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L2 Acquisition Of English Raising Predicates By Chinese EFL Learners: An Integrated Parsing Model Of Semantic Bootstrapping And Synatctic Bootstrapping

Posted on:2010-05-18Degree:DoctorType:Dissertation
Country:ChinaCandidate:Y H XieFull Text:PDF
GTID:1115360275487208Subject:Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
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Due to their unique semantics-syntax correspondence,i.e.,the predicate is notsemantically related to the subject,but to the embedded verb of the sentence,Englishraising predicates pose learning difficulties to L2 learners,regardless of their L1backgrounds.However,to date,the empirical studies that seek to account for thedifficulties encountered by L2 learners are almost non-existent.As the first attempt toaddress this issue,the present study investigates,within the framework of thegenerative approach,the L2 acquisition of English raising predicates by Chinese EFLlearners.To achieve this purpose,three steps are taken:(i) establish a theoreticalframework to account for Chinese EFL learners' behaviors in the acquisition ofEnglish raising predicates;(ii) systematically describe the acquisitional behaviors;and(iii) examine the extent to which the observed behaviors were explained within theestablished framework.The linguistic and cross-linguistic analyses performed within the generativeframework lead to the central issue of the present study:the semantic mismatchbetween the subject and the raising predicate is the major cause of difficultiesencountered by L2 learners.This central issue,in turn,leads to the central researchquestion:What are the underlying factors that trigger the recognition of the semanticmismatch in both raising and non-raising constructions and help L2 learners formulatethe linking rules in the acquisition of English raising predicates? To address this issue,an Integrated Parsing Model is established.On the basis of the model,5 hypotheses,which predict the developmental route supposed to be followed by Chinese EFLlearners in their acquisition of English raising predicates,are put forth.Then adoptingthe cross-sectional investigative approach,145 Chinese EFL learners,whorepresented five levels of English proficiency(i.e.,elementary,low,intermediate, upper-intermediate,and advanced),were recruited to participate in the presentinvestigation.They were required to perform three tasks,i.e.,a guided writingproduction task(GWT),a grammaticality judgment task(GJT),and a think-aloud task(TAT).The quantitative analyses of the GJT and GWT data yielded the following majorfindings:(i) the semantic mismatch between the subject and the raising predicate didpose a serious learning problem to Chinese EFL learners in their acquisition ofEnglish raising predicates;(ii) two distinct developmental routes of English raisingpredicate acquisition,i.e.,an approximately linear path of development of theknowledge of,and an inverted V-shaped route of their ability to use,raising predicates,were identified;(iii) learners failed to reach the level of native speakers in theacquisition of raising predicates;and(iv) the expletives there and it pose the greatestdifficulty to the learners in the development of both knowledge about and productivecontrol of English raising predicates.The qualitative analysis of the TAT data reveals that the on-line parsing processesof English raising predicate has the following three features:First,the cues mostcommonly used by the learners of all proficiency levels are semantic and syntacticcues.The use of intuition begins to appear only when they reach the intermediatelevel.However,it never reaches the level of native speakers.Second,except thelow-level group,all participant groups use cue combinations more often than they usesingle cues,and the more advanced the proficiency level,the more cue combinationsare involved.Third,though the patterns of the cue use sequence vary from group togroup,the more advanced the learners' proficiency,the more frequently theintegration is employed in their parsing process.A comparison of the above findings and our research hypotheses shows that(i)the prediction that the similarities between Chinese and English raising predicates canlead to positive transfer in the recognition of the semantic compatibility between thesubject of the sentence and the embedded verb is generally borne out by the empirical data;(ii) the hypotheses derived from the Integrated Parsing Model are not fullysupported,and(iii) the findings that the learners have shown a considerableawareness of all the syntactic and semantic properties of English raising predicates atthe beginning stage and that they performed better in GJT on expletive it in thenon-raising constructions than in the raising construction are not predicted.On the basis of these findings,the underlying factors that constrain theacquisition of English raising predicates in the Chinese context are identified.First,UG principles play a major role,through the learners' L1(i.e.,Chinese),in theiracquisition of English raising predicates.Their effect appears to be positive whereEnglish and Chinese are similar,but negative where the two languages are different.Second,the observed gap between knowledge and production represents,in essence,two interrelated perspectives of learning:competence and performance.In addition,the difficulty of learning English raising predicates is attributed to the semanticmismatch between the subject and the predicate.Third,the learners' failure to developawareness of the semantic mismatch is attributed to the learners' chunking strategyand overgeneralization errors,which,in turn,results in their difficulty in learning theexpletives it and there.As a result,fossilization occurs in Chinese EFL learners'acquisition of English raising predicates.Since there were discrepancies between the hypotheses derived from the Modeland the actual observations,the Model was modified on the basis of the empiricalfindings.The modified Model is believed to present a better picture of the acquisitionof English raising predicates by Chinese EFL learners in the sense that it is acombination of the strengths of the Semantic and the Syntactic BootstrappingHypotheses and the findings of the empirical study.Thus the Model is not onlycompatible with the UG principles but also closer to the true picture of languageacquisition.The finding that the expletives it and there are fossilized in Chinese EFL learners'acquisition of English raising predicates has its pedagogical implications in the classroom setting.More importantly,the key finding that the semantic mismatchposes the most serious learning problems to L2 learners sheds new light not only onthe learning mechanism for English raising predicates,but also on the learningmechanism for all verbs as a whole.
Keywords/Search Tags:English raising predicate, semantics-syntax correspondence, semantic mismatch, semantic bootstrapping, syntactic bootstrapping, Integrated Parsing Model, second language acquisition
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