Abstract

Grit has been defined as being "perseverance and passion for long-term goals" (Duckworth et al., 2007). Research has tied grit to success in the discipline of second language acquisition (SLA), where researchers have adapted Duckworth's general grit self-assessment instrument to capture measurements of grit within second language learners (Teimouri et al., 2022). Such a scale appears on the Language Ability Self-Evaluation Resource (LASER), a standardized language proficiency test developed by researcher at Brigham Young University. With the aim of replicating the studies that were done to validate the design of the LASER, responses to the grit-measuring section of the test from 6,228 students were collected. Participants also agreed to release their scores on the Oral Proficiency Interview for Computer (OPIc), which were used as a measurement of second language performance. Reliability was measured using Cronbach's Alpha and McDonald's Omega, a partial correlation analysis was run between self-assessed speaking, OPIc, and grit scores, and two multiple linear regression analyses were run with OPIc and grit scores as the different dependent variables. Results showed acceptable reliability consistent with prior studies, and a weak but statistically significant positive correlation was found between grit and OPIc scores, though a stronger positive correlation was found between self-assessed speaking and OPIc scores. The amount of time spent serving a mission also emerged as a statistically significant predictor of both grit and OPIc scores. The results of this study effectively replicate prior LASER validation research, as well as warrant the future investigation of the theoretically interesting relationship between grit and time spent serving a mission.

Degree

MA

College and Department

Humanities; Linguistics

Rights

https://lib.byu.edu/about/copyright/

Date Submitted

2026-06-26

Document Type

Thesis

Keywords

grit, second language acquisition, self-assessment, language proficiency, LASER

Language

english

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