420    Research in the Teaching of English   

Volume 47    May 2013

The Role of Previously Learned Languages in the Thought Processes

of Multilingual Writers at the Deutsche Schule Barcelona

Brandon D. Tullock
Marta Fernández-Villanueva
University of Barcelona, Spain

In recent years, scholars have voiced the need for research which focuses on the ability of multilin-
guals to write across multiple languages rather than on the limitations that they face when com-
posing in a non-native language. In order to better understand multilingual writers as resourceful
and creative problem-solvers, the current study aims to investigate how German/Spanish/Catalan
multilinguals draw on the full extent of their linguistic repertoires to solve lexical problems while
writing in their fourth language, English. Think-aloud data were collected from 10 informants
(8 female, 2 male; ages 16-17) in a German immersion secondary school in Barcelona, Spain.
Analysis of the participants’ protocols revealed that the activation of lexical items across several
languages was a common approach to tackling lexical problems. The writers’ resourcefulness and
creativity were apparent in the activation of cognate forms and their willingness to experiment
with language. In their metacomments, they expressed awareness of their strategic behavior as
well as their degree of satisfaction with their solutions. It is argued that more research into the
strategic behavior of multilingual writers is necessary in order to inform multilingual pedagogy.

Introduction
Multilingual writers are a rapidly growing demographic in today’s modern, global-
ized society, as more and more individuals are finding it necessary to engage in
written communication in multiple languages on a regular basis. To date, however,
most research on multilingual writing has been conducted with the monolingual
native speaker as a model and has viewed phenomena such as code-switching and
the appearance of non-standard forms in written texts as representative of a deficit.
This gives cause for concern to a number of scholars, who work at what Ortega
and Carson (2010) call “the interface between L2 (second language) writing and
SLA (second language acquisition)” (p. 48). Grosjean’s (1989) statement that “a
bilingual is not two monolinguals in one person,” along with Cook’s (e.g., 2010)
notion of “multi-competence,” that is, the unique set of skills and metacognitive
knowledge developed as a result of knowing multiple languages, have challenged

420 Research in the Teaching of English Volume 47, Number 4, May 2013
Copyright © 2013 by the National Council of Teachers of English. All rights reserved.

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 421

the idea of a monolingual norm and led certain researchers to call for a reorienta-
tion of writing research. According to Ortega and Carson, this different approach
will allow us to focus on “what multicompetent writers can do, as opposed to only
understanding what they cannot or wish not to do in their L2” (p. 65). Canagarajah
(2006), taking a similar stance, argues that multilingual writing research needs
to challenge a monolingual bias in order to understand multilinguals better as
resourceful problem-solvers, “shuttling creatively through discourses in order to
achieve their communicative objectives” (p. 591). Textual differences, he says, should
be considered as the result of strategic choices rather than unconscious errors and
that by studying the processes behind these choices we can come to understand
the resources multilinguals bring to their texts.
Perhaps one of the most important resources multilingual writers possess is
their ability to refer to their full linguistic repertoire while composing. In a recent
review, Manchón, Murphy, and Roca de Larios (2007) note that writers have been
shown to deploy their L1 (first language) for a variety of purposes in all stages of
composition. This behavior has been observed in multilingual writers at all profi-
ciency levels and seems to facilitate rather than inhibit text production by reducing
the load on working memory and providing access to key lexical items (see also
Manchón, Roca de Larios, & Murphy, 2009). L1 use during L2 writing is a widely
documented phenomenon, and researchers generally agree that writers use all the
languages in their linguistic repertoire while writing. This is evidenced by studies
of cross-linguistic influence, which have found evidence of transfer from multiple
languages in multilinguals’ written texts (e.g., Cenoz & Gorter, 2011). However,
few studies of the multilingual writing process have gone beyond two languages,
and the role played by non-target languages besides the L1 during composition
remains unexplored. Meanwhile, in the field of multilingualism, the role of the
L2 in L3 (third-language) acquisition and production has proved to be a fruitful
area of study, as L3 learners have been shown to rely heavily on their L2, especially
in early stages of learning (e.g., Hammarberg, 2001; Williams & Hammarberg,
1998; see also Falk & Bardel, 2010). In contexts with favorable attitudes toward
bilingualism, being bilingual has also been linked to advantages in the acquisition
of additional languages due to increased metalinguistic awareness, knowledge of
personal learning strategies, enhanced communication strategies, and a wider lin-
guistic repertoire that can be exploited as a base for transfer (Cenoz, 2003). Thus,
we feel that more research is warranted on how multilinguals’ repertoires at the
resource level (Hayes, 2012) dynamically interact while writing in environments
where multilingualism is socially promoted.
The aim of the present study is to go beyond two languages and examine the
role that previously learned languages play in the lexical searches of German/
Spanish/Catalan multilinguals as they write in their L4 (fourth language), English.
It was inspired by “The Tyrol Study,” where Jessner (2006) used concurrent think-

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 422    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

aloud protocols to gain insight into the cross-lexical problem-solving behavior of

German/Italian bilingual students at the University of Innsbruck as they wrote
in English. The research presented here was carried out in a German immersion
secondary school in Barcelona, Spain, where students have daily contact with
two Germanic and up to three Romance languages. The analysis will focus on
the writers’ strategic use of all the languages in their repertoire as they search for
lexical items, and the discussion will highlight the strategic awareness of these
multicompetent individuals in order to identify what they are actually doing as
creative and resourceful problem-solvers.

