Adult L2 Research Articles

Extensive residence in a second language environment modifies perceptual strategies for suprasegmental categorization.

Languages differ in the importance of acoustic dimensions for speech categorization. This poses a potential challenge for second language (L2) learners, and the extent to which adult L2 learners can acquire new perceptual strategies for speech categorization remains unclear. This study investigated the effects of extensive English L2 immersion on speech perception strategies and dimension-selective-attention ability in native Mandarin speakers. Experienced first language (L1) Mandarin speakers (length of U.K. residence > 3 years) demonstrated more native-like weighting of cues to L2 suprasegmental categorization relative to inexperienced Mandarin speakers (length of residence < 1 year), weighting duration more highly. However, both the experienced and the inexperienced Mandarin speakers continued to weight duration less highly and pitch more highly during musical beat categorization and struggled to ignore pitch and selectively attend to amplitude in speech, relative to native English speakers. These results suggest that adult L2 experience can lead to retuning of perceptual strategies in specific contexts, but global acoustic salience is more resistant to change. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Eye movements unveil sensitivity of naïve listeners to iconicity of Russian onomatopoeic words

Iconicity between form and meaning of words is considered to be instrumental in relating linguistic forms to sensorimotor experience. Some Russian onomatopoeic words (e.g. bac ‘bang’) depict sounds and indicate action connected to these sounds. This study investigated how sensitive adult Finnish L1 speakers with no prior knowledge of Russian are to the iconicity of spoken onomatopoeic words in Russian. First, an iconicity rating test was used to establish the iconicity levels for each token from the perspective of Finnish native speakers who had never learned Russian before. Second, an eye-tracking experiment using different participants, who were also native in Finnish and unfamiliar with Russian, employed the visual world paradigm to test visual recognition of the meaning of spoken words. Our results revealed that iconicity rating for each token varied within the class of onomatopoeic words, and that iconicity ratings for different words were strongly connected with their semantic transparency.

Unknown Vocabulary Density and Reading Comprehension: Replicating Hu and Nation (2000)

AbstractHu and Nation's (2000) study, which stipulated that second language (L2) readers need to be familiar with 98% of lexical items for adequate text comprehension, has become highly influential in L2 vocabulary research and pedagogy. However, the 98% critical threshold figure is based on findings from a research project in which a regression analysis was conducted with only 66 university students in New Zealand. The present study replicated Hu and Nation's research in a context different from a typical Western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic context with a sample of 104 Sri Lankan adult L2 learners in a nonacademic context. They each took a Vocabulary Levels Test and read one of five versions of two reading texts at different levels of density of unknown words before answering comprehension questions. The results of the original study could not be fully replicated.

Adult migrants’ voices about learning and using Swedish at work placements in basic language education

The aim of the present study was to contribute knowledge about how adult L2 learners perceived their possibilities to use and develop the target language (Swedish) when formal language teaching was combined with placements. Situated in the context of Swedish for Immigrants (SFI), the study drew inspiration from action research and ethnographic methodology. A thematic analysis was conducted underpinned by the systemic-functional linguistic concepts of field, tenor and mode. The findings showed that the students highly valued interaction with L1 Swedish speakers outside of the classroom. Several of the students described rich opportunities to interact socially, which, however, also entailed anxiety about their status as L2 speakers. A few of the students reported accessing field-specific language and literacy practices that aligned with their current career goals. However, students with placements relating to kitchen, garage and warehouse work voiced feeling isolated and having little opportunity for social interaction. While students in the first of two course instances found it difficult to discuss and exemplify language they had learnt, a vocabulary assignment developed for the second course instance facilitated discussions about placement-related words and expressions. Implications for teaching are discussed, including using authentic examples of workplace discourse as preparation for placement visits.

