Processing at the syntax-discourse interface in second language acquisition
The Interface Hypothesis (Sorace and Filiaci, 2006) conjectures that adult second language learners (L2 learners) who have reached near-native levels of proficiency in their second language exhibit difficulties at the interface between syntax and other cognitive domains, most notably at the syntax-discourse interface. However, research in this area was limited, in that the data were offline, and thus unable to provide evidence for the nature of the deficit shown by L2 learners. This thesis presents online data which address the question of the underlying nature of the difficulties observed in L2 learners at the syntaxdiscourse interface. This thesis has extended work on the syntax-discourse interface in L2 learners by investigating the acquisition of two phenomena at the syntax-discourse interface in German: the role of word order and pronominalization with respect to information structure (Experiments 1-3), and the antecedent preferences of anaphoric demonstrative (the der, die, das series homophonous with the definite article) and personal pronouns (the er, sie, es series) (Experiments 4- 8). Crucially, this work has used an on-line methodology, the visual-world paradigm, which allows an insight into the
Wilson, Frances
second language learners ; syntax-discourse interface ; word order ; pronominalization
Processing at the syntax-discourse interface in second language acquisition. The Interface Hypothesis (Sorace and Filiaci, 2006) conjectures that adult second language learners (L2 learners) who have reached near-native levels of proficiency in their second language exhibit difficulties at the interface between syntax and other cognitive domains, most notably at the syntax-discourse interface. However, research in this area was limited, in that the data were offline, and thus unable to provide evidence for the nature of the deficit shown by L2 learners. This thesis presents online data which address the question of the underlying nature of the difficulties observed in L2 learners at the syntaxdiscourse interface. This thesis has extended work on the syntax-discourse interface in L2 learners by investigating the acquisition of two phenomena at the syntax-discourse interface in German: the role of word order and pronominalization with respect to information structure (Experiments 1-3), and the antecedent preferences of anaphoric demonstrative (the der, die, das series homophonous with the definite article) and personal pronouns (the er, sie, es series) (Experiments 4- 8). Crucially, this work has used an on-line methodology, the visual-world paradigm, which allows an insight into the
processing syntax discourse interface second_language_acquisition interface hypothesis adult_second language_learner learner reach near native level_proficiency second_language exhibit difficulty interface syntax cognitive domain notably syntax discourse interface however area limit data offline thus unable provide_evidence nature deficit show learner present online data address_question underlying nature difficulty observe learner interface extended work syntax discourse interface learner investigate acquisition phenomena syntax discourse interface german role word_order respect information_structure antecedent preference anaphoric demonstrative der die series definite_article personal_pronoun series crucially work use line visual world paradigm allow_insight