Korean-Speaking L2 Learners’ Understanding of Ambiguous Sentences with the Preverbal Also

Abstract

A sentence containing preverbal also (i.e., Mary also ate a cookie) causes semantic ambiguity since the focus is assigned to a subject NP or an object NP. Depending on which constituent is identified as focus, the sentence evokes a different presupposition in discourse contexts. The current study examined which interpretation Korean EFL learners prefer to have in the comprehension of preverbal also-sentences with ambiguous focus and how it can differ in terms of their English proficiency. In a revised picture truth value judgment task, participants were asked to read a target sentence and then view a picture that described a presuppositional event. They were asked to check whether the target sentence is compatible with the depicted situation. The results showed that low and intermediate proficiency groups favored an object-focused interpretation whereas groups of high proficiency and English native speakers were able to assign the focus to a subject NP and an object NP by making use of relevant presuppositions from picture contexts.