Curiouser and Curiouser: Development and Validation of the Foreign Language Curiosity Scale (FLCS)

ABSTRACT As a catalyst for exploration and intellectual growth, curiosity is vital for successfully navigating the language acquisition journey. Although the role of curiosity in language learning has recently received attention, its complex nature warrants further exploration. The present study is an attempt to deepen our understanding of curiosity in the language acquisition field by developing and validating a new language curiosity measure. To this end, a diverse sample of 999 English as a foreign language learners from China, Iran, Morocco, Poland and Spain was recruited. In this validation effort, exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, convergent and discriminant validity assessment and invariance testing were conducted. The foreign language curiosity scale (FLCS) was found to be unidimensional, with nine items loading onto a single latent variable. Evidence supported the validity, reliability and invariance of FLCS items across gender, proficiency and L1 groups. FLCS can be introduced as a psychometrically valid measure for capturing language curiosity.