dialogic encounter” (p. 370). Task engagement in Platt and Brooks’ sense is thus
related more closely to the procedural strategies or “tools and practices” that learners adopt as
part of their “repertoire for problem solving” (p. 372).
Building on these early notions of learners developing tools and practices through task
engagement is Svalberg’s L2-specific concept of Engagement with Language (EWL; Svalberg,
2009). While not focused on learners’ involvement in task content and interaction, EWL is a

3
mode of engagement that focuses on intentional L2 learning. EWL integrates multiple
dimensions in which learners engage with formal targets of the learning activity (i.e., language as
object, language as vehicle) and the likely outcome of such linguistic targets (i.e., declarative
knowledge about L2 grammatical features, language awareness) (Svalberg, 2018). The term
language-as-object refers to instances where learners’ primary focal point is the language itself.
In a classroom, this might include “learners doing language exercises or tasks, perhaps
discussing solutions in the L1 or target language” (Svalberg, 2009, p. 244). Language-as-vehicle,
on the other hand, refers to cases where language is used as a means of communication in a way
that gives rise to engagement. A classroom example might be “learners doing a communicative
task in the target language without paying attention to aspects other than communicative
efficiency” (Svalberg, 2009, p. 244). In all cases, however, deliberate and selective attention to
form and/or meaning, learners’ depth of processing, their mental elaboration, and retrieval of
previously constructed knowledge, are all within the scope of what learners do when they engage
with language (Svalberg, 2021).
More concentrated work on engagement in the context of task-based learning and
performance also exists (Bygate & Samuda, 2009). This empirical work places tasks at the center
of instructed language learning, and since a special issue on the topic in Language Teaching
Research (see Lambert, 2017), task-based engagement research has established itself as a
mainstay in instructed language learning scholarship. A central premise of this line of work is the
importance of designing and implementing communication tasks to meet learners’ affective
needs and generate the type of personal investment that mastering the fluent use of an L2
requires (Lambert, 2017, p, 657). Recent task engagement research emphasizes the
interdependent nature of the cognitive, social, and affective dimensions of task engagement and
recognizes that these are all part of the quality of student involvement in task-based interaction
(Aubrey et al., 2020; Lambert et al., 2017). This work is also keenly interested in task-based
language pedagogy with its accompanying focus on the necessary task conditions for
engagement and how these differ across groups of culturally and linguistically diverse learners
who come to the task with their own personal learning goals (Nakamura et al., 2021; Phung,
2017). This line of research suggests that elements of the learning environment, the mode of
interaction, and the interlocutors can have differential impacts on L2 learners’ task engagement
and learning (Baralt et al., 2016; Dao, 2019, 2020; Sulis & Philp, 2021). Perhaps unsurprisingly,

4
the consensus of this strand of research is that differences in the amount and type of learners’
engagement coincide with different on-task interactional behaviors (Dao & Sato, 2021; Lambert
& Zhang, 2019).
Finally, there has also been some teaching-oriented work on task engagement, directed to
an audience of classroom practitioners, that is both conceptual (e.g., Egbert, 2020; Mercer &
Dörnyei, 2020) and data-driven in nature (e.g., Egbert et al., 2021). These sources propose an
extensive array of potential characteristics, including facilitators and antecedents (e.g.,
content/topic, goals), indicators (e.g., effort, curiosity), mediating factors (e.g., personality,
emotional state), and even outcomes of task engagement (e.g., attitudes, quantity and quality of
task performance). Further work that focuses squarely on the classroom will no doubt help the
field understand how theoretical constructs (e.g., situational interest; perceptions of task value;
task competence beliefs) link with more tangible task design elements such as task familiarity,
choice of interlocutor, and planning time.
Contemporary scholars doing research on task engagement share a core understanding
about what it is and what it does. As mentioned above, task engagement is deliberate learner
action in service of completing a pedagogic task. This deliberate action is typically thought to
have transformative effects on learners’ L2 development. Task engagement encapsulates the
opportunity for learners to engage behaviorally, by adopting behaviors that drive a task forward
to successful completion; cognitively, by attending to the quality of interaction, the task
demands, and their on-task performance (e.g., formal features of language that arise in the
process); socially, through collaborative, relational moves whose purpose is interaction with and
support of others (e.g., negotiating with and scaffolding a peer); and affectively, by monitoring
and regulating the emotions aroused during task involvement. This four-dimensional view of
task engagement (Philp & Duchesne, 2016) originates in educational psychologists’ work on
school engagement (e.g., Fredricks et al., 2004).
Each line of work reviewed above provides a complementary perspective and contributes
to our knowledge of task engagement. The earliest work established task engagement as a
construct deserving of research (Dörnyei & Kormos, 2000), which then expanded to the qualities
and characteristics of such learner activity (Platt & Brooks, 2002) and the language specific
dimensions of these forms of involvement (Svalberg, 2009). The more empirical work
originating in the TBLT tradition (Lambert, 2017) foregrounded the particular task

5
characteristics and conditions likely to impact the quality of learners’ task engagement and
interaction. Finally, the practice-oriented work speaks more exclusively to what teachers in the
language classroom might do pedagogically to generate and maintain their students’ task
engagement (Egbert et al., 2021).

