Mental Translation as a Cognitive Process in Communicative Language Teaching and Learning

Abstract

In EFL learning and teaching processes, mental translation might play an essential role in the mind of the foreign language learner. Some scholarly papers investigate the types of processing in the language learners’ mind such as language perception, language acquisition and dialogue production. Other studies, based on empirical psycholinguistic research about the process of mental translation, investigate mental translation strategies as well as the neuro-linguistic aspects of this process, including cognitive and brain imaging research. There is a consensus among researchers that using neurolinguistics knowledge, one can connect neurological processes in the language learners’ brain with the foreign language learning. This paper tries to contribute to existing studies in this field and highlight the importance of neuro-linguistic research in connection to the biological capacity of the human memory to make connections between language systems in the process of communicative language learning.

Keywords

• cognitive processing
• cognitive science
• communicative language teaching and learning
• mental translation
• translation process