Self‐Repair in Hearing L2 Learners’ Spontaneous Signing: A Developmental Study

AbstractThis study presents a corpus‐based investigation of self‐repairs in hearing adult L2 (M2L2, second modality and second language) learners of Swedish Sign Language (Svenskt teckenspråk, STS). This study analyses M2L2 learners’ STS conversations with a deaf signer and examines the learners’ self‐repair practices and whether there are differences among learners of different proficiency levels. This provides a description of characteristics of self‐repair made by M2L2 learners as well as the frequency and distribution of self‐repair categories. The results show that the frequency of self‐repair decreases with increased proficiency, at least after the initial stage. Furthermore, the self‐initiated repair categories of the beginners are often phonological repairs, while intermediate learners tend to carry out self‐repairs at the lexical and syntactic level. The results also reveal a specific type of STS repair linked to fingerspelling repairs. We discuss the effects of second modality learning as well as the relationship between monitoring and language proficiency.

Insights into L2 connected speech segmentation: A gating experiment with listeners of different English proficiency levels

The relative contribution of bottom-up (i.e. acoustic-phonetic) and top-down (i.e. contextual) cues for successful L2 online segmentation is still a matter of debate. This study used the gating paradigm to investigate the segmentation processes of adult L2 English listeners with different proficiency levels, by looking at the type of cues they exploit and how they revise their hypotheses as connected speech is progressively revealed. Twenty-one French and Tunisian undergraduates were selected from a larger pool (n=226) and identified as skilled (n=11) and unskilled (n=10) listeners based on their scores on standardized English listening and vocabulary tests. Descriptive statistics, analysis of variance and qualitative analysis were performed on the obtained data. Overall, this study provides supporting L2 evidence for the hierarchical nature of the multiple speech segmentation cues (Mattys et al., 2005). The results indicated an early effect of context on segmentation that was independent of L2 proficiency when the context is constraining. In non-constraining contexts, successful segmentation is delayed for both groups with L2 unskilled listeners needing far more bottom-up information to process input and revise their segmentation hypotheses. We conclude that, in online L2 speech segmentation, what distinguishes proficient from non-proficient listeners is their efficient processing of bottom-up cues. Pedagogical implications are provided hoping to help L2 English teachers (and materials developers) focus on bottom-up training to improve their learners’ real-time comprehension competence.

Interaction between levels of text representation and working memory during L2 reading comprehension: What about it?

AbstractThe relationship between L2 reading comprehension and working memory has been studied for years, and previous studies highlight the existence of a correlation between the two. However, to our knowledge, no previous study used Kintsch's Multilevel Comprehension Model to operationalize reading comprehension in the investigation of its relationship with working memory. More specifically, according to Kintsch's model, comprehension consists of three text representation levels—the surface level (the literal wording of the text), the textbase (which includes inferences made by the reader), and the situation model (the integration of explicit and implicit text information with readers’ background knowledge). Therefore, the study reported in this paper examined the contribution of working memory, the short‐term retention of information and its manipulation, to different text representation levels during L2 reading comprehension. To do so, fifty‐five (N = 55) adult L2 learners of French completed L2 reading comprehension task tapping into three levels of text representation and a numerical complex working memory task. The results showed, on the one hand, a significant contribution of working memory to L2 reading comprehension and, on the other hand, that this relationship was specifically observed with the situation model.

Learning Without Awareness by Academic and Nonacademic Samples: An Individual Differences Study

AbstractThis study addresses the role of awareness in learning and the variables that may facilitate adult second language (L2) implicit learning. We replicated Williams's (2005) study with a similar group of academic learners enrolled at university as well as a group of non‐college‐educated adults in order to explore the generalizability of the findings to an underrepresented population in research on L2 acquisition. Our results revealed that academic learners implicitly acquired items encountered during training (trained items), but this learning disappeared when academic and nonacademic groups were combined. We also observed modest correlations between intelligence and implicit learning of trained items; however, this association disappeared when other variables were considered. Overall, our study highlights the limited potential of implicit form–meaning associations for L2 adults in more general populations and emphasizes the challenges associated with convenience sampling in L2 research (Andringa &amp; Godfroid, 2020). Additionally, it underscores the independence of individual differences in reading exposure, years of education, and nonverbal intelligence for implicit learning of trained items.

