Adopting mixed methods for research topics in teaching Chinese as a second/foreign language

Mixed methods research (MMR) is expanding across various disciplines, and some researchers in the field of teaching and learning Chinese as a foreign or second language (CFL/CSL) have tried to adopt this approach. Drawing from Plano Clark and Ivankova (2016) the socio-ecological framework of MMR, this paper synthesizes the application of MMR in CFL/CSL studies and highlights issues informative for future CFL/CSL researchers and MMR methodologists. Specifically, this paper discusses first the patterns of research questions, participants, and settings, and second the definition of MMR, the rationale for using MMR, the design of MMR, the intersection of MMR with other approaches, and the quality of meta-inferences in the included studies. It concludes that although there are a certain number of studies which use MMR to investigate CFL/CSL topics, however, many aspects in the application of MMR are still open to discussion. Future studies in CFL/CSL which use MMR should be aware of the essence of mixing two strands of methods and of the meta-inferences quality.