Focuses and Trends of the Research on Task-based Language Teaching (1998-2022)

Task-based language teaching, as a communicative language teaching model, has gradually become a hot topic in the field of second language teaching and acquisition. In order to present the research focuses and trends of task-based language teaching, this paper, by resorting to the Web of Science and Excel, conducts a qualitative and quantitative statistical analysis of the relevant papers published in ten internationally renowned second language acquisition academic journals from 1998 to 2022. The results indicate that: (1) the number of papers presents a dynamic upward trend; (2) the research subjects are mainly college students who speak English as a second or foreign language; (3) the main research fields cover task performance, task characteristics, task implementation conditions, learner internal factors and integration of TBLT and computer network; (4) with research methodology being more diversified, empirical studies take a dominant position and the quantitative method plays a leading role. The results of this study have some implications for future task-based language teaching and research.