Disambiguating Task Engagement and Task Motivation

Another framework for looking at how learners participate in and respond to tasks is the notion
of task motivation (e.g., Kormos & Wilby, 2019). Motivation relates to forces that energize and
direct human behavior. It explains the choice of one action over alternative actions and the
intentions that sustain actions toward a desired target (Papi & Hiver, 2022). In the field of
language learning, one early attempt to define task motivation (Jülkunen, 1989) proposed that
task motivation explains how motivated learners perform in a given task. This definition appears
conceptually similar to task engagement as discussed in the previous section. However, a closer
look at task motivation research since Jülkunen’s early work shows that task motivation is
defined specifically as “task-specific cognitions and feelings evoked in the actual task situation”
(Seegers & Boekaerts, 1993, p. 136). In other words, motivation refers to learners’ disposition
(what they think and feel about a task) rather than what they do in completing a task (their task
engagement). This means that task motivation is one step removed from engagement and,
temporally, functions either as a precursor of task engagement or as the by-product of engaging
in a task (i.e., an outcome of engagement) (Dörnyei et al., 2015).
Task motivation relates to the “factors that influence how students [might] learn and
perform on language learning tasks” (Kormos & Wilby, 2019, p. 267). This includes, among
other things, learners’ appraisals of the task demands and their own learning goals, perceptions
of the cost and the value of involvement in a task, and beliefs about their own abilities and
expectations of success on a given task (Maehr, 1984). Task motivation can thus be used to
explain how learners orient to a task, prior to engaging, as well as inter-individual variation in
how learners might “participate in tasks and…potentially learn from a task” (Kormos & Wilby,
2019, p. 267).
Further confusion may arise from the sheer number of theoretical frameworks for
motivation and how they address the domains that are important for task performance (Papi &
Hiver, 2022). In engagement research too, there are varying views regarding what the best

6
indicators of task engagement are for different purposes and how to operationalize them (Hiver,
Al-Hoorie, et al., 2021). Some indicators being researched are in fact precursors to engagement
(e.g., willingness to communicate) while others are distinct outcomes that result from engaging
in tasks (e.g., performance, comprehension, learning) (see Lambert et al., 2021, for one example
of such L2 learning outcomes). What remains, however, is an understanding that learners’ task
motivation affects subsequent task engagement and is itself affected by it. Seeing task motivation
as both a precursor to and a byproduct of task engagement allows both motivation and
engagement to be integrated while still being distinguished as separate constructs (Table 5.1).

Table 5.1. Disambiguating Task Engagement and Task Motivation

Task Task
Components/Indicators
Motivation Engagement
Cognitive
Ability/competence beliefs ✓
Attributions ✓
Alertness ✓ ✓
Goal-orientedness ✓ ✓
Focused, selective attention ✓
Higher-order thought processes ✓
Information processing ✓
Mental elaboration ✓
Monitoring task-demands ✓
Schema activation ✓
Self-monitoring ✓
Self-regulation ✓

Affective
Epistemic curiosity ✓
Interest ✓
Intentionality ✓
Positive appraisals ✓
Value ✓
Willingness to participate ✓
Positive dispositional orientation to task ✓ ✓

7
 Emotions emerging from task performance ✓
Emotional regulation ✓
Satisfaction with task performance ✓

Behavioral
Non-verbal individual cues (e.g., active listening, speaker
✓ ✓
tracking, backchannelling, nodding, facial expressions)
Pursuit of goals ✓ ✓
Time on task ✓
Amount of language produced (e.g., word, turn counts) ✓
Effort expended ✓
Interactive discourse moves ✓
Negotiation of meaning ✓
Number of repairs ✓
Task completion ✓

Social
Willingness to interact ✓
Non-verbal social communication cues (e.g., body
✓ ✓
language, positioning, gestures, and facial expressions)
Collaborative activity (negotiation in/about the task) ✓
Initiating interaction ✓
Maintaining and developing interaction (e.g., turn taking) ✓
Peer correction/peer feedback ✓
Supporting peers (by scaffolding) ✓
Use of LRC (language-related collaboration) ✓
Use of CSC (collaborative sentence-completion) ✓

Other
EWL (engaging with language) ✓
Positive groupwork dynamics ✓
LREs (language-related episodes) ✓

Note. Table adapted from Svalberg (2009) and Hiver, Al-Hoorie, et al. (2021).

