Syntactic Complexity and L2 Academic Immersion Effects on Readers' Recall and Pausing Strategies for English and Spanish Texts

Abstract

In Experiment 1, monolingual native Spanish speakers (NSSs) had better kernel recall and longer end‐of‐clause (EOC) pauses than native English speakers (NESs) when reading texts that varied in syntactic complexity as a function of the number of nonessential clauses added to the kernel text. NSS familiarity with embedded clauses in Spanish seem to lead to a prosodic phrasing strategy in which comma‐triggered pauses improved recall. In Experiment 2, native English‐speaking Spanish teachers (NESSTs) with high exposure to academic immersion recalled better and had longer EOC pauses than low‐exposure NESSTs when reading Spanish texts. High‐exposure NESSTs' Spanish recall was as good as the NSS group in Experiment 1 and with longer—although similarly patterned—EOC pauses. High‐exposure NESSTs' English recall was better and with longer EOC pauses than the NES group from Experiment 1, wherease low‐exposure NESSTs' recall and EOC pauses were similar to the NES group. This suggests a transfer of second language pausing strategies to first language reading that improves recall for complex first language texts.