Chinese EFL Learners' Acquisition Of English Locative Verbs

In Pinker's(1989),learnability of English locative verbs is discussed.By far,there have been a considerable number of studies devoted to the acquisition of locative verbs,especially in second language,making it a significant topic for scholars at home and abroad.Although great results have been attained,the acquisition of locative verbs still requires further study.First of all,there are inconsistencies on whether learners acquire native-like knowledge of locative verbs.Bley-Vroman and Joo(2001)and Joo(2003)demonstrate that L2 learners can't grasp native-like knowledge of locative verbs,while in Choi and Lackshman(2002)and Li(2008)advanced learners can behave similarly to native speakers.Secondly,there are two different accounts of L1 transfer in learners' acquisition of English locatives.Joo(2003)holds that there is no mother tongue transfer found in L2 learners' acquisition,while Li(2008)holds the opposite view.Hence,more work needs to be done so as to verify whether mother tongue plays a role in learners' acquisition of English locatives.Besides,a few of the previous studies focus on Chinese EFL learners' acquisition of locative verbs,this thesis suggests that more studies should be conducted to reveal the similarities and differences of the acquisition of locative verbs from Chinese EFL learners and native speakers.Thirdly,leaning locative verbs in senior high school is essential,because locative verbs often appear in the textbook as a supporting role to help students to understand some vocabulary.However,a few of the previous studies recruit high school students as subjects,which bring about the failure in collecting the acquisitioninformation from those learners.Finally,in the light of the previous experimental investigations,many of the studies use picture description as the main test method,under which circumstances subjects may be easily affected by pictures and focus on the interpretation of pictures.That makes it difficult to reveal the cognitive level of locative verbs.As a consequence,further investigations should be carried out on English learners' acquisition of locative verbs.Based on the previous studies,this thesis is designed to observe the acquisition of English locative verbs by Chinese EFL learners and native speakers.In the experiment,sixty-three Chinese students were recruited in the experimental study,and categorized into three English proficiency levels.In the primary group,subjects were24 students in grade three from High School;in the intermediate group,19 English majors were in grade three from University;in the advanced group,20 postgraduates were in grade two from Beijing Forestry University;and 18 native speakers were chosen as a control group.All the subjects participated in the task of forced sentence selection,after the experiment,the data obtained were analyzed by statistical software SPSS 23.0.Several findings are achieved from the experiment.In the first place,figure verbs are harder for primary EFL learners and advanced EFL learners to acquire,and ground verbs are harder for intermediate EFL learners to acquire.In the second place,the results show that advanced EFL learners to an extent acquire native-like knowledge of locative verbs.In addition,Chinese EFL learners are in the stage where their knowledge of locative verbs is developing,the higher their English proficiency level is,the better they master locative verbs.Finally,with the help of mother tongue,Chinese EFL learners are learning verb semantics,but L1 may have some side effects in understanding semantics of figure verbs and ground verbs and the correspondent constructions.To sum up,on the basis of Goldberg's construction theory and Pinker's learnability theory,this thesis reveals the similarities and differences of the acquisition of locative verbs among Chinese EFL learners and English native speakers.These findings deepen our understanding of language acquisition.At the same time,theresults of the study enrich the literature of the acquisition of English locative verbs and benefit the teaching of English locative verbs in actual discourse context.English teachers can teach English locative verbs and locative constructions according to English language characteristics,so as to help students quickly grasp the knowledge of English locative verbs.