As Table 5.1 shows, task motivation provides a preliminary view of learners’ initial
choice of action, how long and hard they pursue such a goal, and the reasons underlying that

8
choice. In contrast, task engagement indicates the quantity and quality of the action that ensues
during task performance. When studying differences in learners’ L2 task performance, such as
time on task, number of turns, length of discourse runs, and other interactional moves, scholars
are in the realm of task engagement and not motivation. Tasks are the means to promote and
study interactional processes, and TBLT research is interested primarily in how tasks and task-
based interaction provide the necessary conditions for learning to occur (e.g., negotiation of
meaning is thought to promote attention to and noticing of gaps in learners’ L2 repertoire). For
this reason, task engagement is the more important construct for TBLT research. We turn now to
exploring some principles for research work in task engagement.

Researching Task Engagement

Whereas very recent work has adopted careful experimental or correlational designs and
provided focused findings that underscore the importance of task engagement for learners’
development (e.g., Aubrey 2017; Cho, 2018; Dao & Sato, 2021; Dao, 2021; Lambert et al., 2021;
Nakamura et al., 2021), there are multiple avenues to expand and refine future task engagement
research. In particular, Philp and Duchesne (2016) caution two specific points that seem to have
been lost so far in the general excitement surrounding engagement in TBLT research: first that
“engagement looks different according to…the setting, the task, and the participants,” and,
second, that it “should be operationalized based on a theoretical framework of L2 acquisition” (p.
67). Incorporating Philp & Duchesne’s ideas in task engagement research can be accomplished
by a renewed focus on three specific dimensions of task engagement: tasks, students, and time.
First, tasks themselves play an important role in students’ task engagement. The same
task or sequence of tasks can provoke varying responses when presented to students within the
same classroom, and to different students in different classrooms (Larsen-Freeman, 2018). This
is an intuitive observation, and task effects have been studied widely in the field (Long, 2016).
The consensus from recent empirical work in task engagement is also that characteristics of task
design and task implementation—for instance, the level of support provided, the challenge built
into tasks, or the choice, sequencing, and focus of the task—have a central influence on
generating and sustaining learners’ engagement (e.g., Dao, 2019, 2020; Lambert & Zhang, 2019;
Phung, 2017).

9
 Second, students themselves play a role in their own task engagement. This is also not
surprising, and the reasons (i.e., the cognitive and non-cognitive individual factors) underlying
individual variation in language learning success are a mainstay of second language acquisition
(SLA) research (Li et al., 2022), L2 interaction research (Gurzynski-Weiss, 2020), and task-
based research (Bygate, 2015). Engagement is an embodied construct, by which we mean it is
“done” by a learner/agent (see Lambert, 2017; Oga-Baldwin, 2019, for similar arguments), and
future task engagement research will need to better acknowledge that differences in the amount
and type of task engagement are necessarily tied to the agent doing the engaging.
Third, tasks unfold in real time. This temporal dimension in which a task unfolds means
that students’ task engagement is dynamic (Aubrey, 2022). Task engagement does not exist
offline or separate from actual task performance, and it is not meaningful to discuss it in the
abstract sense. Task engagement, instead, emerges dynamically in the context of the L2
interaction that occurs in task performance. It arises from the cognitive, behavioral, social, and
emotional resources that the learner draws on in real-time to reach the objective set out by that
task. What does all this mean for task engagement research? Adopting these ideas as guiding
principles can lead to some broad research tasks and objectives for scholars who undertake task
engagement research.

Engagement as an Emergent Construct

On one level it may make sense to talk about and study the different dimensions of task
engagement. However, another way of seeing task engagement is to examine how parts of the
whole relate to each other. Task engagement is more than merely the aggregate of its discrete
components. To say that task engagement can be understood by examining behavioral, cognitive,
social, and emotional components separately is to bring only half the picture into focus. The
integration of these elements into a whole system is the other half—a perspective that may be
overlooked by studies examining general engagement categories and tendencies in a group of
learners (Hiver, Al-Hoorie, et al., 2021). In reality, the observable manifestations of task
engagement emerge from the components and their adaptive interactions to the task
requirements. The activity that results is what we recognize and describe phenomenologically as
task engagement.