Literature Review
Multilingual Writing
Despite its age, Flower and Hayes’ (1981) Planning-Translating-Reviewing model
contains features that are still current in modern representations of writing. This
is especially true in Hayes’ (2012) latest revised model, which includes a control,
a process, and a resource level—the control level including motivation, goal set-
ting and writing schemas; the process level including the writing process and the
task environment; and the resource level containing working memory, attention
and long-term memory (along with all learners’ linguistic repertoires). The three
macroprocesses involved in writing—planning, translating, and reviewing—remain
in the Hayes (2012) model as proposing, translation, transcription, and evalua-
tion. (Henceforth, “translation/translator” will be referred to as “formulation/
formulator” in order to avoid confusion in a foreign language context.) In the latest
model, writers proceed through these stages in a recursive fashion, shifting their
focus to one process or the other as they attend to both high-level and low-level
goals. At the process level, the “proposer” is responsible for generating a preverbal
message. The “formulator” receives this input and converts it into a pre-text, or
candidate text, which is stored in an articulatory buffer in working memory where
it is evaluated. If deemed acceptable, it is added to the written “text thus far,” and
if not, the process may begin again with the generation of new ideas or alternative
pre-texts. The “evaluator” is supposed to be involved in all of these stages, making
judgments related to the intended written product (Hayes, 2012).
The main area where foreign language (FL) writing distinguishes itself from
L1 writing is in formulation. For formulation to be fluent, writers must have easy,
if not automatic, access to a wide range of target language knowledge. In foreign
language contexts, however, this knowledge is often limited, making it necessary
for writers to divert their attention away from the text as a whole in order to at-
tend to linguistic issues. Writers have been found to devote most of their time to
formulation (between 60% to 80%) when writing in either the L1 or the FL (Roca
de Larios, Marín, & Murphy, 2001; Wang & Wen, 2002; see also Manchón et al.,

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 423

2009). However, FL formulation entails a greater amount of problem-solving, where

writers take steps to bridge the gap between an initial state and their communica-
tive goals. Roca de Larios et al. (2001) found that the ratio of fluent formulation
to problem-solving formulation was 5:1 in L1 writing and 2:1 in FL writing.
Lexical issues are common in FL writing, which involves a wider range of lexical
problems than monolingual writing. Roca de Larios, Manchón, and Murphy (1996)
put into four categories the types of problems L1 and L2 writers face in trying to
transform preverbal messages into language that accurately reflects the intended
meaning and conforms to the appropriate rhetorical style and register of the task.
P1 problems occur when writers struggle to retrieve the words needed to express a
concept from long-term memory. P2 problems are unique to bi/multilingual writing;
they occur when the appropriate lexical item is available in a non-target language
and must be translated into the language of the text. P3 problems involve a writer’s
desire to improve upon an available item in the target language, and P4 problems
indicate insecurity about the accuracy or the appropriateness of a selected lexical
item. P4 problems are theoretically common to both L1 and L2 writers but were
only found in L2 data in the above-mentioned study.
When FL writers encounter lexical problems, they use all the resources available
to them, including prompts and the already written text, dictionaries when available
and linguistic resources stored in long-term memory, along with the writers’ L1
and other known languages (Manchón et al., 2007). One way of bridging the gap
between a concept and the language needed to express it is by generating pre-texts,
or tentative formulations, in the L1 or another known language. This behavior
can be accompanied by a wide range of strategies, such as generating synonyms
until an appropriate match is chosen and translated, repetition, paraphrasing, or
segmenting one’s meaning (see Manchón et al., 2007). This tendency for writers
to activate the L1 while writing led Wang and Wen (2002, p. 239) to state that “the
L2 writing process is a bilingual event.”
Another way learners use other known languages to tackle lexical problems
is by backtranslating target language pre-texts into the L1, using it as a yardstick
to measure the appropriateness of the item they have chosen. This is a variety
of backtracking, the process of moving one’s attention back and forth between
already written text and the text that is currently being produced. Backtracking
helps learners focus on the main task objectives, review the main points of what
they have written, and stimulate text production by freeing up cognitive resources.
It may involve a complete rereading, a summary, or paraphrasing of the text or
writing prompt in any language (Manchón, Roca de Larios, & Murphy, 2000).
Much research has been conducted in order to determine how variables such
as proficiency, task complexity, and general writing expertise affect the extent to
which writers use other languages while composing. However, mixed results have
been found, and these variables seem to interact in complex ways. Nevertheless,

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 424    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

L1 use seems to be common to FL writers at all proficiency levels (Van Weijen,

Van den Bergh, Rijlaarsdam, & Sanders, 2009; Wang, 2003; Wang & Wen, 2002;
Woodall, 2002). In a recent study, Murphy and Roca de Larios (2010) identified
six different purposes for which advanced learners of English as a foreign language
switched to the L1 during lexical searches. Aside from generating pre-texts and
backtracking, learners also used their mother tongue to access metalinguistic
knowledge encoded in the L1 and to monitor their writing process by engaging
in self-talk to focus attention on problems, evaluate solutions, and comment on
their strategic approach.
Having seen the important role the L1 plays in bilingual composition, one may
ask the question, “What is the role of the L2 in L3 composition?” The following
section allows us to view this issue in light of the broader discussion surrounding
the role of the L2 in L3 acquisition and use.

