A feel-good digital practice: Improving social emotional wellbeing through dialogue in Turkish tertiary context

Abstract

The fundamental principle of positive psychology relies on the fact that becoming a happier person should be among the primary objectives of any educational activity. Adopting this basic tenet, this study aims to investigate whether a dialogic second language
(L2) intervention on an interactive digital landscape can boost the social emotional wellbeing of young adult learners while helping them cope with the academic difficulties of acquiring a second language in the foundation year of an extremely competitive public
university in Türkiye. An embedded experimental design was used to incorporate qualitative data within experimental research. Eighty-seven learners participated in this research and completed the Psychological Wellbeing Scale (Ryff & Keyes, 1995) both at the beginning and end of the 14-week study. The experimental group received a dialogic intervention involving the dialogic use of L2 in discussing critical and taboo social issues, conventionally avoided in mainstream English language teaching textbooks, conducted in internet-mediated dialogic space, namely, Google Classroom, in addition to regular L2 instruction. The dialogues were specially designed and revised according to the curricular requirements of the institution. To investigate learners’ emotional regulation and wellbeing, 10 digital classroom dialogues with emotional reactions of the participants were collected and analyzed using inductive content analysis. Analysis of wellbeing scale data indicates statistically meaningful differences between the groups in favor of the experimental group with a medium effect size. Qualitative findings show personal growth through discussing socially relevant and critical issues, building self-efficacy through increased practice in the target language, and building a more positive outlook through increased foreign language enjoyment (FLE), among other aspects relevant in positive psychology. Pedagogical implications are also discussed in the study.
Keywords: dialogic education; second/foreign language acquisition; interactive digital landscape; dialogic intervention; positive psychology; emotional regulation; social emotional wellbeing