10
 A recent study that investigated task engagement in this way is one by Aubrey (2022)
using an adaptation of the Idiodynamic Method (see below). Among other things, the researcher
examined the joint effects of the cognitive and emotional dimensions of engagement (i.e., focus,
interest) on learners’ performance of computer-mediated collaborative writing tasks. After
completing the collaborative writing tasks, students were asked to view a video of their
performance and rate their levels of focus and interest in the given tasks at 12 different intervals.
The researcher then conducted a stimulated-recall interview to explore the reasons underlying the
varying levels of focus and interest that learners had indicated. Among the many noteworthy task
engagement findings in this study (e.g., learner factors, task design factors, task process factors,
and task condition factors), the data analysis highlighted the intertwined nature of interest and
focus. Participants were often unable to distinguish between their reasons for the two measures
and the most meaningful way of making sense of learners’ focus and interest was to combine
them into a more global engagement factor. The stimulated recall interview provided important
qualitative data so that the researcher could understand what influenced the combined cognitive-
affective aspects of task engagement. Though quantitatively tracking the components of
engagement separately was an essential initial part of the study, qualitatively explaining their
joint interaction added deeper insight into how engagement manifested. This study underscores
the difficulty of interpreting aspects of engagement in isolation and suggests that research might
seek to find additional ways of interpreting at the joint effect of components of engagement.

Engagement as Manifest in Specific Learners

The learner is a core part of task engagement. Task engagement is enacted by and embodied
through the learner. Consequently, it is also necessary to focus task engagement research on the
agent (or agents) who are exercising intentional actions that contribute causally to the learning
outcomes (Al-Hoorie, 2015). Tasks provide the spatiotemporal contexts that allow learners to
optimize their learning and decide whether and in what ways to engage their resources in
completing a task. Agency can be seen as the capacity to act adaptively in context (Larsen-
Freeman, 2019). Taking agency into account in task engagement research helps guard against
equating the task itself (i.e., the workplan) with learners’ performance of the task (i.e., the
process) (Ellis, 2018).

11
 An example of research that examines the agent and their role in task engagement is the
ethnographic study by Henry and Thorsen (2020). The researchers explored the phenomenon of
non-participation in classroom tasks and the reasons why individual learners would choose to
opt-out or actively refuse to take part in classroom tasks. Drawing from a larger ethnographic
dataset, the researchers present two cases studies of Swedish secondary school L2 learners who
choose to withdraw from interactive tasks that otherwise did engage their peers or to subvert the
intended purpose of the task. The authors’ report that when presented with tasks that provided
students with opportunities for creativity and personal expression, focal students or small groups
would sometimes work without obvious enthusiasm, deliberately not attend to the flow of
interaction or information in the classroom, or display more active forms of disaffection and
disengagement—for example by manipulating the task in a way that went against the task
assumptions and objectives. These findings provide evidence that task engagement is often
contingent on the agent doing the learning, and that students make “motivated decisions about
the (…) tasks they intend to undertake and those they prefer to avoid or abandon” (Skinner,
2016, p. 155).

Engagement as an Adaptive Process

Task engagement can be seen as an outcome, but at the microlevel it is perhaps better viewed as
a process. Using a more complex and dynamic perspective for task engagement encourages an
emphasis on processes of change and development (de Bot, 2015). At the microlevel time
window of minutes and seconds, task engagement is dynamic: it evolves adaptively over time
and is self-maintaining. The processes that we observe when engagement manifests itself in a
task come about from co-action and adaptation (Symonds et al., 2021). This adaptivity is also a
characteristic of task engagement: it emerges in the moment as an adaptive response to the task
conditions and requirements. Specific manifestations of task engagement or disengagement are
the recognizable patterns that come about as multiple factors interact interdependently, with
some elements having a larger influence at certain times but not at others (Overton & Lerner,
2014).
An example of a study that examines the dynamics of task engagement can be found in
Dao and Sato (2021). The researchers were studying learners’ task engagement in the context of
a 15-minute communicative task performed in dyads. Using the Experience Sampling Method

12
(see below) to capture students’ positive emotional engagement at 5-minute intervals, the
researchers also collected measures of students’ cognitive and social interactional behaviors
while completing the assigned communicative task. The results showed that learners’ positive
emotional engagement fluctuated over the course of the 15-minute interaction, was linked to
several, but not all, of the cognitive and social interaction behaviors, and that the nature of these
relationships varied over the duration of the task. More specifically, while learners’ positive
emotional engagement was linked primarily to their language production and their social
relationships rather than to attention to form, these relationships may be subject to change over
the course of a short interactive task—with some relationships playing a larger role than others at
certain stages of the task. This study provides an example of how a researcher can examine the
relationship between components of engagement at different time points during a task to better
understand the dynamic nature of task engagement.