Cross-linguistic Interaction in Multilinguals

Traditionally, research on cross-linguistic influence, or transfer, has only focused on
the effects of the L1 on a language currently being acquired. However, as research-
ers have begun to pay more attention to other languages known to multilingual
subjects, they have seen that cross-linguistic influence is not limited to transfer
from the L1 but can involve all of a multilingual’s languages. Multilingual learners
have been shown to prefer relying on their L2 to support the acquisition of an L3,
especially at the early stages of acquisition (e.g., Hammarberg, 2001; Wang, 2003;
Williams & Hammarberg, 1998).
The literature on cross-linguistic influence has identified an extensive list of
factors that contribute to the activation of one language over another (see Hall &
Ecke, 2003). However, some factors play a more important role than others, and
the three that appear most frequently are (psycho)typology or language distance,
proficiency, and L2 status. Learners tend to activate languages that are perceived
as being more closely related to the target language during production—or having
less “language distance.” They also show a preference for languages in which they
are more proficient, but L2 status may override this, as learners may choose their
L2 over their L1 on the basis of its status as a foreign language, especially if this
language is typologically close.
Studies of cross-linguistic influence on writing have shown the importance
of transfer strategies to multilingual writers. Navés, Miralpeix, and Celaya (2005)
studied the effects of grade level on the strategies of borrowing and lexical inven-
tions. The researchers found a decrease in the use of both of these strategies as
grade level increased, but this difference was only significant for borrowing. In the
trilingual context of the Basque Country, Cenoz and Gorter (2011) examined the
texts of adolescent writers across all their languages and found evidence of transfer
among all three languages, even influence of the L2 and L3 on the L1.

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 425

Currently, one of the most influential multilingual models is the Dynamic

Model of Multilingualism (Herdina & Jessner, 2002; Jessner, 2006, 2008), in which
languages are not conceived of as separate entities but rather as dynamic and
interdependent systems, with the acquisition of new language systems being sup-
ported by those already present in the multilingual mind. The language systems
known to a learner are in constant flux and interact in complex ways. This concept
of “cross-linguistic interaction” goes a step further than cross-linguistic influence
and includes phenomena such as code-switching and cross-linguistic comparison.
According to the Dynamic Model of Multilingualism, the presence and interac-
tion of multiple language systems in the multilingual mind produces the so-called
Multilingualism-factor, or M-factor, a phenomenon that may be responsible for
advantages in further language acquisition.
Under the Dynamic Model of Multilingualism paradigm, Jessner (2006) con-
ducted one of the few studies devoted to the writing process of multilinguals. She
analyzed the strategic behavior of German/Italian multilinguals as they searched for
words while writing in English. Although the participants had grown up in German/
Italian speaking households, German turned out to be the dominant language used
by most of the writers, who were studying at the University of Innsbruck in Austria.
It was the preferred language for starting a search for lexical items and the source
of most borrowings, while Italian was used to backtranslate and evaluate items
about which learners had doubts, especially in the case of Latin-based cognates.
Jessner also analyzed metalanguage as the most explicit form of linguistic
awareness. She found that language switches preceded by metalanguage were more
frequent in trilingual than in bilingual strategies. Metalanguage also seemed to be
related to language dominance, as most of the Italian metalanguage was produced
by only two subjects, who were Italian dominant and had daily contact with Italian
through university classes and Italian-speaking friends. Those students who were
German dominant showed a clear preference for German in both their compensa-
tory strategies and their metalanguage. Jessner identified two types of awareness
exhibited by her informants: cross-linguistic awareness, defined as the tacit or
explicit awareness of the other active non-target languages during production,
and metalinguistic awareness, which made this comparison possible. (See also
Jessner, 2005, 2008.)

Research Questions
The present study aims to contribute to what is known about multilingual writing
by observing the interplay between the languages that make up the repertoires
of multilingual writers as they engage in lexical problem-solving in a context in
which multilingualism is socially promoted. The following research questions will
be addressed:

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 426    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

1. To what extent do multilingual writers think in previously learned lan-

guages while composing in English?
2. To what extent do writers rely on previously learned languages when
searching for lexical items in English?
3. What role is played by previously learned languages in lexical searches?

Method
Participants
The participants (8 females, 2 males; ages 16-17) were selected from the 11th class,
or grade, of Gymnasium, the university preparatory path, at the Deutsche Schule
Barcelona (henceforth the Schule) on the basis of their linguistic configuration.
At the Schule, German is the language of instruction, but students also at-
tend Spanish class every day for all twelve years. As a result, students at the Schule
develop near-native-like levels of competence in both German and at least one
community language, regardless of their L1, which may be German, Spanish, or
Catalan. Catalan is also taught for the first nine years, but then it becomes an op-
tional subject along with French. English is taught as a foreign language for three
hours a week from the 5th year onward. In the 11th year, students are supposed
to have approximately a B2 (upper-intermediate) level of English.
The linguistic configuration of these students is particularly interesting
because of the typology of the languages involved. Spanish, Catalan and French
are Romance languages, whereas English and German are both West Germanic.
Despite its classification as a Germanic language, English derives a large portion
of its vocabulary from Romance languages.
Since students at the Schule come from varied linguistic backgrounds, the
status of each language in the mind of the participant depends on his or her L1.
The sociolinguistic status of each language taught at the Schule also varies:

