Native English Speakers Research Articles

Impoliteness, Politeness and Mock Impoliteness in Naturally Occurring Data

Research on politeness and impoliteness recently has been the focus of pragmatics and discourse analysis, but impoliteness has gained little attention. An effort was exerted to examine how such a phenomenon works in different cultures. However, impoliteness as a linguistic medium of face attack has not received sufficient area of research in the Arabic context and the intercultural context, which is the main aim of this paper. This paper demonstrates a range of incidents encountered by Arabic and English native speakers. The model of analysis in this paper is a postmodern discursive approach in which the evaluative process is emphasized. It has been found in this paper that impolite utterances do not necessarily involve impoliteness or rudeness when the interlocutors’ social status, familiarity and distance are the same. This paper also showed that mock impoliteness functions as a linguistic tool for establishing solidarity between the members of the same culture when there is no intention of damaging face.

Evaluating Speaker-Listener Cognitive Effort in Speech Communication Through Brain-to-Brain Synchrony: A Pilot Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Investigation.

We explore a new approach to the study of cognitive effort involved in listening to speech by measuring the brain activity in a listener in relation to the brain activity in a speaker. We hypothesize that the strength of this brain-to-brain synchrony (coupling) reflects the magnitude of cognitive effort involved in verbal communication and includes both listening effort and speaking effort. We investigate whether interbrain synchrony is greater in native-to-native versus native-to-nonnative communication using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). Two speakers participated, a native speaker of American English and a native speaker of Korean who spoke English as a second language. Each speaker was fitted with the fNIRS cap and told short stories. The native English speaker provided the English narratives, and the Korean speaker provided both the nonnative (accented) English and Korean narratives. In separate sessions, fNIRS data were obtained from seven English monolingual participants ages 20-24 years who listened to each speaker's stories. After listening to each story in native and nonnative English, they retold the content, and their transcripts and audio recordings were analyzed for comprehension and discourse fluency, measured in the number of hesitations and articulation rate. No story retellings were obtained for narratives in Korean (an incomprehensible language for English listeners). Utilizing fNIRS technique termed sequential scanning, we quantified the brain-to-brain synchronization in each speaker-listener dyad. For native-to-native dyads, multiple brain regions associated with various linguistic and executive functions were activated. There was a weaker coupling for native-to-nonnative dyads, and only the brain regions associated with higher order cognitive processes and functions were synchronized. All listeners understood the content of all stories, but they hesitated significantly more when retelling stories told in accented English. The nonnative speaker hesitated significantly more often than the native speaker and had a significantly slower articulation rate. There was no brain-to-brain coupling during listening to Korean, indicating a break in communication when listeners failed to comprehend the speaker. We found that effortful speech processing decreased interbrain synchrony and delayed comprehension processes. The obtained brain-based and behavioral patterns are consistent with our proposal that cognitive effort in verbal communication pertains to both the listener and the speaker and that brain-to-brain synchrony can be an indicator of differences in their cumulative communicative effort. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.25452142.

Spanish Negative Concord Items: Experimental Evidence for Their Status as Strict Negative Polarity Items

This study investigates the semantic status of Spanish Negative Concord Items (NCIs) through their comparison with English Negative Quantifiers (NQs) and Polarity Items (PIs) in acceptability judgment tasks conducted among native speakers of Spanish and English. NCIs exhibit a dual behavior depending on their syntactic context, which has resulted in various analyses that categorize them as NQs, PIs, or non-negative indefinites. The findings from this investigation provide experimental confirmation that Spanish NCIs behave like strict Negative Polarity Items (NPIs) or indefinites that are exclusively licensed by a syntactically local anti-veridical operator (i.e., negation). This experimental approach sheds light on the longstanding controversy surrounding the semantic characterization of Spanish NCIs and contributes to our understanding of their behavior across a wide array of linguistic contexts.