Engagement as a Contextualized Phenomenon

Another important idea that is front and center in recent language learning research is that
context shapes development and learning outcomes (Hiver, Al-Hoorie, & Evans, 2021). It is
widely accepted that language learning and interaction are embedded in social-cultural contexts
and that language use fulfills important social–interactive functions (Kramsch, 2008; van Lier,
2004). For task engagement, the environment a task creates with its affordances for participation
and its conceptual, cognitive, and interactional demands on learners cannot be seen as extraneous
to how learners enact their involvement in that task. Task engagement involves a particular
adaptation of the learner in the environment that is realized within the immediate context of a
task (Larsen-Freeman, 2015). Task engagement unfolds as learners draw on tools and structures
that are available and necessary for their task performance. Table 5.1 lists many context-
independent indicators of task engagement, but rather than thinking of task engagement as
context-independent performances, contextual factors, including – but not limited to – the task
characteristics and conditions of task implementation, should be seen as dimensions that help
determine the shape task engagement takes as a momentary and situated construct (e.g., Larsen-
Freeman, 2017).
While several studies have examined the impact of task design and implementation
variables (Aubrey, 2017; Cho, 2018; Dao & Sato, 2021; Dao, 2020; Lambert et al., 2017;

13
Nakamura et al., 2021), they often ignore – or attempt to eliminate/control for – broader
contextual influences. One exemplary classroom-based study that has tackled the role of
contextual factors in task engagement is a mixed-methods study by Aubrey et al. (2020)
investigating the task engagement of L2 learners of English in a Japanese task-supported
classroom. In this study, learners performed 10 different speaking tasks over a 10-week period,
and the researchers collected data from learners after each task in the form of self-report
quantitative data and in-depth written reflections. These unique data highlighted various learner-
level, lesson-level, task-level and post-task-level factors (Aubrey et al, 2020, p. 8) contributing to
students’ task engagement and disengagement. They also point to variability in the strength and
centrality of these factors across the duration of the study. Importantly, the authors show how
contextual factors beyond task characteristics influenced task engagement for these learners,
such as the focus and duration of the course, the content of lessons surrounding the tasks, and the
time of day at which the tasks took place. This study illustrates the truism that context plays a
substantial role in determining learners’ precise task engagement profile.
Many existing research methods and techniques for collecting and analyzing data (case-
based research methods, quasi-experimental designs) can lend themselves to the avenues for task
engagement research discussed in this section. There are also novel approaches to research that
can shed new light on task engagement and push research in the field forward (Hiver, Al-Hoorie,
& Mercer, 2021). For instance, the Idiodynamic Method (MacIntyre & Gregersen, 2022; Chapter
8, this volume) provides a mixed-methods template to collect accurate, real-time data (i.e., both
online and offline measurements) of a learner’s intra-individual variability during task
performance. It allows the researcher to use procedures that focus on time-dependent variation
within a single task or from a single participant and explore time varying and time-invariant
predictors of task engagement, and how these differ across participants. This method can also
show how manipulating certain task characteristics or learning supports leads to changes in task
engagement. Other methods such as State Space Grids (Hollenstein, 2013) and Network Analysis
(Freeborn et al., 2022) can provide an observational (i.e., non-experimental) template to help
uncover the nature of relationships among variables in task engagement research. These can be
used, for example, to show how various dimensions of task engagement, the learner, and task
characteristic variables interact to produce different task engagement outcomes. These methods
can also investigate what combination of task characteristics and interactive behaviors produce

14
desired task engagement outcomes. One final method, the Experience Sampling Method
(Hektner et al., 2007), can be used to collect in situ and time-dense data that taps into the way
individuals experience, feel about, and report on learning activities in the moment. This method
provides a real-time, quantitative basis for investigating micro-interactions and patterns of
change in task engagement. It can be used to investigate how task engagement unfolds under
certain task conditions and with certain learning supports as well as how learners’ task
engagement relates to their language learning process (e.g., input processing, negotiation of
meaning, attention to language features, uptake of feedback, etc).

Conclusion
In this chapter we have discussed task engagement as a construct relating to how individuals
focus on, interact within, and learn from tasks in the L2 classroom. By revisiting earlier work on
task engagement and drawing distinctions between its various definitions and cognate constructs,
we have highlighted gaps in how task engagement has been conceptualized. We propose that
reconfiguring the level of granularity at which task engagement is conceptualized, observed, and
measured will allow scholars to address how task engagement emerges as a function of tasks,
time, and agents (learners). We then discussed a complex dynamic framing of task engagement
that, we feel, would allow scholars to capture task engagement as its multiple dimensions interact
in context and lead to a momentary emergent phenomenon as learners adapt to the demands and
situational requirements they face while completing tasks in TBLT.

Discussion questions
1. Why might separate, single-factor explanations of task engagement (e.g., only
investigating cognitive engagement, or only emotional engagement) be inadequate for
task engagement research?
2. Looking at Table 5.1, how would you describe the difference between task motivation
and task engagement?
3. How might you expect L2 task engagement to differ as a function of the task, agent, and
time?