• German—language of instruction
• Spanish—community language with instructional support
• Catalan—community language with fewer hours of instructional support
• English—first foreign language
• French—second foreign language

All 26 students who volunteered to take part in the study were asked to fill
out a sociolinguistic background questionnaire that included questions about the
acquisition of their languages as well as their patterns of use at home, at school,
and at activities outside school. As proficiency in both German and at least one of
the community languages was considered to be a crucial factor, only those who
were born in Spain and had received all of their formal education at the Schule

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 427

were considered as potential candidates. As a further control for L2 proficiency,

the eligible students completed the DIALANG word-recognition task1 in their L2
(German or Spanish), and only those who scored above 600 (advanced) were in-
cluded. The L1 was determined by using the students’ self-reported first language
and crosschecking them with the language background and use questionnaires.
Three participants had Spanish as an L1, 3 had Catalan, and 4 had German. Eng-
lish proficiency was also measured using the DIALANG word recognition task.
After these measures were taken, eleven willing participants qualified to take part
in the study. However, one participant, who failed to perform the task, was later
eliminated.

Writing Task
The writing task for this study was a response to the prompt: “How is growing up
nowadays different from growing up in your parents’ generation?” This topic was
chosen because it was related to what the students were presently studying in their
English classes, the assumption being that the ideational content necessary for
composing the essay would be easy to access and more working memory would
be available to deal with lexical problems. The students were given 30 minutes
to write approximately 200 words. These are roughly the conditions given to the
participants in Wang’s (2003) study and are similar to the constraints faced by
writers during English language examinations.

Data Collection Procedure

For the purposes of the present study, data were collected using think-aloud pro-
tocols, also referred to as verbal or concurrent protocols. This method was selected
because it gives immediate, direct access to writers’ thought processes (Cohen, 1996).
The authors are aware of the criticism that has been raised against this method
and took steps to reduce threats to validity. According to Manchón, Murphy, and
Roca de Larios (2005), the main threats associated with this method are reactivity
to the task and interaction effects between the writer and researcher. In order to
combat reactivity, the informants were given clear and simple instructions about
the task they were expected to perform, and they had several minutes to practice
thinking aloud on their own before carrying out the task. Meanwhile, we avoided
creating expectations about the kind of information we were after. Modeling
thinking aloud was avoided, as this might influence their behavior (Wang, 2003).
In order to minimize interaction effects, the task instructions were identical for all
the participants, and interaction between the writer and researcher was also kept
to a minimum in order to reduce variability in the way the informants performed
the task.
The data collection procedure was carried out over three days. On the first
day, the students were familiarized with thinking aloud and were given a mock
composition to practice on their own. On the second day, two interlocutors (an

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 428    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

English native speaker along with a Spanish native speaker) conducted two record-
ing sessions in which four students were recorded individually in separate rooms
at the Schule at the same time as their regular English lessons. All instructions were
given to the participants in English so as not to influence their language-switching
behavior. Once again, they were given a mock composition to practice thinking
aloud for about ten minutes as the interlocutors selectively listened in to make sure
that they performed the technique properly. Then the students were given the actual
task and began writing their compositions. The interlocutors sporadically listened
in as the students were writing and prompted them to keep talking or to speak up
when necessary. In order to keep interaction to a minimum, interlocutors only
intervened if the informant was quiet for more than eight seconds. Once the end
of the time limit was reached, the subjects were told to finish their compositions,
which were then collected so that they could be referred to when segmenting the
transcribed data. Students were allowed to finish early or were granted a couple of
extra minutes to finish up their compositions when necessary. No dictionaries were
provided to the writers, as the study aimed to find out how they used the resources
available to them in their current stage of linguistic development. On the third
day, the remaining three students were recorded following the same procedure.
This time an additional interlocutor, a native speaker of German, was present.

Data Preparation
The first step in preparing the data for analysis was transcribing the recorded
think-aloud data. The first author, along with another trained linguist who was a
fluent speaker in all the languages involved, transcribed word for word what the
subjects said, along with phenomena such as long pauses, hesitations, yawning
and coughing. The data were then segmented and matched to sentences in the
students’ actual written compositions. Once this was done, the data were prepared
in three phases.
First, words in the compositions and words in the protocols were counted.
Composition time was measured from the instant the subjects started talking to
the moment they finished. The next step was to isolate formulation from planning,
taken to mean the planning of ideas, and from revision, which includes revisions
made to the already written text. Following Roca de Larios et al. (2001), formulation
included “both the verbalization of written material and those other utterances that,
because of their strict linear nature (lexical units, syntactic structures, etc.) could be
considered clear candidates for becoming part of the text” (pp. 510-511). Changes
made to the sentence currently being written were also categorized as formulation.
Then, lexical searches during formulation were isolated. In order to be con-
sidered a lexical search, two elements were required: evidence of a lexical gap
between what the learner wanted to say and what he or she was able to say, as well
as steps taken toward solving the problem. Sometimes a problem was revealed

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 429

through explicit problem indicators such as “How do you say…?” At other times
the perception of a problem was related to implicit clues such as long pauses or
repetition of a pre-text with a rising intonation. Those instances where the writer
expressed a word in a non-target language and then effortlessly translated the word
into English without any intervening steps were coded as binary searches and were
not included in lexical searches (see Appendix 1 for transcription conventions):

Example of a Binary Search

“…because they lived in another societat, (C: society) society.” CR
Lexical searches were also distinguished from restructuring problems, which involve
the search for an alternate syntactic structure after a problem had been encountered
with the initial structure:

