scholarly journals REFLECTIONS ON FREQUENCY EFFECTS IN LANGUAGE PROCESSING

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 297-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick C. Ellis
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Fundamental Difference ◽  
Theory Testing ◽  
Communicative Interaction ◽  
Learning Mechanisms ◽  
Frequency Effects ◽  
Developmental Readiness ◽  
History Of ◽  
Blind Faith

This response addresses the following points raised in the commentaries: (a) complementary learning mechanisms, the distinction between explicit and implicit memory, and the neuroscience of “noticing”; (b) what must and what need not be noticed for learning; (c) when frequency fails to drive learning, which addresses factors such as failing to notice cues, perseveration, transfer from L1, developmental readiness, thinking too hard, pedagogical input, and practicing; (d) attention and form-focused instruction; (e) conscious and unconscious knowledge of frequency; (f) sequences of acquisition—from formula, through low-scope pattern, to construction; (g) the Fundamental Difference hypothesis; (h) the blind faith of categorical grammar; (i) Labovian variationist perspectives; (j) parsimony and theory testing; (k) universals and predispositions; and (l) wanna-contractions. It concludes by emphasizing that language acquisition is a process of dynamic emergence and that learners' language is a product of their history of usage in communicative interaction.

Between the input and the acquisition lies the shadow

2004 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-31
Author(s):  
MICHAEL HARRINGTON
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
L2 Acquisition ◽  
Learning Mechanisms ◽  
Processing Theory ◽  
Theory Of Language ◽  
L1 And L2

Acquisition by Processing Theory (APT) is a unified account of language processing and learning that encompasses both L1 and L2 acquisition. Bold in aim and broad in scope, the proposal offers parsimony and comprehensiveness, both highly desirable in a theory of language acquisition. However, the sweep of the proposal is accompanied by an economy of description that makes it difficult to evaluate the validity of key learning claims, or even how literally they are to be interpreted. Two in particular deserve comment; the first concerns the learning mechanisms responsible for adding new L2 grammatical information, and the second the theoretical and empirical status of the activation concept used in the model.

scholarly journals FREQUENCY EFFECTS AND SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 249-260 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susan M. Gass ◽  
Alison Mackey
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Speech Processing ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Frequency Effects ◽  
Input And Output ◽  
Target Article ◽  
Processing Language

In this response to Ellis's target article on frequency in language processing, language use, and language acquisition, we argue in favor of a role for frequency in several areas of second language acquisition, including interactional input and output and speech processing. We also discuss areas where second language acquisition appears to proceed along its own route and at its own pace regardless of the frequency of the input, as well as areas where input is infrequent but acquisition appears to be unimpeded. Our response is intended to highlight the complexity of the task of deciphering the role and importance of frequency.

Language acquisition as a side effect of language processing

2010 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-188
Author(s):  
Michael Sharwood Smith
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Side Effect ◽  
Vital Role ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Learning Mechanisms ◽  
Time Dimension ◽  
Making Sense ◽  
Theoretical Approaches ◽  
The Individual

Researchers in the field of language acquisition may adopt various particular theoretical approaches to the description and explanation of linguistic phenomena. They need this theory to describe the nature of what is or is not undergoing change over time. However linguistic theory normally makes no reference to the time dimension, a dimension crucial to any study of development. Psycholinguists, on the other hand, focus on temporal phenomena but these are normally measured in milliseconds. At the same time, they still need a coherent model of linguistic structure to carry out their investigations. The logic of this suggests that a framework is needed that integrates linguistic theories about the properties of language, i.e., linguistic knowledge, with theories about on-line processing. The need to integrate these two ways of looking at language is also crucial for researchers who study linguistic development in the individual. One such approach is Modular Growth and Use of Language (MOGUL), a theoretical framework based on a close examination of research in several disciplines and within which utterance processing plays a vital role in explaining development. In fact, in that part of MOGUL which is devoted to explaining acquisition, the claim is that development is a side-effect of making sense of language to which we are exposed. No special learning mechanisms are involved.

scholarly journals Comparing and explaining the trajectories of first and second language acquisition: in search of the right mix of psychological and linguistic factors

1998 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
GERARD KEMPEN
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Emotional Reactions ◽  
Parameter Setting ◽  
Learning Mechanisms ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
L1 And L2

When you compare the behavior of two different age groups which are trying to master the same sensori-motor or cognitive skill, you are likely to discover varying learning routes: different stages, different intervals between stages, or even different orderings of stages. Such heterogeneous learning trajectories may be caused by at least six different types of factors:(1) Initial state: the kinds and levels of skills the learners have available at the onset of the learning episode.(2) Learning mechanisms: rule-based, inductive, connectionist, parameter setting, and so on.(3) Input and feedback characteristics: learning stimuli, information about success and failure.(4) Information processing mechanisms: capacity limitations, attentional biases, response preferences.(5) Energetic variables: motivation, emotional reactions.(6) Final state: the fine-structure of kinds and levels of subskills at the end of the learning episode.This applies to language acquisition as well. First and second language learners probably differ on all six factors. Nevertheless, the debate between advocates and opponents of the Fundamental Difference Hypothesis concerning L1 and L2 acquisition have looked almost exclusively at the first two factors. Those who believe that L1 learners have access to Universal Grammar whereas L2 learners rely on language processing strategies, postulate different learning mechanisms (UG parameter setting in L1, more general inductive strategies in L2 learning). Pienemann opposes this view and, based on his Processability Theory, argues that L1 and L2 learners start out from different initial states: they come to the grammar learning task with different structural hypotheses (SOV versus SVO as basic word order of German).