15
Further readings
1. Philp, J., & Duchesne, S. (2016). Exploring engagement in tasks in the language
classroom. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 36, 50–72.
https://doi.org/10.1017/s0267190515000094

This paper describes the ways learners engage in tasks in the context of language classrooms.
Drawing on earlier work in educational psychology, the authors describe engagement in the
context of L2 tasks as a multidimensional construct that includes cognitive, behavioral, social,
and emotional dimensions. They also outline some of the important issues in researching
engagement in the context of task-based instruction.

2. Lambert, C. (2017). Tasks, affect and second language performance. Language Teaching
Research, 21(6), 657–664. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168817736644

This introduction to the 2017 special issue of Language Teaching Research makes the case that
task engagement research provides a promising way to incorporate a role for the learner into
task-based instruction. It describes the multiple contributions to the special issue (also highly
recommended reading) which showcase various ways that independent factors in the design and
implementation of tasks are related to learners’ engagement while performing those tasks.

3. Hiver, P., Al-Hoorie, A. H., Vitta, J. P., & Wu, J. (2021). Engagement in language
learning: A systematic review of 20 years of research. Language Teaching Research.
https://doi.org/10.1177/13621688211001289

This paper reports a systematic review of 20 years of engagement research in language

education. The authors examine the various methodological characteristics of previous L2
engagement research, noting trends and tendencies in designs and analytical choices. They then
summarize the applications and operationalizations of engagement across various subdomains of
language education.

16
Acknowledgements
We thank Miseong Kim and Joseph Sorensen for contributing to the exchange of ideas in this
chapter.

References

Al-Hoorie, A. H. (2015). Human agency: Does the beach ball have free will? In Z. Dörnyei, P.
D. MacIntyre, & A. Henry (Eds.), Motivational dynamics in language learning (pp. 55–
72). Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781783092574-009
Aubrey, S. (2017). Inter-cultural contact and flow in a task-based Japanese EFL classroom.
Language Teaching Research, 21(6), 717–734.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168816683563
Aubrey, S. (2022). Dynamic engagement in second language computer-mediated collaborative
writing tasks: Does communication mode matter? Studies in Second Language Learning
and Teaching, 12(1), 59–86. https://doi.org/10.14746/ssllt.2022.12.1.4
Aubrey, S., King, J., & Almukhaild, H. (2020). Language learner engagement during speaking
tasks: A longitudinal study. RELC Journal, 003368822094541.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0033688220945418
Baralt, M., Gurzynski-Weiss, L., & Kim, Y. (2016). Engagement with language: How examining
learners’ affective and social engagement explains successful learner-generated attention
to form. In M. Sato & S. Ballinger (Eds.), Peer interaction and second language
learning. Pedagogical potential and research agenda (pp. 209–240). John Benjamins.
https://doi.org/10.1075/lllt.45.09bar
Bygate, M. (2015). Domains and directions in the development of TBLT. John Benjamins.
Bygate, M., & Samuda, V. (2009). Creating pressure in task pedagogy: The joint roles of field,
purpose, and engagement within the interaction approaches. In A. Mackey & C. Polio
(Eds.), Multiple perspectives on interaction: Second language research in honor of Susan
M. Gass (pp. 90–116). Routledge.
Cho, M. (2018). Task complexity, modality, and working memory in L2 task performance.
System, 72, 85-98. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2017.10.010
Dao, P. (2019). Effects of task goal orientation on learner engagement in task performance.
International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 59(3), 315–334.
https://doi.org/10.1515/iral-2018-0188
Dao, P. (2020). Effect of interaction strategy instruction on learner engagement in peer
interaction. System, 91, 102244. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2020.102244
Dao, P., & Sato, M. (2021). Exploring fluctuations in the relationship between learners’ positive
emotional engagement and their interactional behaviours. Language Teaching Research,
25(6), 972–994. https://doi.org/10.1177/13621688211044238
de Bot, K. (2015). Rates of change: Timescales in second language development. In Z. Dörnyei,
P.D. MacIntyre, & A. Henry (Eds.), Motivational dynamics in language learning (pp.
29–37). Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781783092574-006