Example of Restructuring
“This is a a topic which…[cough] which… ¿cómo se dice con el que (S: how do you say
‘with which’)? With…No. No para empezar (S: no, not to start out) [cough]” This is a
topic which with that I CP

Orthographical problems were also excluded from the analysis. Once lexical
searches had been identified they were counted and categorized according to the
languages involved.
In the final phase, the lexical searches were broken down into the steps taken,
starting with the occurrence of the problem and going up to the point where the
subject either decided on a solution, even if it was only a tentative one, or gave up
and moved on. Once the lexical searches had been broken down into their compo-
nents, those problem-solving steps that involved the use of a non-target language
were identified and put into the following six categories taken from Murphy and
Roca de Larios (2010): generating lexical units or pre-texts; backtracking or back-
translating; self-questioning, problem-indicating and problem-focusing; evaluation;
metalinguistic appeal; and metacomments.
In order to establish consistency in coding the data, the first author and a
trained colleague coded two of the compositions separately. These decisions were
then compared and any disagreements were resolved. Then the same author coded
the rest of the compositions.

Results
Before interpreting the results, it is important to mention some important dif-
ferences that were observed regarding participants’ English proficiency and the
number of words in the protocols and the compositions. Half of the participants
scored at an advanced learner level (601-900) while the other half scored at the
intermediate level (401-600). The means for the Spanish and Catalan L1 students
were similar (569 and 594, respectively), while the mean proficiency of the German

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 430    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

L1 students turned out to be much higher (706). Additionally, composition length

varied, ranging from 138 words to 371. Finally, some students were better verbal-
izers than others, and the number of words in the protocols varied widely. The
descriptive statistics of the informants’ protocols and compositions are reported
in Table 1 along with their proficiency scores in English and their L2.

RQ1: To what extent do multilingual writers think in previously

learned languages while composing in English?
The first research question was asked in order to obtain a general overview of
the languages that were active during composition. In order to respond to this
question, the percentage of words in each language were calculated following the
procedure outlined in Manchón, Roca de Larios, and Murphy (2000). The words
in the protocol were totaled, and then the words in each language were counted.
Then the number of words in the students’ compositions was subtracted from
both the total number of words in the protocol and the total number of English
words. Finally, a percentage was calculated in each language. The percentages as
well as the raw number of words produced in each language are reported in Table 2.
In accordance with previous writing studies, languages other than the target
language were active during the production. These were not limited to the L1, how-
ever. All students, regardless of L1, thought in German, although three used fewer
than 10 German words. Eight of the informants, including 2 German-dominant
and all Catalan-dominant writers, thought in Spanish, while use of Catalan was
confined to the Catalan L1 writers. CR used every language in her linguistic rep-

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics

L2 Proficiency
English Words in Words in
Writers* (G=German,
Proficiency Protocol Composition
S=Spanish)
SN 457(Int.) G730 2,789 304
SB 532(Int.) G940 2,681 184
SJ 720(Adv.) G802 1,709 223
CA 690(Adv.) G649 1,163 275
CP 531(Int.) G807 1,652 285
CR 561(Int.) G652 1,442 327
GC 590(Int.) S730 1,676 371
GJ 727(Adv.) S703 1,040 263
GS 730(Adv.) S730 1,067 217
GR 778(Adv.) S778 1,103 138
*Note: The first letter of the abbreviation indicates the writer’s L1 (Spanish, Catalan, or German). The second
letter is part of the writer’s pseudonym.

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 431

Table 2. Overall Language Use in Protocols

English German Spanish Catalan French Words in
Writers %/ %/ %/ %/ %/ Protocol
words words words words words (Adjusted)
SN 35.7 / 888 0.5 / 12 63.8 / 1,585 2,485
SB 88.4 / 2,392 0.6 / 15 11.0 / 274 2,497
SJ 49.1 / 953 0.6 / 9 50.3 / 747 1,486
CA 62.5 / 830 0.2 / 2 36.8 / 327 0.5 / 4 888
CP 88.0 / 1,487 0.1 / 1 5.3 / 72 6.7 / 92 1,367
CR 14.3 / 486 1.6 / 18 4.9 / 54 79.1 / 882 0.2 / 2 1,115
GC 76.0 / 1,363 9.8 / 128 14.2 / 185 1,305
GJ 97.3 / 1,019 2.7 / 21 777
GS 77.1 / 872 22.9 / 195 850
GR 28.0 / 408 71.4 / 689 0.6 / 6 965

ertoire, including French, a language she had been studying for under than three
years, lending support to the notion that writers draw upon their full linguistic
repertoire while composing.
The majority of the writers in this study preferred their L1 except for CA and
GC, who both used Spanish more than their L1 to support their composition. Ac-
cording to the information gathered in the background questionnaire, CA comes
from a Spanish-Catalan bilingual household and speaks only Spanish with one
of her parents, and her patterns of use reveal that she mostly uses Spanish with
friends at school. At the beginning of her composition, she starts to express herself
in Catalan before switching to Spanish:

Primer, primer les diferencias de (C: first, first the differences from) ayer . . . una
introducción . . . (S: yesterday . . . an introduction)

After these first four words, she never goes back to formulating her thoughts in
Catalan. GC, on the other hand, maintained a balance between German and Spanish
while composing. Her linguistic background questionnaire shows that, unlike the
other German L1 speakers, she mainly uses Catalan at home and only sometimes
uses German to communicate with her family. Meanwhile, with friends at school
she always uses either German or Spanish and never Catalan. The predominance
of Spanish and German over Catalan at the Schule could have influenced these
individuals to restrict their Catalan use to non-academic contexts.

