Testing the Interpretability Hypothesis: Evidence from acceptability judgments of relative clauses by Persian and French learners of L2 English.
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| Title: | Testing the Interpretability Hypothesis: Evidence from acceptability judgments of relative clauses by Persian and French learners of L2 English. |
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| Authors: | Solaimani, Ehsan1 es19488@essex.ac.uk, Myles, Florence1, Lawyer, Laurel1 |
| Source: | Second Language Research. Jul2024, Vol. 40 Issue 3, p481-504. 24p. |
| Subject Terms: | *Second language acquisition, *Educability, *Language ability, Skills inventories, Relative clauses |
| Abstract: | Many studies have explored the second language (L2) acquisition of relative clauses (RCs) and whether L2 speakers transfer a resumptive strategy from first language (L1) to L2. While evidence seems to suggest that there are significant L1–L2 differences in the processing of RCs, relatively little is known about the source of non-target-like L2 behaviour. The present study investigates the grammatical acceptability of different RC types in L2 English and whether reliance on a resumptive strategy is a syntactic or processing issue. The participants included 71 L1-Persian L2-English, 52 L1-French L2-English, and 44 native English speakers, who completed a proficiency c-test, a grammaticality judgment task, and a reading span working memory (WM) task. Unlike French, which is similar to English in the syntactic derivation of RCs, Persian is a structurally wh-in-situ language that syntactically allows resumption in direct object and object-of-preposition RCs. The results showed that unlike L1-French speakers, L1-Persian speakers were more likely to accept resumptive pronouns in L2-English RCs; however, both L1 and L2 groups overwhelmingly preferred a gap over a resumptive strategy. The results suggest that given sufficiently high proficiency and long immersion experience, L2 speakers can match native speakers in terms of RC syntactic representations, suggesting that the issue faced by learners is a processing issue rather a representational one as suggested by the Interpretability Hypothesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
| Copyright of Second Language Research is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.) | |
| Database: | Education Research Complete |
| FullText | Text: Availability: 0 |
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| Header | DbId: ehh DbLabel: Education Research Complete An: 178718546 AccessLevel: 6 PubType: Academic Journal PubTypeId: academicJournal PreciseRelevancyScore: 0 |
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| Items | – Name: Title Label: Title Group: Ti Data: Testing the Interpretability Hypothesis: Evidence from acceptability judgments of relative clauses by Persian and French learners of L2 English. – Name: Author Label: Authors Group: Au Data: <searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Solaimani%2C+Ehsan%22">Solaimani, Ehsan</searchLink><relatesTo>1</relatesTo><i> es19488@essex.ac.uk</i><br /><searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Myles%2C+Florence%22">Myles, Florence</searchLink><relatesTo>1</relatesTo><br /><searchLink fieldCode="AR" term="%22Lawyer%2C+Laurel%22">Lawyer, Laurel</searchLink><relatesTo>1</relatesTo> – Name: TitleSource Label: Source Group: Src Data: <searchLink fieldCode="JN" term="%22Second+Language+Research%22">Second Language Research</searchLink>. Jul2024, Vol. 40 Issue 3, p481-504. 24p. – Name: Subject Label: Subject Terms Group: Su Data: *<searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Second+language+acquisition%22">Second language acquisition</searchLink><br />*<searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Educability%22">Educability</searchLink><br />*<searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Language+ability%22">Language ability</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Skills+inventories%22">Skills inventories</searchLink><br /><searchLink fieldCode="DE" term="%22Relative+clauses%22">Relative clauses</searchLink> – Name: Abstract Label: Abstract Group: Ab Data: Many studies have explored the second language (L2) acquisition of relative clauses (RCs) and whether L2 speakers transfer a resumptive strategy from first language (L1) to L2. While evidence seems to suggest that there are significant L1–L2 differences in the processing of RCs, relatively little is known about the source of non-target-like L2 behaviour. The present study investigates the grammatical acceptability of different RC types in L2 English and whether reliance on a resumptive strategy is a syntactic or processing issue. The participants included 71 L1-Persian L2-English, 52 L1-French L2-English, and 44 native English speakers, who completed a proficiency c-test, a grammaticality judgment task, and a reading span working memory (WM) task. Unlike French, which is similar to English in the syntactic derivation of RCs, Persian is a structurally wh-in-situ language that syntactically allows resumption in direct object and object-of-preposition RCs. The results showed that unlike L1-French speakers, L1-Persian speakers were more likely to accept resumptive pronouns in L2-English RCs; however, both L1 and L2 groups overwhelmingly preferred a gap over a resumptive strategy. The results suggest that given sufficiently high proficiency and long immersion experience, L2 speakers can match native speakers in terms of RC syntactic representations, suggesting that the issue faced by learners is a processing issue rather a representational one as suggested by the Interpretability Hypothesis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] – Name: AbstractSuppliedCopyright Label: Group: Ab Data: <i>Copyright of Second Language Research is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites without the copyright holder's express written permission. Additionally, content may not be used with any artificial intelligence tools or machine learning technologies. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract.</i> (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.) |
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| RecordInfo | BibRecord: BibEntity: Identifiers: – Type: doi Value: 10.1177/02676583231162783 Languages: – Code: eng Text: English PhysicalDescription: Pagination: PageCount: 24 StartPage: 481 Subjects: – SubjectFull: Second language acquisition Type: general – SubjectFull: Educability Type: general – SubjectFull: Language ability Type: general – SubjectFull: Skills inventories Type: general – SubjectFull: Relative clauses Type: general Titles: – TitleFull: Testing the Interpretability Hypothesis: Evidence from acceptability judgments of relative clauses by Persian and French learners of L2 English. Type: main BibRelationships: HasContributorRelationships: – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Solaimani, Ehsan – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Myles, Florence – PersonEntity: Name: NameFull: Lawyer, Laurel IsPartOfRelationships: – BibEntity: Dates: – D: 01 M: 07 Text: Jul2024 Type: published Y: 2024 Identifiers: – Type: issn-print Value: 02676583 Numbering: – Type: volume Value: 40 – Type: issue Value: 3 Titles: – TitleFull: Second Language Research Type: main |
| ResultId | 1 |
