Table Of ContentInterfaces and Features in Second Language
Acquisition
Jia Wang
Interfaces and Features
in Second Language
Acquisition
A Study on the Acquisition of Chinese
Negation by English Speakers and Korean
Speakers
Jia Wang
Institute for International Students
Nanjing University
Nanjing, China
ISBN 978-981-19-8628-4 ISBN 978-981-19-8629-1 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-8629-1
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For all my loved ones and those golden days.
Preface
This book reports on a comprehensive study on the acquisition of Chinese negation
by English speakers and Korean speakers with both grammaticality judgment data
and learner corpus data. Within the theoretical framework of the Interface Hypoth-
esis (Sorace and Filiaci 2006) and the Feature Reassembly Hypothesis (Lardiere
2008), we examine whether L2 learners could achieve nativelike representation at the
multiple interfaces involved with Chinese negative structures and whether they could
reassemble the mood features, [±realis], encoded with Chinese negation markers
(bu/mei), from their L1 configurations. The variables underlying L2 acquisition at
interfaces and the process of feature reassembly are also explored. This research
also probes into the representation of explicit and implicit knowledge about Chinese
negationinL2grammar.
A written grammaticality judgment test and an aural grammaticality judgment test
were administered to L2 learners and native controls. L2 learners included a group of
English speakers (N = 90) and a group of Korean speakers (N = 92). Each L2 group
was divided into five subgroups, from elementary to advanced groups, based on
learners’ scores in a Chinese proficiency test. Native controls included 15 Chinese
native speakers. Production data on the use of Chinese negation markers by L1-
English and L1-Korean learners were also extracted for analysis from four existing
Chinese learner corpora (overall scale: 15.19 million characters), including the HSK
Dynamic Composition Corpus, the TOCFL Composition Corpus, the Error-tagged
Chinese Interlanguage Corpus, and the Jinan Chinese Learner Corpus.
The results of this study provide evidence for examining the L2 theories in ques-
tion. First, the results from the judgment data and the learner corpus data do not
completely support the assumptions of the Interface Hypothesis. While it is found
that L2 learners from both L1 backgrounds achieve success at the narrow syntax,
there is much variability in their acquisition at the internal interfaces involved with
Chinese negation, including the syntax–semantics interface, the syntax–morphology
interface, and the syntax–semantics–morphology interface. The Interface hypothesis
thus needs to be refined by considering the variables that modulate the acquisition
of interface structures (Yuan 2010).
vii
viii Preface
Second, the results of our study in general are consistent with the proposals of the
feature reassembly hypothesis. It is shown that L2 learners with lower proficiency
tend to map their L1 features encoded with negation onto corresponding L2 items,
resulting in their target-deviant performances at the early stages of their learning.
With increased Chinese proficiency, both L1-English and L1-Korean learners could
assemble the [+realis] feature with mei and the [–realis] feature with bu although
they have great difficulty in detecting the mood features in certain licensing contexts,
including past habitual activities, the durative aspect, and hypothetical conditionals.
Third, the results of the present study reveal multiple factors contributing to the
variability in L2 acquisition at the interfaces involved with Chinese negative struc-
tures, including L1 influence, the quantity (input frequency) and the quality of the
target input (input consistency and regularity), as well as L2 proficiency. These factors
also underlie the detectability and reassembly of the [±realis] features encoded with
bu/mei in different licensing contexts.
Fourth, task modality (written vs. aural) seems to play a role in L2 learners’
access to explicit and implicit knowledge about Chinese negation, but the effect of
task modality is constrained by other factors such as structural/feature complexity,
L2 proficiency, and L1-L2 similarity.
On the whole, the approach of employing both elicited experimental data and
authentic learner corpus data furnishes comprehensive evidence for the acquisition
of Chinese negation by L2 learners. The findings of our study are of significance to
the examination of the Interface Hypothesis and the Feature Reassembly Hypothesis
in accounting for L2 acquisition and also to the instruction of Chinese negation in
teaching Chinese as a foreign language.
Nanjing, China Jia Wang
References
Lardiere, Donna. 2008. Feature assembly in second language acquisition. In The role of formal
features in second language acquisition, eds. Juana Liceras, Helmut Zobl, and Helen Goodluck,
106–140. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Sorace, Antonella, and Francesca Filiaci. 2006. Anaphora resolution in near-native speakers of
Italian. Second Language Research 22(3): 339–368.