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 432    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

RQ2: To what extent do writers rely on previously learned languages

when searching for lexical items in English?
The learners in this study carried out 111 lexical searches while writing their com-
positions, ranging from 1 to 36 lexical searches per individual. As some participants
wrote much longer compositions than others, the frequency of lexical searches was
calculated by dividing the number of lexical searches by number of words in the
composition. To make proficiency-related differences more visible, the informants
are organized according to proficiency level in Table 3.
The mean number of lexical searches per 100 words was 4.13 (sd = 3.14).
There was a great deal of variation in the frequency with which learners tackled
lexical problems, ranging from 0.38 to 11.84. A high Spearman rank correlation
was found between English proficiency and the frequency of lexical searches (r =
-0.8788, p <.001). This correlation is not surprising, given that we would expect
lower proficiency learners to have more difficulty accessing lexical items, which
would in turn lead to more frequent lexical problems.
On average, students with a Romance language as an L1 encountered more
lexical problems than those with German as their L1. While the overall higher
English proficiency of the German L1 group is likely to be partially responsible
for their low number of lexical searches, this interpretation should be regarded
with caution. Closer inspection suggests that it may also be attributed to one
participant’s lack of verbalization, as evidenced by frequent long pauses as well as
a low number of words in her protocol. In addition, another German-dominant
participant was beset with ideational problems from the outset, and spent most

Table 3. Lexical Searches by English Proficiency Level

Lexical Search Lexical Searches
English Lexical
Writers Frequency/100 in Non-target
Proficiency Searches
words Languages
SN 457 36 11.84 35/36
CP 531 15 5.26 15/15
SB 532 13 7.07 11/13
CR 561 10 3.06 10/10
GC 590 15 4.04 13/15
CA 690 7 2.55 7/7
SJ 720 8 3.59 6/8
GJ 727 1 0.38 1/1
GS 730 3 1.38 3/3
GR 778 3 2.17 3/3
Total 111 104/111

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 433

of his time thinking about what to say in response to the prompt rather than how
to say it. As a result, he spent less time formulating and wrote a much shorter
composition than the others.
Of the 111 lexical searches in our data, 104 of them involved non-target lan-
guages. Even GJ, who carried out 97.3% of her composition in English, used her L1
to help her access a lexical item. A closer look at the searches involving non-target
languages revealed which ones were used. Of these 104 searches, 81 were bilingual,
22 were trilingual, and 1 was quadrilingual. These results are similar to Jessner’s
(2006), who also found more bilingual than trilingual searches.
Overall, Spanish was clearly dominant in the bilingual searches (62 of 81, see
Table 4). This dominance can be partially accounted for by the fact that over half
of these were produced by Spanish speakers, who overwhelmingly preferred their
L1. This preference for the L1 was also shared by 3 of the 4 German speakers and
1 Catalan speaker.
Seven of the 10 participants used up to 3 or 4 languages in their lexical searches
(see Table 5). The three German students who tackled fewer lexical problems than
the other participants only used German. The most frequent combination of
languages used in lexical searches was German/Spanish/English (13), followed by
German/Catalan/English (4) and Spanish/Catalan/English (4), while the combina-
tions Catalan/French/English and German/Spanish/Catalan/English each occurred
once. Again, a clear preference for the L1 can be observed, as 19 of the 23 tri- or
quadrilingual lexical searches involved the participant’s L1.

Table 4. Languages Involved in Bilingual Searches

Writers G/E S/E C/E Total
SN 29 29
SB 2 7 9
SJ 5 5
CA 5 5
CP 10 3 13
CR 2 2
GC 2 9 11
GJ 1 1
GS 3 3
GR 3 3
Total 11 62 5 81

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 434    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

Table 5. Languages Involved in Multilingual Searches

Trilingual Quadrilingual
Writers G/S/E G/C/E S/C/E C/F/E Total G/S/C/E
SN 6 6
SB 2 2
SJ 1 1
CA 2 2
CP 1 1 1
CR 4 3 1 8
GC 2 2
Total 13 4 4 1 22 1

RQ3: What role is played by previously learned languages in lexical

searches?
The third research question was asked in order to shed light on writers’ purposes for
switching to languages besides the target language and the L1. As the main interest
of this study was to go beyond L1 use, those three subjects who only used their L1
German were excluded from this part of the analysis. The following examples were
selected for the dual purpose of exemplifying the categories that were used (from
Murphy & Roca de Larios, 2010) and for illustrating the idiosyncratic approach
these multicompetent learners took to tackling lexical problems.