Articulatory working space in first and second languages

Articulatory working space (acoustic and kinematic) is often studied to understand the overall size (limits) of a speaker’s articulatory behaviors. For example, prior research has shown that the magnitude of articulators’ movement (e.g., maximum tongue advancement, lip aperture) changes as a function of speech effort (loud, clear, and slow speech). To better understand second language acquisition in adults (i.e., articulatory working space determined by the language or anatomical differences), we compare both acoustic and kinematic working space of adult learners of English between their first language (L1) and second language (L2), which is also compared with that of native speakers of English. Specifically, the articulatory convex hull is measured during passage reading for both acoustic (F1 and F2 trajectories) and kinematic (tongue trajectories on x- and y-dimensions) data. Participants include 11 adult learners of English (four men and seven women) with a Korean language background and 10 adult L1 speakers of English (six men and four women). In the presentation, the findings will be discussed to address whether articulatory space is (1) different between native and nonnative languages (determined by linguistic needs) or (2) rather a constant articulatory characteristic of speakers between the languages, regardless of the speaker’s English proficiency.

Comparison of the prediction accuracy of machine learning algorithms in crosslinguistic vowel classification

Machine learning algorithms can be used for the prediction of nonnative sound classification based on crosslinguistic acoustic similarity. To date, very few linguistic studies have compared the classification accuracy of different algorithms. This study aims to assess how well machines align with human speech perception by assessing the ability of three machine learning algorithms, namely, linear discriminant analysis (LDA), decision tree (C5.0), and neural network (NNET), to predict the classification of second language (L2) sounds in terms of first language (L1) categories. The models were trained using the first three formants and duration of L1 vowels and fed with the same acoustic features of L2 vowels. To validate their accuracy, adult L2 speakers completed a perceptual classification task. The results indicated that NNET predicted with success the classification of all L2 vowels with the highest proportion in terms of L1 categories, while LDA and C5.0 missed only one vowel each. Furthermore, NNET exhibited superior accuracy in predicting the full range of above chance responses, followed closely by LDA. C5.0 did not meet the anticipated performance levels. The findings can hold significant implications for advancing both the theoretical and practical frameworks of speech acquisition.

Proficiency versus lexical processing efficiency as a measure of L2 lexical quality: Individual differences in word-frequency effects in L2 visual word recognition.

This study investigated Korean-English second language (L2) speakers' recognition of high- and low-frequency English words and compared two individual difference measures in their role of representing lexical quality in L2: cloze test scores and inverse efficiency scores (IES; response latency corrected for the amount of errors committed), obtained from lexical decision on a separate set of words. Cloze test scores aimed to assess general L2 proficiency, whereas IES was purported to measure lexical processing efficiency. 109 adult Korean-English L2 speakers participated in the study. Results showed significant main effects of word frequency, cloze test scores, and IES on lexical decision times, replicating previous findings and confirming the predictions of the lexical quality hypothesis. Crucially, IES was revealed to be a better measure of individual differences in L2 lexical quality than were cloze test scores. These findings suggest that lexical quality (which can be operationalized in terms of online lexical processing efficiency) comprises a distinct subdomain of language skills on its own, which cannot be measured in full using conventional language proficiency tests.

Wanna contraction in first language acquisition, child second language acquisition, and adult second language acquisition

Abstract Contraction of want to to wanna is sometimes possible (e.g., Who do you want to/wanna stay with ___ ?), but sometimes impossible (e.g., Who do you want ___ to/*wanna stay?). This contrast is attributable to the grammatical constraint that a wh-trace blocks the contraction of want and to. Most first language (L1) and second language (L2) acquisition studies testing learner knowledge of this constraint have used elicited production tasks and focused on adult participants, with inconsistent results. Using a child-friendly acceptability judgment task, the current study shows that children as young as 3;11 and both child and adult L2 learners have target-like knowledge of the constraint on wanna contraction. This result is in line with the position that L1 acquisition, child L2 acquisition, and adult L2 acquisition are qualitatively similar.