Stance expressions in applied linguistics research articles: A corpus-based contrastive study

Stance, a crucial aspect of academic writing, is complex and vital for both beginner and advanced writers. However, L2 English learners and experienced writers frequently struggle with using stance markers effectively. Currently, there remains a scarcity of research comparing the utilisation of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles between native English professional writers and L1 Indonesian speakers. This study aims to fill this gap by investigating similarities and differences in the deployment of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles by authors with L1 Indonesian and L1 English backgrounds and discussing the educational implications derived from the analysis results. The analysis involves two corpora: the Indonesian academic corpus (IAC), comprising articles authored by L1 Indonesians, and the English academic corpus (EAC), consisting of articles by native English speakers. The study investigates various types of stance markers and their distribution across the corpora, revealing significant differences in their usage. L2 English authors employ more boosters and attitude markers, while L1 English writers use more hedges and self-mentions, with the most notable disparities observed in the usage of self-references. These findings underscore the necessity for educators, particularly within the Indonesian context, to sensitise learners to the discursive norms surrounding the use of stance markers in applied linguistics research articles and provide targeted instruction to enhance English learners’ proficiency in employing stance markers effectively.

Language transfers in third language acquisition of Chinese by intermediate level German and English native speakers: evidence from a behavioral experiment online.

The paper investigates language transfers in third language acquisition of Chinese by native German and English speakers at intermediate level. Subjects are divided into two groups and complete a Grammaticality Judgment and Correction Task through a behavioral experiment online. The results from multiple sources show that: (1) both L1 and L2 are sources of language transfers and the perceived crosslinguistic similarity of abstract structural properties serves as the main reason; (2) language transfers can be non-facilitative on L3 learning; (3) as L3 proficiency level improves, the less likely learners are to be affected by non-facilitative language transfers in L3 learning, but it may not disappear completely; (4) the background language with higher proficiency level is more likely to impose language transfers in L3 learning. The research suggests that language transfers in TLA are simultaneously regulated by a number of factors, such as similarities of abstract structural properties between background languages and L3, as well as language proficiency levels. At the end, we discuss the application of the results to Chinese language teaching.

Comparing Comparatives

This article explores the acceptability of constructions with double comparative elements in Danish and English. First, a brief introduction to theoretical assumptions for adjective phrases and degree phrases is given. After this, the methodology and challenges of setting up an empirical study are laid out. The results of the acceptability study were that native speakers of Danish and English evaluated double comparative constructions as being rather unacceptable when compared with control sentences and standard comparative constructions.

Effects of pronominal reference on the integration of syntactic and semantic information in second language processing

AbstractThis study investigated the effect of pronominal reference on the integration of syntactic and semantic information in second language (L2) processing. We conducted a self‐paced reading task involving 60 adult Korean‐speaking learners of English and 44 native English speakers. The experiment manipulated the semantic congruity between a subject and its adjectival predicate, as well as the reference type (pronoun vs. full noun) within the intervening relative clause. The results showed that the native speaker group consistently displayed sensitivity to the incongruity between the subject and the predicate, regardless of the reference type. Similarly, the nonnative speakers exhibited sensitivity to the mismatch in the critical region. However, this effect did not persist in subsequent regions including the spill‐over and wrap‐up regions. Instead, in the wrap‐up region, the L2 learners’ processing patterns were affected by the reference type, with sensitivity exclusively observed in the pronoun condition. The L2 learners’ processing pattern remained consistent across varying levels of English proficiency. These findings provide insights into the role of pronominal reference in L2 sentence processing.

Transfer of collostructions: the case of causative constructions

Abstract In an attempt to identify possible cases of collostructional transfer in the use of the causative construction [X make Y Vinf] by French-speaking learners of English, two types of analyses are combined in this study. First, a contrastive collostructional analysis compares the verbs occurring in the [Vinf] slot of the English construction and its French equivalent, [X faire Vinf Y]. Second, a contrastive interlanguage collostructional analysis compares the verbs used in the [Vinf] slot of [X make Y Vinf] by native speakers of English, French-speaking learners of English and learners of English from other mother tongue backgrounds. The aim is to identify verbs that are more distinctive of [X faire Vinf Y] than of [X make Y Vinf] and that are also more likely to be used by French-speaking learners of English than by other populations, as these verbs could be potential cases of collostructional preferences transferred by learners from French to English. The results suggest that learners might transfer verbs expressing a change of state or location and some individual verbs like discover from the French to the English causative construction. Their dispreference for copular verbs (other than be) could also be the result of transfer effects.