Generating Lexical Units or Pre-texts

One of the most common ways learners use previously learned languages during
lexical searches is to produce pre-texts, or candidate texts. The generation of pre-
texts indicates the selection of a preverbal concept for which the target language
item is not immediately accessible, so lexical units consisting of one or more words
were produced in one or more languages in order to bridge the gap between the
writer’s intended meaning and the target item. In the protocols, this was often
accompanied by repetition and the activation of synonyms across languages. In
the present study, this process seemed to be almost effortless, as when both Span-
ish and German were activated before producing the equivalent term in English:

“Aunque sea muy innecessario (S: although it’s very unnecessary), obwohl (G:
although), aunque (S: although), although it, it’s a bit innecessary…” SA

However, this process could also entail a struggle to activate the target linguistic
form, as in the following example, where SJ switched back and forth between Ger-
man and Spanish before finally settling on “time”:

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 435

“. . . that each Epoche (G: epoch) , Epoche, die Epoche, época (S: epoch) each, that each,
each, // época, each // Epoche, época, each Epoche, época, // that each . . . time,” SJ

Backtracking and Backtranslating

Backtracking, or rescanning already produced text, is a strategy that can be deployed
in a target or non-target language. Backtracking can involve reading over what has
already been written in order to stimulate text production (P1 problems, to use
Roca de Larios, Manchón, and Murphy’s, 1996, terminology). Additionally, when
a learner has doubts about the correctness or appropriateness of a lexical item (P4
problems), the writer may backtranslate the item in order to evaluate it (Manchón
et al., 2000). Both kinds of backtracking appear in the excerpt below. CR reiter-
ates the first part of her clause, repeating the stem, “sense” (C: without) in order
to stimulate the generation of ideas. Once she expresses her idea in Catalan, she
generates pre-texts in Catalan and French. Finally, she comes up with the English
form “take” and, after backtranslating it into Catalan and finding it acceptable,
she includes it in her text:

“. . . sense . . . ehm, sense vigilar, (C: without watching out) sense, sense, sense que
la policia te (C: without the police), with the, with the policia, sense que la policia ehm
. . . et detengui . . . (C: detaining you) arrête, arrête, (F: arrest) ehm, eh the police . . .
take, t’emporti, (C: take you away) ehm sense que la policia t’emporti (C: without the
police taking you away).” CR

Self-Questioning, Problem-Indicating and Problem-Focusing

Writers monitor their problem-solving activity as they become aware of their
lexical problems and attempt to focus on them though questions or comments
that lead to strategic behavior. Here, SC’s self-questioning reveals the activation
of both Spanish and German:

“You have the, you have the, you have ehm easier options, easier opti- no, opciones (S:
options) you have easier, ¿cómo se dice opciones en inglés? (S: how do you say ‘options’
in English?) You have easier ways to get in connection, connect, wie heißt denn..? (G:
how do you say..?) Para conectarse con alguien, para poder (S: to connect with someone,
to be able to) connect you have easier ways to . . .” SC

Sometimes the question frame did not necessarily match the language of the pre-
text, as in the following examples, both from CR:

“Com dir (C: how to say) ‘vor allem’ (G: above all)?” CR
“Com es diu (C: how do you say) ‘Einkommen’ (G: income)?” CR

Following Murphy and Roca de Larios (2010), we also included fillers such as “a
ver (S: let’s see)” in this category, as they served a problem-focusing purpose and
often preceded re-readings or other strategic behavior.

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 436    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

Evaluation
Evaluation goes hand in hand with problem-focusing. Learners also engage in
self-talk to evaluate the correctness or appropriateness of their solutions. Here,
the facility with which the participants switched between languages is evident. In
this example, CP uses Spanish for evaluation, Catalan for problem-focusing, and
German for generating a pre-text:

“. . . that folgs (G: leads) to that, that eh, cause, no, causes otra vez no, (S: not ‘causes’
again) ehm that leads to..aviam ja hi he posat leads (C: let’s see have I put down ‘leads’
yet)? Hmm..which leads, si. Bueno, es igual (S: Yes, well it’s okay) that leads to ehm a
different, a different, com es diu? A veure (C: how do you say it? Let’s see), and that leads
to a different growing up . . .” CP

Metacomments
In lexical problem solving, writers made metacomments, which provided insight
into the writers’ awareness of their problem-solving approach as well as shed light
on affective factors such as engagement with the task. An example is in the fol-
lowing excerpt, where SN has decided to include the term “actuality” despite her
observation that it “sounds Spanish.“

“I think to live in the, in the actuality, so bueno una esp-, una españolada que le estoy
metiendo (S: well I’m making it sound very Spanish),. . .” SN

On the other hand, note CR’s appropriation of the English language as she shows
no reservations about coining the word “dictature” in the example below:

“They lived in, dictadura en anglès (dictatorship in English)? Pff, Bueno me lo saco de
la manga y pim pam (S: well, I’ll make it up [literally: I’ll pull it out of my sleeve] and
‘pim pam’), they, // they lived in a dictature.” CR

Metalinguistic Appeal
Metalinguistic appeal is another strategy where learners focus on language as
an object using metalinguistic terms, which can be standard or explained in the
subject’s own words. Two examples are the following:

“sinónimo (S: synonym), ehm allow, ehm… zulassen (G: allow)?” SB

“otra palabra para conectar (S: another word for connect).” SC

The top three purposes for which writers used previously learned languages
were for generating lexical units; evaluation; and self-questioning, problem-indi-
cating and problem-focusing; whereas backtracking and backtranslating; meta-
comments; and metalinguistic appeal were found to a lesser extent. Spanish was