17
Dörnyei, Z., MacIntyre, P. D., & Henry, A. (Eds.) (2015). Motivational dynamics in language
learning. Multilingual Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781783092574
Dörnyei, Z., & Kormos, J. (2000). The role of individual and social variables in oral task
performance. Language Teaching Research, 4(3), 275–300.
https://doi.org/10.1191/136216800125096
Ellis, R. (2018). Reflections on task-based language teaching. Multilingual Matters.
Ellis, R., & Shintani, N. (2014). Exploring language pedagogy through second language
acquisition research. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203796580
Ellis, R., Skehan, P., Li, S., Shintani, N., & Lambert, C. (2020). Task-based language teaching:
Theory and practice. Cambridge University Press.
Egbert, J. L. (2020). The new normal? A pandemic of task engagement in language learning.
Foreign Language Annals, 53(2), 314–319. https://doi.org/10.1111/flan.12452
Egbert, J. L., Shahrokni, S. A., Zhang, X., Abobaker, R., Bantawtook, P., He, H., Bekar, M.,
Roe, M. F., & Huh, K., (2021). Language task engagement: An evidence-based model.
The Electronic Journal for English as a Second Language, 24(4).
https://eric.ed.gov/?id=EJ1288722
Freeborn, L., Andringa, S., Lunansky, G., & Rispens, J. (2022). Network analysis for modeling
complex systems in SLA research. Studies in Second Language Acquisition. Advance
online publication. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0272263122000407
Fredricks, J. A., Blumenfeld, P. C., & Paris, A. H. (2004). School engagement: Potential of the
concept, state of the evidence. Review of Educational Research, 74, 59–109.
https://doi.org/10.3102%2F00346543074001059
Fredricks, J. A., Reschly, A. L., & Christenson, S. (2019). Handbook of student engagement
interventions: Working with disengaged students. Elsevier.
https://doi.org/10.1016/C2016-0-04519-9
Gurzynski-Weiss, L. (Ed.) (2020). Cross-theoretical explorations of interlocutors and their
individual differences. John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/lllt.53
Hektner, J., Schmidt, J., & Csikszentmihalyi, M. (2007). Experience sampling method:
Measuring the quality of everyday life. SAGE.https://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781412984201
Henry, A., & Thorsen, C. (2020). Disaffection and agentic engagement: ‘Redesigning’ activities
to enable authentic self-expression. Language Teaching Research, 24(4), 456–475.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168818795976
Hiver, P., Al-Hoorie, A. H., & Evans, R. (2022). Complex dynamic systems theory in language
learning: A scoping review of 25 years of research. Studies in Second Language
Acquisition, 44(4), 913–941. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0272263121000553
Hiver, P., Al-Hoorie, A. H., & Mercer, S. (2021). Student engagement in the language
classroom. Multilingual Matters.
Hiver, P., Al-Hoorie, A. H., Vitta, J. P., & Wu, J. (2021). Engagement in language learning: A
systematic review of 20 years of research methods and definitions. Language Teaching
Research. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/13621688211001289
Hollenstein, T. (2013). State space grids: Depicting dynamics across development. Springer.
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-5007-8
Jülkunen, K. (1989). Situation- and task-specific motivation in foreign language learning and
teaching. University of Joensuu.

18
Kim, Y. (2015). The role of tasks as vehicles for language learning in classroom interaction. In
N. Markee (Ed.), The handbook of classroom discourse and interaction (pp. 163–181).
Wiley. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118531242.ch10
Kormos, J., & Wilby, J. (2019). Task motivation. In M. Lamb, K. Csizér, A. Henry, & S. Ryan
(Eds.), The Palgrave handbook of motivation for language learning (pp. 267–286).
Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28380-3_13
Kramsch, C. (2008). Ecological perspectives on foreign language education. Language
Teaching, 41(3), 389–408. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444808005065
Lambert, C. (2017). Tasks, affect and second language performance. Language Teaching
Research, 21(6), 657–664. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168817736644
Lambert, C., Philp, J., & Nakamura, S. (2017). Learner-generated content and engagement in
second language task performance. Language Teaching Research, 21(6), 665–680.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168816683559
Lambert, C., & Zhang, G. (2019). Engagement in the use of English and Chinese as foreign
languages: The role of learner-generated content in instructional task design. The Modern
Language Journal, 103(2), 391–411. https://doi.org//10.1111/modl.12560
Lambert, C., Gong, Q., & Zhang, G. (2021). Learner-generated content and the lexical recall of
beginning-level learners of Chinese as a foreign language. Language Teaching Research.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168820981407
Larsen-Freeman, D. (2015). Saying what we mean: Making the case for language acquisition to
become language development. Language Teaching, 48, 491–505.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444814000019
Larsen-Freeman, D. (2017). Complexity theory: The lessons continue. In L. Ortega & Z. Han
(Eds.), Complexity theory and language development: In celebration of Diane Larsen-
Freeman (pp. 12–50). John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/lllt.48.02lar
Larsen-Freeman, D. (2018). Task repetition or task iteration: It does make a difference (pp. 311–
329). In M. Bygate (Ed.), Language learning through task repetition. John Benjamins.
https://doi.org/10.1075/tblt.11.12lar
Larsen-Freeman, D. (2019). On language learner agency: A complex dynamic systems theory
perspective. The Modern Language Journal, 103(s), 61–79.
https://doi.org/10.1111/modl.12536
Li, S., Hiver, P., & Papi, M. (Eds.) (2022). The Routledge handbook of second language
acquisition and individual differences. Routledge.
https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003270546
Long, M. (2015). Second language acquisition and task-based language teaching. Wiley.
Long, M. (2016). In defense of tasks and TBLT: Nonissues and real issues. Annual Review of
Applied Linguistics, 36, 5–33. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0267190515000057
MacIntyre, P. D., & Gregersen, T. (2022). The idiodynamic method: Willingness to
communicate and anxiety processes interacting in real time. International Review of
Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 60(1), 67–84. https://doi.org/10.1515/iral-
2021-0024
Maehr, M. L. (1984). Meaning and motivation. In R. Ames & C. Ames (Eds.), Research on
motivation in education (Vol. 1) (pp. 115–144). Academic Press.
Mercer, S., & Dörnyei, Z. (2020). Engaging language learners in contemporary classrooms.
Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009024563