Lexical collocation as a discursive mechanism

Some terms are spreading in the research literature with particular speed. In the theory of education such terms include, for example, competence, in linguistics it is concept; the term discourse is common both for linguistics and philosophy. The purpose of the article is to define the nature of discourse analysis in linguistic philosophy. We believe that in research activities, it is necessary not to compile, but to truly integrate, which significantly complicates the task of the scientist: this article is devoted to trying to find possible solutions to this problem. The choice of methods and techniques of discourse analysis is determined by the purpose of the article and the set of tasks. An integrated approach is used: discursive analysis, hypothetical-deductive method, general scientific descriptive method (observation, generalization, interpretation and classification), as well as cognitive analysis are carried out in the framework of this article. The materials of the study are texts selected from text corpora, translations, as well as original texts of various genres of written and oral speech, including texts of classical philosophical works and corpus texts. However, if a native speaker of English (that is, a non-native speaker of French) nevertheless succumbs to the temptation in the European discursive community to denote the Frenchlanguage corpus of texts with the expression "discours académique", then how will this choice be interpreted? As a mistake, or worse, a native English speaker's preference for an anglicism? These are not at all simple questions, and to answer them is the purpose of the article. The perspective of the research is connected with the fact, as it is defined in the article, that the further development of discourse analysis theory becomes possible due to the development of such an applied field of humanitarian knowledge as corpus linguistics.

Clinical Focus: The Development and Description of a Palette of Transmasculine Voices.

The study of gender and speech has historically excluded studies of transmasculine individuals. Consequently, generalizations about speech and gender are based on cisgender individuals. This lack of representation hinders clinical training and clinical service delivery, particularly by speech-language pathologists providing gender-affirming communication services. This letter describes a new corpus of the speech of American English-speaking transmasculine men, transmasculine nonbinary people, and cisgender men that is open and available to clinicians and researchers. Twenty masculine-presenting native English speakers from the Upper Midwestern United States (including cisgender men, transmasculine men, and transmasculine nonbinary people) were recorded, producing three sets of speech materials: Consensus Auditory-Perceptual Evaluation of Voice sentences, the Rainbow Passage, and a novel set of sentences developed for this project. Acoustic measures vowels (overall formant frequency scaling, vowel-space dispersion, fundamental frequency, breathiness), consonants (voice onset time of word-initial voiceless stops, spectral moments of word-initial /s/), and the entire sentence (rate of speech) that were made. The acoustic measures reveal a wide range for all dependent measures and low correlations among the measures. Results show that many of the voices depart considerably from the norms for men's speech in published studies. This new corpus can be used to illustrate different ways of sounding masculine by speech-language pathologists performing gender-affirming communication services and by higher education teachers as examples of diverse ways of sounding masculine.

An Eye-Tracking Study on the Processing of L2 Collocations: The Effect of Congruency, Proficiency, and Transparency.

The availability of a first language translation equivalent (i.e., congruency) has repeatedly been shown to influence second-language collocation processing in decontextualized tasks. However, no study to date has examined how L2 speakers process congruent/incongruent collocations on-line in a real-world context. The present study aimed to fill this gap by examining the eye-movement behavior of 31 Arabic-English speakers and 30 native English speakers as they read 20 congruent and 20 incongruent collocations (in addition to 40 control phrases) in short contexts. The study also examined possible modulating effects of proficiency level and transparency on congruency effects. Results showed that non-natives (similar to native speakers) showed a processing advantage for collocations over control phrases. However, there was no effect of congruency (i.e., no difference between congruent and incongruent collocations) for either group, and no modulating effect of proficiency or transparency on congruency. We discuss implications of the findings for theories of L2 lexical processing.

고등학교 영어 교과서 속 칭찬과 칭찬응답

Objectives The purpose of the paper was to analyze two speech acts (compliment and compliment response) in high school English textbooks and to find whether they were presented authentically and accurately according to L2 pragmatic norms.
 Methods Compliments in 8 differing textbooks were analyzed in terms of three aspects of compliment (syntactic structures, lexicals and topics), and compliment responses in textbooks were categorized according to four types of response (acceptance, amendment, rejection and non-acknowledgement). Then the analyzed compliments and compliment responses were compared with those acts made by English native speakers.
 Results Compliments in textbooks heavily relied on specific syntactic structures, used a variety of adjectives rather than a limited set of adjectives, and focused more on personality than physical appearance as compliment topics, which showed clear differences from what English native speakers do in their performance of compliments. Also unlike native speakers who prefer acceptance by responding positively to compliments, compliment responses in textbooks over-used non-acceptance strategies through refusal or non-acknowledgement.
 Conclusions Given these results, English textbooks should be developed based only on pragmatic norms of target language speakers, not intuitions or L1 knowledge of textbook developers.

