Misbehaved masculines: Incidental acquisition of grammatical gender in L2 German during reading

2017 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-141 ◽  
Author(s):  
DENISA BORDAG ◽  
AMIT KIRSCHENBAUM ◽  
MARIA ROGAHN ◽  
ANDREAS OPITZ ◽  
ERWIN TSCHIRNER
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Short Text ◽  
Early Stages ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Syntactic Context

The present study explores the early stages of incidental acquisition of grammatical gender during reading in German as a second language (L2) using a self-paced reading paradigm. The results show that advanced L2 learners are sensitive to gender agreement violations after as few as three to four exposures to a novel noun within a short text. The results also indicate that the acquisition of grammatical gender from syntactic context is gender dependent: Whereas gender violation effects were observed for feminine and neuter nouns, no such effects were observed for masculine nouns.

Processing of grammatical gender in French as a first and second language: Evidence from ERPs

2009 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 76-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cheryl Frenck-Mestre ◽  
Alice Foucart ◽  
Haydee Carrasco-Ortiz ◽  
Julia Herschensohn
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
English Learners ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Language Background ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Phonetic Cues

The present study examined the processing of grammatical gender in second language (L2) French as a function of language background (Experiment 1) and as a function of overt phonetic properties of agreement (Experiment 2) by examining Event Related Potential (ERP) responses to gender discord in L2 French. In Experiment 1 we explored the role of the presence/absence of abstract grammatical gender in the L1 (gendered German, ungendered English): we compared German and English learners of French when processing post-nominal plural (no gender cues on determiner) attributive adjectives that either agreed in gender with the noun or presented a gender violation. We found grammaticalized responses (P600) by native and L1 English learners, but no response by German L1, a result we attribute to the possible influence of plurality, which is gender neutralized in German DP concord. In Experiment 2, we examined the role of overt phonetic cues to noun-adjective gender agreement in French, for both native speakers and Spanish L2 learners of French, finding that both natives and L2 learners showed a more robust P600 in the presence of phonetic cues. These data, in conjunction with those of other ERP studies can best be accounted for by a model that allows for native language influence, that is not, however constrained by age of acquisition, and that must also allow for clear cues in the input to influence acquisition and/or processing.

scholarly journals Idiosyncratic Grammars: Syntactic Processing in Second Language Comprehension Uses Subjective Feature Representations

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (7) ◽  
pp. 1428-1444 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristin Lemhöfer ◽  
Herbert Schriefers ◽  
Peter Indefrey
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Sentence Comprehension ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Nonnative Speakers ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Syntactic Processing ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Feature Representations ◽  
L2 Learners

Learning the syntax of a second language (L2) often represents a big challenge to L2 learners. Previous research on syntactic processing in L2 has mainly focused on how L2 speakers respond to “objective” syntactic violations, that is, phrases that are incorrect by native standards. In this study, we investigate how L2 learners, in particular those of less than near-native proficiency, process phrases that deviate from their own, “subjective,” and often incorrect syntactic representations, that is, whether they use these subjective and idiosyncratic representations during sentence comprehension. We study this within the domain of grammatical gender in a population of German learners of Dutch, for which systematic errors of grammatical gender are well documented. These L2 learners as well as a control group of Dutch native speakers read Dutch sentences containing gender-marked determiner–noun phrases in which gender agreement was either (objectively) correct or incorrect. Furthermore, the noun targets were selected such that, in a high proportion of nouns, objective and subjective correctness would differ for German learners. The ERP results show a syntactic violation effect (P600) for objective gender agreement violations for native, but not for nonnative speakers. However, when the items were re-sorted for the L2 speakers according to subjective correctness (as assessed offline), the P600 effect emerged as well. Thus, rather than being insensitive to violations of gender agreement, L2 speakers are similarly sensitive as native speakers but base their sensitivity on their subjective—sometimes incorrect—representations.

