Second language (L2) learners need to acquire large vocabularies to approach native-like proficiency. Many controlled experiments have investigated the factors facilitating and hindering word learning; however, few studies have validated these findings in real-world learning scenarios. We use data from the language learning app Lingvist to explore how L2 word learning is affected by valence (positivity/negativity) and concreteness of target words and their linguistic contexts. We found that valence, but not concreteness, affects learning. Users learned positive and negative words better than neutral ones. Moreover, positive words are learned best in positive contexts and negative words in more negative contexts. Word and context valence effects are strongest on the learner’s second encounter with the target word and diminish across subsequent encounters. These findings provide support for theories of embodied cognition and the lexical quality hypothesis and point to the linguistic factors that make learning words, and by extension languages, faster.

Recalling future intentions (i.e., prospective memory, PM) plays an essential role in everyday life, but sometimes, if the person is involved in a demanding ongoing task, PM is unsuccessful. This is especially relevant for bilinguals who, in many situations, have to recall intentions while performing a task in their second language (L2). Our aim was to explore whether PM is modulated by the linguistic context in which PM takes place. In this study, bilinguals performed a PM task in their first (L1) or second language (L2). We also manipulated the demands of the ongoing task (early/late updating) and the PM cue (focal/non-focal). In general, results showed an overall impairment in the recall of future intentions when the task was performed in L2. This impairment was especially evident in the more demanding conditions, suggesting that increments in attentional demands due to L2 processing hinder the processes required for prospective remembering.