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 437

the dominant language in all the categories, and it was also the most widely used,
which is related to the overall preference for Spanish by most of the informants
in this sample. Catalan was the second most frequently used language, followed
by German. French was only used once. The widest array of languages was used
for generating pre-texts, and this purpose was the main one for which German
was used. In Figure 1, the overall frequencies of each purpose are displayed and
broken down by the language used.
While Spanish was the dominant language used for generating pre-texts, every
single writer in the sample also used German for this purpose, as is illustrated in
Figure 2. Further qualitative analysis of the subjects’ language switching behavior
in generating pre-texts revealed several episodes where writers seemed to be at least
tacitly aware of language distance at the word level. CR, who did most of her think-
ing in Catalan, generated lexical units in the widest variety of languages, including
the cognate forms: arrête (F: arrest), Einkommen (G: income), and Haushalt (G:
household). Although in all three of these cases she opted for a simplified target
form, it is possible that she was tacitly aware of and was attempting to activate the
English cognate forms. Her use of cognates also appears in the following excerpt,
when she backtranslates “attend” and expresses doubts about its appropriateness
but decides to include it anyway:

Figure 1. Purposes for Using Non-Target Language, by Language

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 438    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

Figure 2. Generating Pre-texts: Individual Frequencies

“women had to stay at home and, ehm.. ehm fer coses a casa (C: do things at home),
Haushalt (G: Household), ehm Haushalt, ehm ehm Haushalt, ehm com es diu (C: how
do you say it)? At home and do and and clean la casa o cuinar (C: the house or cook)
or attend attender, prestar attenció,(C: tend to, pay attention) o ayudar, o (S: or help or)
hmm hmm hmm attend… bueno jo diria que no es pot dir però bueno (C: well, I don’t
think you can say that but oh well) or attend the kids.” CR

Her behavior is similar to that exhibited in SN and SB’s metacomments above,

where the writers balance their strategic use with awareness of what does and does
not conform to target norms.

Discussion
The aim of the present study was to examine how multilinguals’ linguistic reper-
toires interact at the resource level in order to solve lexical problems during foreign
language writing. The use of think-aloud protocols to gather our data was crucial
in order to gain access to the cognitive processes that underlie strategic behavior
during writing. Although this method was not entirely problem-free (some students
experienced difficulty thinking aloud; long pauses in the protocols indicated that
not all thoughts were verbalized), we were able to gather rich information that
sheds light on the multilingual writer as a creative problem-solver.
From our results, we can conclude that multilingual writing is indeed a mul-
tilingual event. As expected, learners drew on all the resources in their linguistic
repertoires, activating multiple languages while writing. Not only daily contact but

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 Tullock and Fernández-Villanueva Thought Processes of Multilingual Writers 439

also daily use seem to have a great influence on the likelihood that a given language
will be activated during writing, which is exemplified by the predominance of
Spanish and German in our participants’ protocols. Nearly all the lexical searches
carried out by our participants involved language-switching, which corresponds
to a growing body of research that has found this to be a common strategy among
foreign language writers of all proficiency levels. In our study, this practice was not
avoided but was embraced and employed strategically, suggesting that, rather than
conflicting with one another, multilinguals’ languages cooperate during writing,
aiding in text production.
The most common reason for activating previously learned languages during
lexical problem-solving was for generating pre-texts, bridging the gap between
proposed concepts and the target language needed to express them, while back-
tracking was found to a lesser extent. Both generating pre-texts and backtracking
were often carried out with the help of cognates, which can be seen as evidence of
cross-linguistic awareness, also found in Jessner (2006).
The participants’ linguistic flexibility is exemplified in other aspects of their
behavior, including code-switching, idiosyncratic borrowings, and mixed word
formations. This behavior, supported by the information contained in metacom-
ments, demonstrates that the appearance of nonstandard forms such as “live in
the actuality” and “dictature” in the written texts were not the result of ignorance
but rather conscious decisions made despite an awareness of their deviation from
the normative standard. Here, the sociolinguistic context most likely plays an im-
portant role. These writers, operating in a context of socially valued multilingual-
ism, develop and support their own norms which deviate from the monolingual
standard. This has been described as a characteristic of English as a Lingua Franca
in Europe (Seidlhofer, Breiteneder, & Pitzl, 2006).
In conclusion, while this study has shed light on how multilinguals’ languages
interact at the resource level, it also indicates that there is still work to be done on
how researchers can jointly study and model the interaction of cognitive processes
with motivation, task engagement and, especially in the case of multilinguals, social-
affective factors in multilingual writing. Future research entailing a wide variety of
tasks across all participants’ languages and carried out in different social contexts
would be helpful in creating a more robust picture of the multilingual writer as a
creative problem-solver, a perspective that is increasingly necessary in the modern
foreign language classroom, where more and more students are entering school
with knowledge of more than one language.

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 440    Research in the Teaching of English    Volume 47    May 2013

Appendix 1: Transcription Conventions

Bold Example of featured category
Plain text Words in English, the target language
Italics Words in a non-target language (German, Spanish, Catalan, or French)
Underline Written text
Strikethrough Correction made to written text
, Short hesitation
. Short pause
.. Medium pause
… Long pause
// Denotes where text was abbreviated for space-saving purposes
XX (e.g., CP) At the end of each excerpt the speaker’s participant code is given in italics,
with the first letter representing the participant’s L1 and the second letter
representing part of the writer’s pseudonym.
(text in Translation of non-English words. The source language is indicated as G:
parentheses) (German), S: (Spanish) or C: (Catalan). Clarifications regarding the transla-
tions are provided in square brackets within the parentheses.

Note
1. Available at http://www.lancs.ac.uk/researchenterprise/dialang/about.

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