scholarly journals FREQUENCY EFFECTS IN LANGUAGE PROCESSING

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 143-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nick C. Ellis
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Change ◽  
Sentence Production ◽  
Sociolinguistic Variation ◽  
Frequency Effects ◽  
History Of ◽  
Implicit And Explicit ◽  
Implicit And Explicit Learning ◽  
Explanatory Concept ◽  
Connectionist Learning

This article shows how language processing is intimately tuned to input frequency. Examples are given of frequency effects in the processing of phonology, phonotactics, reading, spelling, lexis, morphosyntax, formulaic language, language comprehension, grammaticality, sentence production, and syntax. The implications of these effects for the representations and developmental sequence of SLA are discussed. Usage-based theories hold that the acquisition of language is exemplar based. It is the piecemeal learning of many thousands of constructions and the frequency-biased abstraction of regularities within them. Determinants of pattern productivity include the power law of practice, cue competition and constraint satisfaction, connectionist learning, and effects of type and token frequency. The regularities of language emerge from experience as categories and prototypical patterns. The typical route of emergence of constructions is from formula, through low-scope pattern, to construction. Frequency plays a large part in explaining sociolinguistic variation and language change. Learners' sensitivity to frequency in all these domains has implications for theories of implicit and explicit learning and their interactions. The review concludes by considering the history of frequency as an explanatory concept in theoretical and applied linguistics, its 40 years of exile, and its necessary reinstatement as a bridging variable that binds the different schools of language acquisition research.

THE EVOLVING CONTEXT OF THE FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCE HYPOTHESIS

2009 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Bley-Vroman
Keyword(s):  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Development ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Native Language ◽  
Universal Grammar ◽  
Foreign Language Learning ◽  
Fundamental Difference ◽  
Foreign Language Acquisition

Foreign language learning contrasts with native language development in two key respects: It is unreliable and it is nonconvergent. At the same time, it is clear that foreign languages are languages. The fundamental difference hypothesis (FDH) was introduced as a way to account for the general characteristics of foreign language learning. The FDH was originally formulated in the context of the theory of rich Universal Grammar, and this theory has guided much foreign language acquisition research over the past two decades. However, advances in the understanding of language have undermined much of the supporting framework.The FDH—indeed all of SLA research—must be rethought in light of these advances. It is proposed here that (a) foreign language grammars make central use of patches, which are also seen as peripheral phenomena in native languages; (b) non-domain-specific processes are used in foreign language acquisition, but that these are also employed—although more effectively because they are integrated into the language system—by native language development; and (c) foreign language online processing relies heavily on the use of shallow parses, but these are also available in native language processing, although less crucially.

What we have to explain in foreign language learning

1996 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 718-718 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Bley-Vroman
Keyword(s):  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Development ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Language Learning ◽  
Learning Theory ◽  
Foreign Language Learning ◽  
Fundamental Difference ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Development Theory

AbstractWhile child language development theory must explain invariant “success,” foreign language learning theory must explain variation and lack of success. The fundamental difference hypothesis (FDH) outlines such a theory. Epstein et al. ignore the explanatory burden, mischaracterize the FDH, and underestimate the resources of human cognition. The field of second language acquisition is not divided into camps by views on “access” to UG.

scholarly journals Language Usage and Second Language Morphosyntax: Effects of Availability, Reliability, and Formulaicity

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rundi Guo ◽  
Nick C. Ellis
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Second Language Learners ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Elicited Imitation ◽  
Short Delay ◽  
Word Forms ◽  
Generalized Linear Mixed Effects

A large body of psycholinguistic research demonstrates that both language processing and language acquisition are sensitive to the distributions of linguistic constructions in usage. Here we investigate how statistical distributions at different linguistic levels – morphological and lexical (Experiments 1 and 2), and phrasal (Experiment 2) – contribute to the ease with which morphosyntax is processed and produced by second language learners. We analyze Chinese ESL learners’ knowledge of four English inflectional morphemes: -ed, -ing, and third-person -s on verbs, and plural -s on nouns. In Elicited Imitation Tasks, participants listened to length- and difficulty-matched sentences each containing one target morpheme and typed the whole sentence as accurately as they could after a short delay. Experiment 1 investigated lexical and morphemic levels, testing the hypotheses that a morpheme is expected to be more easily processed when it is (1) highly available (i.e., occurring in frequent word-forms), and (2) highly reliable (i.e., occurring in lemma words that are consistently conjugated in the form containing this morpheme). Thirty sentences were made for each morpheme, divided into three Availability-Reliability Distribution (ARD) groups on the basis of corpus analysis in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA; Davies, 2008-): 10 target words high in availability, 10 high in reliability, and 10 low in both reliability and availability. Responses were scored on whether the target morpheme was accurately reproduced given the provision of the correct lemma. A generalized linear mixed-effects logit model (GLMM) revealed fixed effects of morpheme type, availability, and reliability on the accuracy of morpheme provision. There were no effects of lemma frequency. Experiment 2 successfully replicated these results and extended the investigation to explore phrasal formulaicity by manipulating the frequency of the four-word strings in which the morpheme was embedded. GLMMs replicated the effects of word-form availability and reliability and additionally revealed independent phrase-superiority effects where morphemes were better reproduced in contexts of higher string-frequency. Taken together, these findings demonstrate that morpheme acquisition reflects the distributional properties of learners’ experience and the mappings therein between lexis, morphology, phraseology, and semantics. These conclusions support an emergentist view of the statistical symbolic learning of morphology where language acquisition involves the satisfaction of competing constraints across multiple grain-sizes of units.

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