Yuan, Boping. 2010. Domain-wide or variable-dependent vulnerability of the semantics-syntax
interface in L2 acquisition? Evidence from wh-words used as existential polarity words in L2
Chinese grammars. Second Language Research 26(2): 219–260.
Acknowledgements
This book is based on my doctoral thesis at City University of Hong Kong. I would
like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Chan Yuet Hung Cecilia, for
her patient guidance, generous support and continuous encouragement throughout
my Ph.D. studies. She has devoted considerable time to discussing the research topics
with me and reading the draft of my thesis. She has also offered insightful comments
and suggestions on the refinement of the research design of this study and the revision
of the thesis during our regular meetings. I have benefited a lot from her expertise
and meticulousness in teaching and research.
I wish to thank Dr. Paul Law for his kind help in clarifying certain concepts in
linguistic theories and discussing the problems I encountered in my research. I am
also very grateful to Prof. James C.-T. Huang for letting me sit in his course on
generative theories at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and for his kindness in
answering my questions about my research topics. The knowledge I gained in his
course has enabled me to have a better understanding of the generative-oriented L2
acquisition theories.
I would like to extend my great appreciation to the students at Beijing Normal
University, Nanjing University, and the Hopkins-Nanjing Center (HNC). I also thank
the students studying Chinese in the program of China Education Tours (CET) in
Beijing, Princeton-in-Beijing (PIB), Notre Dame in Beijing (NDiB), Seoul National
University (SNU) in China, Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE)
in Nanjing, University of California in Beijing, and Dartmouth College in Beijing.
Without their participation in the experiments, it would be impossible to complete my
research. I am very grateful to Prof. Zhiping Zhou, Prof. Cornelius C. Kubler, Prof.
Caihua Xu, and Prof. Xianwen Cao for their generous support during data collection
of my study. I wish to thank Fang Liu, Zhao Chen, Di Bai, and Xiaodie Liu for their
assistance in recruiting participants for the study.
I am also obliged to Prof. Shou-hsin Teng, Prof. Liping Zhang, Prof. Baolin Zhang,
and Prof. Xiaobing Zhou for their generous help in providing information about the
Chinese learner corpora used in this study.
ix
x Acknowledgements
My sincere thanks go to Mr. Steven Ka Pak So and Mr. Tat Kin Ko for their kind
help with installing the software for my research. I also appreciate Jennifer Eagleton
for her work in proofreading the draft of my thesis.
I acknowledge the financial support of the Postgraduate Studentship, Research
Activities Fund, and Conference Grant (UGC funds) I received during my Ph.D.
studies at City University of Hong Kong.
I would also like to thank all my good friends Yan, Xinlei, Lao Lao, Hua, and
Ping, for their sharing of my joy and worries all these years.
Finally, I wish to thank my family members for their love, support, and encour-
agement over these years. I am grateful to my parents for their understanding of my
dream and the life I choose. This book is dedicated to them.
Contents
1 Introduction ................................................... 1
1.1 Research Background ....................................... 1
1.2 Aims of the Present Study ................................... 3
1.3 Structure of the Book ....................................... 4
References ..................................................... 4
2 Theoretical Frameworks and Related Studies ..................... 9
2.1 Introduction ............................................... 9
2.2 The Interface Hypothesis .................................... 10
2.2.1 What is Meant by “Interface”? ......................... 10
2.2.2 The Assumptions of the Interface Hypothesis ............ 10
2.2.3 Previous Studies on L2 Acquisition at Interfaces .......... 12
2.2.4 Applicability of the IH to the Present Study .............. 20
2.3 The Feature Reassembly Hypothesis .......................... 21
2.3.1 What is a “Feature”? ................................. 21
2.3.2 Feature Selection as Parameter Setting in SLA ........... 22
2.3.3 The Main Assumptions of the Feature Reassembly
Hypothesis .......................................... 24
2.3.4 Previous Studies Based on the FRH ..................... 26
2.3.5 Applicability of the FRH to the Present Study ............ 35
2.4 Explicit/Implicit Knowledge in L2 Acquisition ................. 35
2.4.1 The Distinction Between Explicit and Implicit L2
Knowledge .......................................... 35
2.4.2 The Measurement of Explicit and Implicit L2
Knowledge Through Task Modality ..................... 37
2.4.3 Relevance to the Present Study ......................... 38
2.5 Interim Summary ........................................... 38
References ..................................................... 39
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