An Investigation Into Second Language Aptitude for Advanced Chinese Language Learning PAULA WINKE Michigan State University Second Language Studies Program Department of Linguistics and Languages B252 Wells Hall, 619 Red Cedar Road East Lansing, MI 48824 Email: winke@msu.edu In this study I examine the construct of aptitude in learning Chinese as a second language (L2) to an advanced level. I test 2 hypotheses: first, that L2 aptitude comprises 4 components—working memory, rote memory, grammatical sensitivity, and phonemic coding ability—and second, that L2 aptitude affects learning both directly and indirectly (mediated by strategy use and motivation). Native speakers of English (n ¼ 96) studying advanced Chinese took the Modern Language Aptitude Test and a phonological working memory test and responded to motivation and strategy use questionnaires. Using end‐of‐course listening, reading, and speaking proficiency test results as measures of Chinese learning, I constructed a structural equation model to test the hypotheses. The model fit the observed data. Of the 4 components foreseen to comprise L2 aptitude, rote memory contributed the most and working memory the least. Aptitude, strategy use, and motivation had about the same impact on learning but varied in how well they predicted the individual skills of listening, reading, and speaking. The results shed light on L2 aptitude in the particular context of an advanced L2 Chinese course. COGNITIVE PROCESSES AND AFFECTIVE variables shape how individuals acquire a foreign or second language (L2) and predict how well they are likely to learn one (Beckner et al., 2009; Ellis, 2004; Robinson, 2002c; Skehan, 1989). This study investigates the plausibility, via structural equation modeling (SEM), of a model of language learning that includes cognitive (rote memory, phonemic coding ability, grammatical sensitivity, and phono- logical working memory), cognitively oriented (strategy use), and affective (motivation) variables as learning predictors. It also examines how the factors affect each other within the model. First, I review research that addresses what I suggest is a narrow definition of L2 aptitude as a set of purely cognitive constructs. Second, I argue that a broader concept of L2 aptitude should be accepted, one that recognizes the effects of mediating, cognitively oriented, and/or affective variables—most vitally, strategy use and motiva- tion. Third, because L2 aptitude may be best understood in terms of the context of the language learning situation (Robinson, 2007), I detail the particular conditions of this study’s L2 learning context: native‐English‐speaking adults learning Chinese in an intensive (6 to 8 hours a day in class), 63‐week course intended to bring them to an advanced level of proficiency in Chinese. Finally, I describe the use of SEM to investigate L2 learning aptitude in this context, which has been rarely used in L2 aptitude research. THE COGNITIVE CONSTRUCTS OF SECOND LANGUAGE APTITUDE Acquiring proficiency in an L2 in an instructed setting is considered challenging for adults (Doughty, 2004; Ellis, 2004, 2005). Understanding The Modern Language Journal, 97, 1, (2013) DOI: 10.1111/j.1540-4781.2013.01428.x 0026-7902/13/109–130 $1.50/0 © 2013 The Modern Language Journal