Grammatical gender processing in L2: Electrophysiological evidence of the effect of L1–L2 syntactic similarity

2010 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 379-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALICE FOUCART ◽  
CHERYL FRENCK-MESTRE
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Syntactic Processing ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Advanced Learners ◽  
Electrophysiological Evidence ◽  
Syntactic Similarity ◽  
L1 And L2 ◽  
Gender Processing

This study examines the effect of proficiency and similarity between the first and the second language on grammatical gender processing in L2. In three experiments, we manipulated gender agreement violations within the determiner phrase (DP), between the determiner and the noun (Experiment 1), the postposed adjective and the noun (Experiment 2) and the preposed adjective and the noun (Experiment 3). We compared the performance of German advanced learners of French to that of French native controls. The results showed a similar P600 effect for native and non-native speakers for agreement violations when agreement rules where similar in L1 and L2 (Experiment 1, depending on proficiency), whereas no effect was found for L2 learners when agreement rules varied across languages. These results suggest that syntactic processing in L2 is affected by the similarity of syntactic rules in L1 and L2.

The effects of proactive form-focused instruction and individual differences on second language acquisition

2021 ◽  
pp. 136216882110510
Author(s):  
Andrew H. Lee
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Attention Control ◽  
Binary Choice ◽  
Learning Gains ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Picture Description ◽  
Gender Attribution

This study investigated the extent to which second language (L2) learners benefited from proactive form-focused instruction (FFI) targeting French grammatical gender attribution and the degree to which L2 learners’ attention control and working memory predicted their learning gains. A total of 102 L2 learners received either proactive FFI targeting French grammatical gender attribution or their regular instruction (i.e. control condition) for six 80-minute instructional sessions. A pretest, an immediate posttest, and a delayed posttest were administered, each entailing binary-choice, text-completion, picture-description, and listening tasks. The L2 learners also completed the Simon Test and the Corsi Block-Tapping Test, which measured their attention control and working memory. Results showed that L2 learners receiving the proactive FFI condition significantly outperformed those receiving the control condition in all tasks after the instructional sessions. More importantly, L2 learners’ attention control and working memory were significant predictors of their learning gains in the binary-choice and listening tasks, but not in the text-completion and picture-description tasks. The current study highlighted the roles of L2 learners’ attention control and working memory in proactive FFI.

scholarly journals Nominal agreement in the interlanguage of Dutch L2 learners of Spanish

2019 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Paz Gonzalez ◽  
Damaris Mayans ◽  
Huub van den Bergh
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Inflectional Morphology ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Heritage Speakers ◽  
Number Agreement ◽  
Language Research ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Nominal Agreement ◽  
And Gender

Abstract Inflectional morphology causes persistent difficulties for second language (L2) learners (Montrul, Silvina & Kim Potowski. 2007. Command of gender agreement in school-age Spanish-English bilingual children. International Journal of Bilingualism 11(3). 301–328; Montrul, Silvina, Israel de la Fuente, Justin Davidson & Rebecca Foote. 2013. The role of experience in the acquisition and production of diminutives and gender in Spanish: Evidence from L2 learners and heritage speakers. Second Language Research 29(1). 87–118). Learners operate with a default gender value, and overgeneralize the masculine forms of determiners and modifiers (White, Lydia, Elena Valenzuela, Martyna Kozlowska-Macgregor & Ingrid Leung. 2004. Gender and number agreement in nonnative Spanish. Applied Psycholinguistics 25(1). 105–133; Schlig 2003). 111 essays written were collected containing 799 correct uses and 281 errors from Dutch students whose written ability in Spanish is A2 (Common European Framework). The results show that singular masculine nominal agreement marking at the determiner is significantly better produced by Dutch L2 learners of Spanish than when the marking of nominal agreement is plural, feminine or at the adjective. This study corroborates the previous results where learners operate with a default gender value and overgeneralize the masculine forms of determiners. Also these results show that L2 learners of Spanish are significantly less accurate in gender agreement with adjectives than with determiners.

