PanSIG 2025

Lived emotional experiences - What can they tell us about our students and our teaching?

17 May 2025, 16:20

25m

BLDG 8/1F-106 (Kanda University of International Studies (神田外語大学))

Research-oriented Oral Face-to-face presentation College and University Educators B8-106 CUE

Speaker

Nicholas Marx (Kanazawa Seiryo University)

KEYWORDS

psychology
emotions
pedagogy

ABSTRACT

Though definitions of emotions and their processes are not yet agreed upon, more modern conceptualizations take a more social constructivist perspective of these phenomena. And by doing so, the notion of perezhivanie as introduced by Lev Vygotsky (1994) in his works in the early 20th century has taken a more focal role in social psychology circles and has even made its way into language education research (Lantolf & Swain, 2020; Ng, 2024). Most commonly, perezhivanie is translated as “emotional lived experiences”. These experiences, social roles, understandings, and influences from the world around us lead to a complex web of connectedness. This presentation sets out to understand how the notion of perezhivanie can be seen and influences students’ future emotional understandings in the language classroom. This qualitative study examines interviews with two Japanese university students taking compulsory English classes to understand how their lived emotional experiences inside the classroom have influenced their perceptions of English language education. Findings suggest that students’ previous learning experiences influence how they perceive their language education and the potential emotions that may carry into these learning environments. By better understanding student experiences, we may be able to better address them through professional and pedagogical actions.