Recent perspectives on the role of previously known …faculty.ecnu.edu.cn/picture/article/220/e2/e8/1ad88d...Dulay and Burt helped moving the emphasis from a behaviorist view of language

Recent perspectives on the role of previously known languages Part I

3/15/2016 FANG CHEN ECNU 陈芳华东师范大学英语系 1

Outline

FANG CHEN / 陈芳华东师大英语系 2

Theories of learning Child SLA Morpheme order studies: children &

Adults Revised perspectives on the role of the

native language

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Theories of learning


Example 1: Conclusions?

During the 1950s and 1960s, there were challenges to the behaviorist theory of language and language learning. Language came to be seen not as a set of automatic habits, but as a set of structured rules. These rules were claimed to be learned not by imitation, but by actively formulating them on the basis of innate principles as well as on the basis of exposure to the language being learned.

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Let’s start from Child SLA…


Definition: Child second language acquisition refers to “acquisition by individuals young enough to be within the critical period (5-9), but yet with a first language already learned” or “successive acquisition of two languages in childhood”.

Foster-Cohen, 1999,pp.7-8; McLaughlin, 1978a.p.99

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The quality of the input to the learner was seen as a central variable in second language outcome. Learner system did not develop (and possibly even fossilized) in settings where there was an absence of native-speaking peers of the target language. (Selinker, Swain, & Dumas 1975)

If the child has target language peers, there is a

greater social context where the child learns the L2 rules as if the L2 were L1, with no language transfer occurring. (McLaughlin 1978a)

Think: How about “younger is better”?

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McLaughlin argued that Children occasionally use first-language

structures to solve the riddle of second-language structure; and a child is more likely to use first language structures when confronted with difficult L2 structures.

But in all, language learning is language

learning. Both L1 and child L2 learners use the same strategies in learning a language.

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Child SLA: Question formation studies


Hakuta (1974a, 1974b) A Japanese child learning English

Ravem (1968, 1974) A Norwegian child learning English

Conclusions: There is no uniform pattern

of the acquisition of question formation.

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Child SLA morpheme order studies


Background: Chomsky (1959) attacked Skinner’s work on

behaviorism and viewed the learners as an active participant in the learning process and as a language creator.

Because transfer was strongly associated with behavorist thought, a way of arguing that SLA was not a behavorist-based activity was to argue that transfer was not a major, or even an important, factor in attempts to account for SLA.

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The theory of “Creative Construction” 创造性构建


Dulay and Burt (1974) developed a “creative construction” theory which is “the process in which children gradually reconstruct rules for speech they hear, guided by universal innate mechanism which cause them to formulate certain types of hypotheses about the language system being acquired, until the mismatch between what they are exposed to and what they produce is resolved.”

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Meaning?


Emphasis is placed on the centrality of mental processes 心理过程 and the innate propensity 内在属性 for language that all humans have.

Children construct second language in similar ways regardless of their NL or the language being learned. In other words, processes involved in acquisition are assumed to be the same. L1=L2

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The study: Dulay and Burt 1974a


The first to apply Brown’s findings (1973 about morpheme orders in L1) to child SLA.

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Dulay and Burt 1974a continued


Hypothesis and conclusions 1. Similar patterns of development would be found in

child first language acquisition and child second language acquisition.

2. If similar patterns of development were found between two groups of children with different language backgrounds, one could conclude that developmental factors rather than NL factors

were at play and that universal mechanisms for second language

acquisition had to be considered primary

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Adult SL morpheme order studies


Dulay and Burt helped moving the emphasis from a behaviorist view of language learning to a view of second language acquisition that relied more on mental processes.

Bailey, Madden and Krashen 1974 find evidence about similar order in adults.

Simple comparison --- hierarchy of difficulty -

-- developmental patterns

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Question: How about these evidence of NL influence?


Larsen-Freeman (1975a, 1975b), found articles difficult for Japanese English-learners than other groups

Hakuta (1974b) found a different order of

morpheme acquisition for a Japanese child learning English.

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Section Summary


It is not sufficient to posit an order without positing an explanation for that order. Ascribing singular causality does not work. E.g. are morpheme orders due to native language

influence? Or are morpheme orders due to perceptual saliency?

What is more realistic is that many factors contribute to

acquisition order. What is left to be determined is the relative weighting each factor has, i.e., how do all of these factors converge to produce the particular orders obtained.

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Challenges to the morpheme order studies


A long list: The results may be an artifact of the Bilingual

Syntax Measure. Porter 1977. The Bailey, Madden, and Krashen study pools

the data for speakers of various L1. The pooling might have masked the possible difference between groups of various L1. Does this remind you of the paper by Eckman & Iverson, 2013?

Methodology issue: Do accuracy orders reflect developmental sequences?

The researches were based on a limited number of morphemes, yet the implications extended to acquisition in general.

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New terminologies

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Since the 1970s, people start to view transfer as a creative process.

Kellerman and Sharwood Smith (1986)

suggested the term cross-linguistic influence, which is sufficiently broad to include transfer, in the traditional sense, but also avoidance, language loss (whether of the L1 or of another L2), and rate of learning.

Revised perspectives on the role of the L1


1. Avoidance: happens anyway 2. Differential learning rates: closer is better 3. Different paths: when does NL help? 4. Overproduction: definitely NL influence 5. Predictability/selectivity: When 6. Second language processing

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1. Avoidance

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Kleinmann (1977) study showed that his groups showed differential behavior that could not be attributed to a lack of knowledge, but rather to some choice to use or not to use particular structures to express given concepts. The basis of the choice was related to the NL.

Source of Avoidance ---happens anyway


Why? L1: Differences or similarities between L1 and L2

Laufer and Eliasson 1993: L1-L2 difference consistently predicts avoidance Kellerman : learners may doubt that these

similarities are real L2: Complexity of the target language structure, e.g.

Hebrews learning English phrasal verbs (p138) preferred the one-word equivalent of the phrasal

verbs: enter. Semantically transparent phrases are preferred:

come in, take away; Less transparent avoided: let down, mix up

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2. Differential learning rates---closer is better


Ard & Homburg (1983, 1992) The Spanish speakers , because so many cognates 同

源词 exist between their NL and the TL, can focus more of their “learning time” on other aspects of language hence accelerated learning rates.

Henkes 1974 as pointed out by Zobl 1982 Although the same pattern of copula use was

observed in all three children, it took the Arabic child longer to get the facts of English straightened out due to the absence of the category in NL.

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3. Different paths --- when does NL affect?


Zobl 1982 native languages lead the learners down two

different paths--- the Chinese child through a stage in which this occurs before the definite article, and the definite article and the demonstrative this co-occur for the Spanish child.

Wode 1977 German learning English negation: No N1 influence

at early stages. Learners must see some resemblance between the

language they are learning and their native language before they are able to recognize that the NL might be “useful” to them.

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4. Overproduction --- the role of NL for sure


Schachter and Rutherford 1979 Overproduction of topic-comment structure 话题-评论结构 by Chinese and Japanese ELLs. NL is at play. It is very unfortunate that… Many things of the restaurant are like those…

Han 2000, Pseudo-passive 假被动式 The L1 exerts a subtle influence even at later

stage of proficiency.

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To be continued

3/15/2016 FANG CHEN ECNU 陈芳华东师范大学英语系 24

Recent perspectives on the role of previously known …faculty.ecnu.edu.cn/picture/article/220/e2/e8/1ad88d...Dulay and Burt helped moving the emphasis from a behaviorist view of language

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