The acquisition of object movement in Dutch L1 transfer and near-native grammars at the syntax–discourse interface

This article investigates near-native grammars at the syntax–discourse interface by examining the second language (L2) acquisition of two different domains of object movement in Dutch, which exhibit syntax–discourse or syntax–semantics level properties. English and German near-native speakers of Dut...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Second language research Vol. 35; no. 4; pp. 479 - 504
Main Author: Smeets, Liz
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London, England Sage Publications, Ltd 01.10.2019
SAGE Publications
Sage Publications Ltd
Subjects:
Acceptability
Acquisition
Bilingualism
Cloze Procedure
Cognitive Mapping
Comparative Analysis
Convergence
Cues
Decision Making
Discourse
Discourse Analysis
Dutch language
English
English language
Experiments
Felicity
Form Classes (Languages)
German
German language
Grammar
Indo European Languages
Judgment
Language acquisition
Language Research
Language Tests
Learning transfer
Linguistic Input
Linguistic Theory
Mapping
Native Language
Native Speakers
Property
Second Language Learning
Semantics
Syntactic movement
Syntax
Syntax discourse relationship
Syntax semantics relationship
Task Analysis
Transfer of Training
Truth
Value Judgment
near-native grammars
object movement
interface hypothesis
L1 transfer
syntax–discourse interface
ISSN:0267-6583, 1477-0326
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:This article investigates near-native grammars at the syntax–discourse interface by examining the second language (L2) acquisition of two different domains of object movement in Dutch, which exhibit syntax–discourse or syntax–semantics level properties. English and German near-native speakers of Dutch, where German but not English allows the same mapping strategies as Dutch in the phenomena under investigation, are tested on two felicity judgment tasks and a truth value judgment task. The results from the English participants show sensitivity to discourse information on the acceptability of non-canonical word orders, but only when the relevant discourse cues are sufficiently salient in the input. The acquisition of semantic effects on object movement was native-like for a large subset of the participants. The German group performed on target in all experiments. The results are partially in line with previous studies reporting L2 convergence at the syntax–discourse interface, but suggest that input effects should also be taken into account. Furthermore, the differences between the first language (L1) English and the L1 German group suggests that non-target performance at the syntax–discourse interface is not caused by general bilingual difficulties in integrating discourse information into syntax. The article elaborates on factors that contribute to (in)complete acquisition at the syntax–discourse interface.
Bibliography:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
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ISSN:0267-6583
1477-0326
DOI:10.1177/0267658318782357