Although extensive research on the topic of input processing has produced many published works, this volume adds to this body of research by examining secondary and cumulative effects of instruction, an area yet to be investigated. Secondary effects result from transfer-of-training to a processing problem that is similar to the primary target of instruction, whereas cumulative effects are found when instruction affects a processing problem that differs from the primary target of instruction: If the primary target is the French imperfect tense, secondary effects may be observed in the French subjunctive and cumulative effects may be observed in French causative constructions with faire “to do” (chapter 5). After providing an overview of processing instruction as well as an introduction to secondary and cumulative effects of instruction, Benati and Lee report the results of three studies that have tested such effects in three different second languages. The authors also provide an appendix, which is a useful tool not only to illustrate the materials used in the different studies but also to enable readers to compare and contrast processing instruction with traditional instruction—even if the materials for traditional instruction activities are not provided for all studies.

Graduate students who are not yet familiar with processing instruction will find chapter 1 quite accessible and informative, even if the key studies of processing instruction are not presented in much detail and readers would need to consult the original articles to find exact results. The presentation of the studies is user-friendly—short summaries, figures, and tables enable a quick glance at the content of the chapters—in spite of quite a few unfortunate typos. There are some repetitive passages, especially in the introduction of processing instruction and of the activities used during treatment; however, this repetition allows each empirical chapter to be read as a stand-alone chapter and thus to be used independently.

In chapters 3–5, Benati and Lee review three studies they conducted with the goal of investigating secondary or cumulative effects of instruction. Note that the cumulative effects of instruction are only examined in one study (chapter 5). Despite the small number of participants in each study, the results are quite striking: Processing instruction was found to have an effect not only on the focus of treatment (i.e., primary effects) but also on similar or different processing problems that were not the focus of treatment (i.e., secondary and cumulative effects). Nonetheless, given that the number of participants in each study is rather small, a more fine-grained analysis of individual results would have strengthened the findings, and the reader is left to wonder whether all participants showed secondary or cumulative effects in all studies. This question is revived in the final chapter, in which relevant principles and hypotheses are summarized, including the individual difference hypothesis, which states that “some learners benefit more from PI [processing instruction] than do others” (p. 172). A discussion of the individual difference hypothesis would have been warranted earlier in the text with or even before the presentation of the studies, and it is a bit surprising that Benati and Lee did not address this hypothesis.

The main limitation of this volume seems to lie in its lack of detail, which at the same time contributes to its nontechnical appeal. As a consequence, there are a few minor shortcomings. Taking the French study (chapter 5) as an example, the researchers’ motivation for the inclusion of irregular forms in addition to regular forms in the test of secondary effects (i.e., the subjunctive in French) is never made apparent to the reader. Because participants in the processing instruction group are found to acquire aspects of the subjunctive despite the mix of regular and irregular forms, it is quite puzzling that Benati and Lee did not discuss this point, as it would strengthen the argument for positive effects of processing instruction.

All in all, graduate students will find this volume a gold mine of ideas for research topics because Benati and Lee not only encourage follow-up studies but also provide an array of new areas of investigation. Researchers in the field will certainly be interested in discovering the additional effects of processing instruction discussed by the authors and will no doubt, as a result of reading this volume, be motivated to conduct research of their own.