To CALL or not to CALL: empirical evidence from neuroscience

The English as a foreign language (EFL) learners’ levels of attention and meditation as well as brainwaves while interacting with an interlocutor in three different second-language (L2) socialization contexts—with another human in person, with another person through a virtual platform, and with an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot—were explored in this study. Thirty participants participated in an experiment, throughout which they were asked to wear a NeuroSky Mindwave headset to assess their real-time levels of attention and meditation, as well as their brainwave activities in each of the three contexts. Statistical analyses of the results revealed a significant effect of the EFL socialization context on participants’ level of attention and meditation. The EFL learners’ level of attention was highest when they were socializing with other humans in person. When their interlocutor was a chatbot, their level of meditation was highest. When they were interacting with another person in a virtual environment, both their attention and meditation were lowest. A one-way multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) revealed a significant main effect of the dominant ratios of participants’ brainwave activities, based on their interactions with interlocutors in all three contexts. The AI chatbot was associated with the greatest dominant ratio of delta and theta brainwaves for EFL learners. Face-to-face L2 socialization with interlocutors triggered alpha and beta brainwaves, whereas interaction with human interlocutors in the virtual environment made gamma brainwaves dominant. The present study is the first to have empirically examined EFL learners’ levels of attention and meditation as well as brainwaves during L2 socialization in three different contexts.