Capturing Thresholds and Continuities: Individual Differences as Predictors of L2 Sociolinguistic Repertoires in Adult Migrant Learners in Austria

Abstract This cross-sectional study addresses for the first time the non/linear association between individual learner differences of social, proficiency-related, and socioaffective nature (length of residence [LoR], varietal proficiency, exposure, and socioaffect) and differential outcomes in L2 sociolinguistic repertoires against the backdrop of the Austro-Bavarian naturalistic context. Forty adult migrant L2 German learners participated in a virtual reality experiment involving interactions with dialect-speaking and standard German-speaking interlocutors. The goal was to explore differences in participants’ interpersonal varietal behavior, that is, their addressee-relational variable use of standard German, Austro-Bavarian dialect, and mixture varieties. The results of Bayesian multinomial modeling indicated that LoR, dialect exposure, and proficiency, as well as reduced anxiety when speaking dialect, predicted differences in interpersonal varietal behavior. That said, a visual-quantitative analysis revealed critical thresholds concerning when, within these predictors, changes in sociolinguistic behavior manifested, indicating a rapid change in sociolinguistic development at the inter-individual level and ultimately facilitating initial insights as to how advanced one needs to be in order to engage in sociolinguistic variation in the Austro-Bavarian naturalistic context.

Using intonation to disambiguate meaning: The role of empathy and proficiency in L2 perceptual development

AbstractThe present study investigates the interplay between proficiency and empathy in the development of second language (L2) prosody by analyzing the perception and processing of intonation in questions and statements in L2 Spanish. A total of 225 adult L2 Spanish learners (L1 English) from the Northeastern United States completed a two-alternative forced choice (2AFC) task in which they listened to four utterance types and categorized them as either questions or statements. We used Bayesian multilevel regression and drift diffusion modeling to analyze the 2AFC data as a function of proficiency level and empathy scores for each utterance type. We show that learner response accuracy and sensitivity to intonation are positively correlated with proficiency, and this association is affected by individual empathy levels in both response accuracy and sentence processing. Higher empathic individuals, in comparison with lower empathic individuals, appear to be more sensitive to intonation cues in the process of forming sound-meaning associations, though increased sensitivity does not necessarily imply increased processing speed. The results motivate the inclusion of measures of pragmatic skill, such as empathy, to better account for intonational meaning processing and sentence comprehension in second language acquisition.

“Foreign” language aptitude predicts individual differences in native grammatical proficiency

AbstractLanguage aptitude is known to be a strong predictor of success in late second-language (L2) learning in instructional settings but is generally assumed to be irrelevant for native language (L1) acquisition. We investigated the relationship between language aptitude and L1 grammatical proficiency in the two studies reported here. Language aptitude was measured by means of a newly-developed test of grammatical sensitivity (Studies 1 and 2) and the Language Analysis subtest of the Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery (Study 1), whereas grammatical proficiency was assessed by a grammaticality judgment task in Study 1 and a picture selection task in Study 2. The results of the two studies reveal a robust relationship between language aptitude and L1 grammatical proficiency that is remarkably consistent across different measures for both variables and appears to hold across the board for a variety of grammatical structures. These results fit well with the proposal that explicit learning may play an important role not only in adult L2 learning but also in L1 acquisition and raises questions about the validity of arguments for a fundamental difference between L1 and L2 acquisition based on the premise that only the latter is related to aptitude.

Individual differences in attention control and the processing of phonological contrasts in a second language.

This study investigated attention control in L2 phonological processing from a cognitive individual differences perspective, to determine its role in predicting phonological acquisition in adult L2 learning. Participants were 21 L1-Spanish learners of English, and 19 L1-English learners of Spanish. Attention control was measured through a novel speech-based attention-switching task. Phonological processing was assessed through a speeded ABX categorization task (perception) and a delayed sentence repetition task (production). Correlational analyses indicated that learners with more efficient attention switching skill and faster speed in correctly identifying the target phonetic features in the speech dimension under focus could perceptually discriminate L2 vowels at higher processing speed, but not at higher accuracy rates. Thus, attentional flexibility provided a processing advantage for difficult L2 contrasts but did not predict the extent to which precise representations for the target L2 vowels had been established. However, attention control was related to L2 learners' ability to distinguish the contrasting L2 vowels in production. In addition, L2 learners' accuracy in perceptually distinguishing between two contrasting vowels was significantly related to how much of a quality distinction between them they could make in production.

