The Acquisition of English Articles by Adult Chinese Speakers

Abstract

The present study investigates the use of English articles in matrix and embedded sentences by adult Chinese speakers of L2 English and sets out to explain the native and non-native divergence in relation to Parameter Resetting Theory in Second Language Acquisition (SLA) within the framework of Principles and Parameters of Universal Grammar (UG). The study tests two competing theories, namely the Full Access Full Transfer theory (FT/FA) and the Partial Access to UG account of SLA theory to see whether or not the functional category words such as the and a/an are resettable in L2 grammar.95 participants were asked to take a grammatical judgment test correcting article usage and other grammatical points as distracters. The participants were adult university students from the FENM (Freshman English of Non Major Students) program at Tunghai University. They were grouped into three language proficiency levels based on the Tunghai English Placement Exam (TEPE) (Sims, 2006). Another group of 12 native speakers of English were invited as the control group.The results of the study suggest that there is a twofold divergence among the participants. There is a significant difference in the use of English articles between native and non-native speakers. It also demonstrates a discrepancy between non-native speakers in the interpretation of articles in matrix and embedded sentences. These results argue against the FT/FA account of UG and support the Partial Access to UG accounts.