An Analysis of ELF-informed Practices in ESP Coursebooks

The investigation of English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) contexts has produced significant results in the last few years. Moreover, these results have initiated a shift from achieving native speaker competency to more context-related and functional language use in the perspective of the overall approach to ESP. Yet, the literature needs more study to reveal how far this shift has embedded ESP coursebooks and audio materials. Therefore, this study aimed to explore to what extent the recent ESP coursebooks and audio materials matched the characteristics of ELF. In the study, four ESP coursebooks and their audio tracks were analyzed in terms of the presence or absence of references to ELF features, specifically; ELF-informed activities, the promotion of using English outside the inner circle countries, and the use of authentic expending circle English communication. The findings revealed the dominance of Standard English in language exposure, a dearth of ELF-informed activities, and a sparse representation of expending circle cultures in the four ESP coursebooks. Similarly, the listening tracks showed a strong preference for native English speakers as the introducers of English users in the tracks. The study presents a number of critical implications for ESP instructors and material designers.

Sources of English Neologisms

With the social changes and technological development since the 20th century, many new things have emerged, and with them, the language has also changed. Neologism is a linguistic phenomenon, which is the product and reflection of the development and change of language. According to statistics, there are currently more than 600 million native English speakers in the world, and one-third of the world's population speaks English as a second language. This shows the importance of English as a universal language. Consequently, English inevitably produces many new words with the rapid changes in social life. This paper delves into the origins and mechanisms behind neologisms in the English language. This study aims to explore the dynamic processes that drive vocabulary expansion by examining vocabulary innovation, borrowing, and integration. Based on grasping the concept of English neologisms, this paper discusses the origin and derivation of English neologisms through the study of dictionaries and monographs, and a large number of examples of neologisms. The study found that the sources of English neologisms are mainly divided into three aspects, namely, traditional word formation, new meanings of old words in modern English, and the fusion of foreign words and native words.

The interpretation of reflexive pronouns in VP-ellipsis by L2 English learners with different proficiency levels

Abstract English reflexive anaphora in cases of VP-ellipsis may allow for strict and sloppy readings. A few L2 studies (Epoge, 2012; Park, 2016; Ying, 2005) have focused on determining the role that L2 proficiency may exert on learners’ choices in bare, referential, and non-referential contexts. This paper provides data from 104 Spanish learners of English (A2, B1, and B2 levels) and 32 native speakers of English. Results showed that participants tended to interpret reflexives sloppily in bare and non-referential contexts, whereas strict readings prevailed in referential ones. There existed significant differences in the interpretation of learners versus native speakers, whilst the differences among the three learner groups were not so marked. However, the least proficient group differed most from native speakers. Findings partially confirm previous research and discrepancies may be tentatively ascribed to extraneous variables (e.g., the learners’ L1, the range of the proficiency levels, or the characteristics of the control groups).

English loanwords in Hong Kong Cantonese: false friend cognates and English vocabulary acquisition

Abstract Research on loanword semantics seldom investigates systematic patterns of change because semantic change is not nearly as constrained and predictable as phonological change. Hong Kong is a bilingual city of English and Chinese/Cantonese, where people frequently use English loanwords in Hong Kong Cantonese (ELCs). Drawing upon the notion of cognates, this questionnaire-based study examines the extent to which Hong Kong Cantonese speakers are aware of the contrasts in meaning between ELCs and the English words from which they have been borrowed. Three ELCs that are false friend cognates with their English source words were selected to be included in the study. Respondents who completed the questionnaire included a group of native English speakers (N = 19) and a group of native Cantonese speakers (N = 107). Their responses were compared and contrasted through both qualitative and quantitative methods. The results show that the ELCs affect the Cantonese speakers’ understanding of the English source words. The English proficiency of native Cantonese speakers has been identified as a contributing factor that correlates with the accuracy of understanding word meanings. This study delineates the relationship between false friend cognates, ELCs and English vocabulary acquisition. It offers pedagogical implications for vocabulary learning and teaching in bilingual contexts.

Production of the English /ɹ/ by Mandarin-English Bilingual Speakers.

