Do gender-pairings and age/proficiency interplay in LRE production? A preliminary study with young CLIL learners

Many studies have explored Language-Related Episodes (LREs) during collaborative dialogue. However, research on the factors affecting LRE production in children, especially regarding gender-pairings in CLIL contexts, remains limited (e.g., Martínez-Adrián & Gutiérrez-Mangado, 2022). Also, no studies have tackled the interplay between gender-pairings and age/proficiency in LRE production amongst young learners. To fill this gap, the study involved CLIL learners aged 9–11 who worked in same- and mixed-gender dyads to complete an oral picture-based narrative task. The LREs were analysed based on the amount, nature (meaning vs form) and resolution (target-like, non-target-like or unresolved). The preliminary results indicate that same-gender dyads seem to outperform mixed-gender pairs in both groups as they produce more LREs. Also, as age/proficiency increases, same-gender dyads tend to produce more target-like LREs. Thus, despite significant proficiency differences between both groups, the tendency towards working better in matched-gender pairs seems to persist throughout middle childhood.