ABSTRACT
Enjoyment has been described as the emotion that fuels the second language learning process and boosts performance in the second language. This chapter shows how enjoyment emerged in second language acquisition (SLA) research in the second decade of the 21st century as a result of the dissemination of concepts from positive psychology and educational psychology in SLA. After a historical overview, the chapter focuses on studies that have investigated the relationship between enjoyment, anxiety, and motivation before delving into learner-internal and learner-external sources of variation in enjoyment. Particular attention is then given to the instruments used for measuring enjoyment before considering the pedagogical implications of this area of research. The chapter concludes with a number of suggestions for further research.