Rhotic sounds are some of the most challenging sounds for L2 learners to acquire. This study investigates the production of English rhotic sounds by Mandarin-English bilinguals with two English proficiency levels. The production of the English /ɹ/ by 17 Mandarin-English bilinguals was examined with ultrasound imaging and compared with the production of native English speakers. The ultrasound data show that bilinguals can produce native-like bunched and retroflex gestures, but the distributional pattern of tongue shapes in various contexts differs from that of native speakers. Acoustically, the English /ɹ/ produced by bilinguals had a higher F3 and F3-F2, as well as some frication noise in prevocalic /ɹ/, features similar to the Mandarin /ɹ/. Mandarin-English bilinguals did produce language-specific phonetic realizations for the English and Mandarin /ɹ/s. There was a positive correlation between language proficiency and English-specific characteristics of /ɹ/ by Mandarin-English bilinguals in both articulation and acoustics. Phonetic similarities facilitated rather than hindered L2 speech learning in production: Mandarin-English bilinguals showed better performance in producing the English /ɹ/ allophones that were more similar to the Mandarin /ɹ/ (syllabic and postvocalic /ɹ/s) than producing the English /ɹ/ allophone that was less similar to the Mandarin /ɹ/ (prevocalic /ɹ/). This study contributes to our understanding of the mechanism of speech production in late bilinguals.

Disambiguating ambiguity: A comparative analysis of lexical decision-making in native and non-native English speakers

Making lexical decisions to disambiguate multiple-meaning words or senses provides clear evidence of word recognition, processing systems and representation in the mental lexicon. This comparative study explores non-native English speakers’ and native English speakers’ cognitive mechanisms employed in phonological and lexical ambiguity resolution embedded in auditory and visual utterances. English proficiency and vocabulary tests and two lexical decision tests were conducted with 35 EFL undergraduate students and four native English monolingual speakers. The effects of factors such as L2 proficiency and familiarity on ambiguity resolution in addition to the resolution techniques employed were also explored. Our findings suggest that the differences in disambiguating L2 words among native English speakers and non-native English speakers might indicate different comprehension, representation and processing patterns. The ambiguity type most likely has a major role in determining the diverse phenomenon of ambiguity resolution. More specifically, there was evidence of significant differences in homophone use, metaphorical polysemy and homonym ambiguity resolution between the two groups, excluding metonymous polysemy. Homophones and polysemy were the least problematic and challenging lexical ambiguity types unlike homonymy for the non-native group. Other results also revealed the positive effects of L2 proficiency and L2 word familiarity on ambiguity resolution. Thus, this study also has important implications considering the vital role of vocabulary in L2 competence and knowledge.

Sociolinguistic Insights from Free Associative Experiment Data

This study delves into the intricate relationship between language, cognition, and society by employing a multidimensional approach. It combines free associative experiments and sociolinguistic analysis to offer a nuanced perspective on concept configuration. By focusing on the intersection of sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics, the research explores how sociocultural factors influence the way individuals associate concepts, exemplified through the study of “Altruism” in English native speakers. The findings underscore the significant impact of variables like age and gender on the concept configuration, revealing the fact that social variables shape linguistic consciousness. This integration of methodologies provides a comprehensive understanding of the concept configuration, emphasizing the need for a multidimensional approach in the study of language intricacies. In summary, this article highlights the importance of merging free associative experiments and sociolinguistic analysis to unravel the influence of social factors on concept associations. It contributes valuable insights into the dynamic nature of language, cognition, and society while emphasizing the relevance of age and gender variables in such investigations. This research lays a foundation for further exploration in the fields of sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics.

Do native and non-native speakers make different judicial decisions?

Abstract Bilinguals experience diminished emotion when using their foreign compared with their native language. The diminished emotion has been shown to lead to more lenient moral evaluations in a foreign language. Here we show that non-native speakers of English are less sensitive to emotional mitigating circumstances of a crime than native speakers, presumably because of the diminished experience emotion. This can lead non-native speakers to provide harsher, rather than more lenient, evaluations. Native and non-native speakers of English recommended sentence duration for crimes committed because of mitigating emotional circumstances (e.g., fraud to pay spouse's medical treatment) or for selfish reasons (e.g., buying luxury goods). Native English speakers differentiated more between the two types of scenarios than non-native speakers did. The study thus provides preliminary evidence that processing information in a foreign language can influence decisions, and that the directionality of the effect depends on the role of emotion in the context.