D1 Türkçe / D2 Rusça Olan Yetişkinlerin Rusçada Sıfatlara Eklenen ve Bölünmüş Ad Öbeklerinde Sıfat Uyuşmasını Sağlayan Biçimbilgisel Eklerin Edinimi

This enquiry aims to examine whether L2 Russian adjectival morphology and adjective agreement in split contexts are acquirable by adult L1 Turkish learners at higher proficiency levels. Unlike Turkish, the Russian adjective is specified for case, number, and grammatical gender. The respective features, along with splitting, are not operational in Turkish. The Bottleneck Hypothesis Updated (Slabakova, 2019) predicts a full acquisition of this domain albeit it poses the highest level of challenge constituting a microparameter with complicated L1-L2 mapping, whereas the Interpretability Hypothesis (Tsimpli and Mastropavlou, 2007) claims it cannot be acquired. The research instrument is a Semantic Entailments task with short- and long-distance NP split d-linked wh-questions designed for the participants to assign the wh-word to either dative or accusative noun, respectively. The data came from adult L1 Turkish/L2 Russian learners and L1 Russian control group. The obtained findings suggest that functional morphology and adjective agreement in split contexts are successfully acquirable by the L2 population.

Deconstructing imagined identities and imagined communities through humor

Abstract The aim of this study is to explore humor as a means for deconstructing identities in humorous narratives written by adult L2 learners. Norton Pierce’s (1995) notions of investment in L2 learning, imagined identities, and imagined communities as well as the concepts of script opposition and target employed for the sociopragmatic analysis of humor (Attardo 2001) are exploited for demonstrating how humor constitutes a means for deconstructing L2 learners’ imaginary projections and investments in L2. The analysis reveals that L2 learners use humor in their narratives to account for their failure to fulfill their imagined identities as competent speakers and legitimate members of the host community, or for the flouting of their expectations concerning the behavior of the members of the imagined host community. Moreover, humor emerges as a strategy allowing learners to attenuate potential threats against their own positive face or that of host community members (Brown and Levinson 1987).

Sensitivity to syntactic dependency formation in child second language processing: a study of numeral quantifiers in Korean

AbstractThis study investigates whether child second language (L2) learners can use syntactic information during the processing of sentences involving unbounded dependencies and how their processing patterns compare to those of child monolinguals and adult L2 learners. Through a self-paced reading experiment involving the numeral quantifier (NQ) construction in Korean, we tested participants’ sensitivity to agreement violations between a noun phrase (NP) and an NQ in local and nonlocal conditions. The results showed that a subset of child L2 learners who demonstrated target-like knowledge of NP-NQ agreement in an offline task spent a longer processing time in the NP-NQ mismatch than in the NP-NQ match condition, in both local and nonlocal contexts. These child L2 learners’ processing patterns were comparable to those observed in child monolinguals and adult L2 learners. These findings suggest that child and adult L2 learners rely on the same system of syntactic representations and processing mechanisms that guide first language processing.

Task effects and the yes-bias in heritage language bilingualism

ABSTRACT This study investigated three key issues in heritage language (HL) research. Previous research shows HL speakers have an advantage on oral production tasks compared to L2 speakers who instead perform better on written tasks. Furthermore, both L2 and HL speakers are claimed to have a yes-bias towards retaining ungrammaticality in GJTs. Finally, the morphological domain has been shown to be as problematic for HL as L2 speakers but research in lesser-known languages is needed. Adult L1, L2, and HL speakers of Italian were compared on an oral priming task and timed GJT. Accuracy and response times were elicited from the latter test. The forms investigated were object and si-passive pronouns which lack corresponding forms in Swedish, the dominant language of the bilingual groups. Mixed effect regression was modelled to accuracy on the priming and GJT and response time data from the GJT. In contrast, a d-prime analysis was used to measure the degree of sensitivity to grammaticality and bias towards correct and incorrect answers in the GJT. Overall, the two bilingual groups performed quite similarly across the measures tested. All three groups show high sensitivity to grammaticality and a very similar bias for yes-answers on both grammatical and ungrammatical items.