EFL Learners' Processing Of Words With Derivational Suffix

Lexical processing is an important issue in psycholinguistic research.One of the research focuses is how morphologicall y complex words(i.e.,words composed of two or more morphemes)are represented and proces sed.From a bulk of literature concerned with this issue,it can be seen that three models have been proposed: Full-listing Model,Decomposition Model and Dual-route Model.Moreover,supporters of the Decomposition Model disagree on the nature of morphological decomposition,that is to say,how morphological decomposition takes place: is it based on morpho-orthographic information or morpho-semantic information.Previous research mainly focuses on native speakers or bilinguals ' processing of morphologicall y complex structures,whereas few related studies on second language learners are still in disp ute.Some researchers maintain that second language learners could decompose morphologicall y complex word forms into stems and affixes just like native speakers do;some researchers h old the idea that second language learners rely more on lexical sto rage;some researchers support the Dual-route Model in which whole-word processing and morphological decomposition coexist.What 's more,researchers who support that second language learners also adopt decomposition processing route rarely further explore the nature of morphological decomposition.In 2004,researchers found that transposed-letter nonwords(e.g.,jugde)are easier to facilitate the recognition of target words(e.g.,judge)in comparison with substituted-letter nonwords(e.g.,jubpe),which is known as transposed-letter priming effect.Previous scholars have put forward two theories of letter position coding to explain transposed-letter effect: the Open-bigram Coding Theory and Spatial Coding Theory.After reviewing previous studies on morphological processing,it can be found th at morphological priming effect was generall y used by previous scholars to study morphological processing,and few researchers employed transposed-letter priming effect to study morphological processing.Inspired by these studies,the present study extends the processing of morphologicall y complex words into the field of letter transposition and takes English words with derivational suffix as stimuli to explore how second language learners process morphologicall y complex words and thus attempts to study second language learners' morphological processing from a new perspective.The experimental materials in this study are divided into two conditions: appropriatel y suffixed(e.g.,speak+er)and illegall y suffixed condition(e.g.,speak+ly).In the appropriately suffixed condition,letter transposition is divided into two types: within-morpheme type(e.g.,sepaker)and across-morpheme type(e.g.,speaekr).Masked priming paradigm with lexical decision task was employed in the experiment.The major f indings are summarized as follows.Firstl y,transposed-letter effect appeared in within-morpheme letter transposition in appropriatel y suffixed condition,which showed second language learners ' uncertaint y of letter position coding in the earl y stage of wo rd processing,proving the rationality of Open-bigram Coding Theory and Spatial Coding Theory.Secondly,transposed-letter effect also appeared in across-morpheme letter transposition in appropriately suffixed condition.However,transposed-letter effect in across-morpheme letter transposition was apparently weakened compared with that in within-morpheme letter transposition,which showed that morphemic boundary had some influence on transposed-letter effect.Thirdl y,transposed-letter effect appeared in a cross-morpheme letter transposition in appropriatel y suffixed condition,which proved that whole-word processing route was adopted b y second language learners when processing morphologicall y complex words.Transposed-letter effect also existed in illegally suffixed condition,which demonstrated that second language learners also adopted decomposition processing route.In conclusion,it can be found that second language learners' processing of morphologicall y complex words was accomplished b y the whole-word processing route and morpheme-based decomposition route,which provided empirical support for Dual-route Model.In the meanwhile,it proved that second language learners ' morphological decomposition was activated on the basis of morpho-orthographic information,and morpho-semantic factor did not play a role at the earl y stage of processing morphologicall y complex structures.