Consistency and variation in second language acquisition

1998 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 376-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kazue Kanno
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Acquisition Process ◽  
Early Stages ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Over Time

This article proposes that L2 learners differ from native speakers with respect to two benchmarks–the extent to which native-like success on one principle of UG predicts comparable success on other principles (lateral consistency), and the extent to which this level of success is stable over time (longitudinal). Results of two experimental studies on the acquisition of Japanese as a second language show that L2 learners exhibit neither lateral nor longitudinal consistency with respect to UG, at least in the early stages of the acquisition process.

scholarly journals Specific Referential Contexts Shape Efficiency in Second Language Processing: Three Eye-Tracking Experiments With 6- and 10-Year-Old Children in Spanish Immersion Schools

2017 ◽  
Vol 37 ◽  
pp. 128-147 ◽  
Author(s):  
Casey Lew-Williams
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Elementary Schools ◽  
Visual Field ◽  
Eye Tracking ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
First Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Second Language Processing ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Biological Gender

ABSTRACTEfficiency in real-time language processing generally poses a greater challenge to adults learning a second language (L2) than to children learning a first language (L1). A notoriously difficult aspect of language for L2 learners to master is grammatical gender, and previous research has shown that L2 learners do not exploit cues to grammatical gender in ways that resemble L1 speakers. But it is not clear whether this problem is restricted to grammatical gender or whether it reflects a broader difficulty with processing local relations between words. Moreover, we do not know if immersive L2 environments, relative to typical L2 classrooms, confer advantages in learning regularities between words. In three eye-tracking experiments, 6- and 10-year-old children who were enrolled in Spanish immersion elementary schools listened to sentences with articles that conveyed information about the grammatical gender (Experiment 1), biological gender (Experiment 2), and number of referents in the visual field (Experiment 3). L1 children used articles to guide their attention to target referents in all three experiments. L2 children did not take advantage of articles as cues to grammatical gender, but succeeded in doing so for biological gender and number. Interpretations of these findings focus on how learning experiences interact with the nature of specific referential contexts to shape learners’ efficiency in language processing.

scholarly journals The problematic issue of grammatical gender in Arabic as a foreign language

2016 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatima A. Alkohlani
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Gender Assignment ◽  
Considerable Difficulty ◽  
Learner Corpus ◽  
L2 Learners ◽  
Problematic Issue ◽  
Demonstrative Pronouns ◽  
Gender System

AbstractMany languages of the world have a grammatical gender system that divides all nouns into gendered categories. The gender assigned to a given noun requires gender agreement with associated items in the sentence, such as: determiners, adjectives, and demonstrative pronouns. Research in the area of grammatical gender acquisition has found that this grammatical category poses considerable difficulty for L2 learners. However, rarely was this area of difficulty the focus of L2 studies in Arabic. The present study focuses on the problematic issue of grammatical gender in Arabic as a foreign language. It examines advanced Arabic L2 learners’ written errors of gender assignment and agreement in the Arabic Learner Corpus (ALC) v2, compiled by Alfaifi, Atwel, and Hedaya (2014). Based on the classification and analysis of the errors, possible factors of the difficulty facing L2 learners in assigning the correct gender are discussed, and recommendations to reduce their effects are suggested.

scholarly journals Spanish Grammatical Gender Interference in Papiamentu

Languages ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (4) ◽  
pp. 78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge R. Valdés Kroff ◽  
Frederieke Rooijakkers ◽  
M. Carmen Parafita Couto
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Grammatical Gender ◽  
Forced Choice ◽  
Gender Agreement ◽  
Gender Assignment ◽  
Heritage Speaker ◽  
Syntactic Differences ◽  
Gender Features

The aim of this study is to determine whether Spanish-like gender agreement causes interference in speakers of Papiamentu (a Western Romance-lexified creole language) who also speak Spanish. Papiamentu and Spanish are highly cognate languages in terms of their lexicons. However, Papiamentu lacks grammatical gender assignment and agreement, leading to cognate words with major morpho-syntactic differences. A total of 41 participants with different linguistic profiles (Papiamentu-dominant, Dutch-dominant, Spanish-dominant, and Spanish heritage speaker-Papiamentu bilinguals) listened to 82 Papiamentu sentences, of which 40 contained a Spanish-like gender-agreeing element on the Determiner, Adjective, or Determiner + Adjective and with half of the experimental items marked with overtly masculine (i.e., -o) or feminine (i.e., -a) gender morphology. Participants performed a forced-choice acceptability task and were asked to repeat each sentence. Results showed that Spanish-dominant speakers experienced the greatest interference of Spanish gender features in Papiamentu. This suggests that in cases where speakers must suppress gender in their second language (L2), this is not easy to do. This is especially the case in highly cognate languages that differ in whether they realize gender features.

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