19
Nakamura, S., Phung, L., & Reinders, H. (2021). The effect of learner choice on L2 task
engagement. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 43(2), 428–441.
https://doi.org/10.1017/S027226312000042X
Oga-Baldwin, W. L. Q. (2019). Acting, thinking, feeling, making, collaborating: The
engagement process in foreign language learning. System, 86, 102–128.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2019.102128
Ohta, A. S. (2001). Second language acquisition processes in the classroom: Learning Japanese.
Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781410604712
Overton, W. F., & Lerner, R. M. (2014). Fundamental concepts and methods in developmental
science: A relational perspective. Research in Human Development, 11(1), 63–73,
https://doi.org/10.1080/15427609.2014.881086
Papi, M., & Hiver, P. (2022). Motivation. In S. Li, P. Hiver, & M. Papi (Eds.), The Routledge
handbook of second language acquisition and individual differences. Routledge.
Philp, J., & Duchesne, S. (2016). Exploring engagement in tasks in the language classroom.
Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, 36, 50–72.
https://doi.org/10.1017/s0267190515000094
Phung, L. (2017). Task preference, affective response, and engagement in L2 use in a US
university context. Language Teaching Research, 21, 751–766.
https://doi.org/10.1177/1362168816683561
Platt, E., & Brooks, F. B. (2002). Task engagement: A turning point in foreign language
development. Language Learning, 52(2), 365–400. https://doi.org/10.1111/0023-
8333.00187
Reschly, A. L., & Christenson, S. L. (Eds.) (2022). Handbook of research on student
engagement (2nd ed.). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07853-8
Seegers, G., & Boekaerts, M. (1993). Task motivation and mathematics achievement in actual
task situations. Learning and Instruction, 3(2), 133–150.
Skinner, E. (2016). Engagement and disaffection as central to processes of motivational
resilience and development. In K. R Wentzel & D. B. Miele (Eds.), Handbook of
motivation at school (pp. 145–168). Routledge.
Storch, N. (2008). Metatalk in a pair work activity: Level of engagement and implications for
language development. Language Awareness, 17(2), 95–114.
https://doi.org/10.2167/la431.0
Sulis, G., & Philp, J. (2021). Exploring connections between classroom environment and
engagement in the foreign language classroom. In P. Hiver, A.H. Al-Hoorie, & S. Mercer
(Eds.), Student engagement in the language classroom (pp. 101–119). Multilingual
Matters. https://doi.org/10.21832/9781788923613-009
Svalberg, A. M. L. (2009). Engagement with language: Developing a construct. Language
Awareness, 18(3–4), 242–258. https://doi.org/10.1080/09658410903197264
Svalberg, A. M. L. (2018). Researching language engagement; Current trends and future
directions. Language Awareness, 27(1-2), 21–39.
https://doi.org/10.1080/09658416.2017.1406490
Svalberg, A. M. L. (2021). Engagement with language in relation to form-focused versus
meaning-focused teaching and learning. In P. Hiver, A.H. Al-Hoorie, & S. Mercer (Eds.),
Student engagement in the language classroom (pp. 38–55). Multilingual Matters.
https://doi.org/10.21832/9781788923613-006

20
 Symonds, J., Kaplan, A., Upadyaya, K., Salmela-Aro, K., Torsney, B., Skinner, E., & Eccles, J.
S. (2021). Momentary student engagement as a dynamic developmental system.
PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/fuy7p
Van den Branden, K. (2016). Task-based language teaching. In G. Hall (Ed.), The Routledge
handbook of English language teaching (pp. 238–251). Routledge.
van Lier, L. (2004). The ecology and semiotics of language learning: A sociocultural
perspective. Kluwer. https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-7912-5

21

View publication stats