This study investigated the morpheme acquisition order of Swedish students in grades 6 and 7, utilizing corpus texts drawn from the Uppsala Learner English Corpus (ULEC). It is an extension of Khor (2012) that focused on students in grades 9 and 12. Previous studies on morpheme acquisition order suggested that there was a natural sequence in acquiring morphemes, regardless of first language (L1). First language influence was said to be minimal or non-existing. Recently, studies have found evidence that L1 transfer is greater than first thought. This study examined three morphemes; articles, the preposition in, and plural form. The results showed that the errors that both groups made were consistent with the errors that were found in Khor (2012). The errors were of the same nature in all age groups, mainly in differences in (1) generic and specific usage of articles in Swedish and English, (2) the generic sense of regular plural nouns, (3) plural form of irregular nouns and nouns of Latin or Greek origin, (4) plural forms of countable and misuse of uncountable nouns, and (5) the usage of prepositions in Swedish and English. Current studies have also generated these results, which points towards strong L1 influence. The different usage and the errors suggest that the first language influence is stronger than first described, and consequently, that it influences the acquisition of morphemes. Therefore, the L1 seems to shape the order in which grammatical morphemes are acquired. Learners in one language group seem to learn the morphemes in a specific order, rather than a fixed universal order.

Linguistic fossilization is a prevalent phenomenon in adult ESLA and presents a perpetual pedagogical challenge to teachers. Despite controversy about the theoretical concept, research is increasingly showing that persistent erroneousness cannot be attributed to single causal factors. This single case study examines controversial aspects surrounding the concept and formulates criteria for identifying fossilization. The study investigates the conversational output of an independent adult learner over a period of nine months and presents a holistic exploration of causal influences. The findings substantiate that fossilization arises from changing combinations of factors, and that such combinations are unique to the situation of each adult learner. The key to the successful treatment of fossilized errors may lie in identifying their roots, which can be achieved by analyzing output and through discussion with learners in order to gain insight into their experience of the learning process. Results also suggest that a critical perspective on the theoretical construct is needed in order to investigate the phenomenon in adult second language acquisition. / Linguistics / M.A. (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL))

Linguistic fossilization is a prevalent phenomenon in adult ESLA and presents a perpetual pedagogical challenge to teachers. Despite controversy about the theoretical concept, research is increasingly showing that persistent erroneousness cannot be attributed to single causal factors. This single case study examines controversial aspects surrounding the concept and formulates criteria for identifying fossilization. The study investigates the conversational output of an independent adult learner over a period of nine months and presents a holistic exploration of causal influences. The findings substantiate that fossilization arises from changing combinations of factors, and that such combinations are unique to the situation of each adult learner. The key to the successful treatment of fossilized errors may lie in identifying their roots, which can be achieved by analyzing output and through discussion with learners in order to gain insight into their experience of the learning process. Results also suggest that a critical perspective on the theoretical construct is needed in order to investigate the phenomenon in adult second language acquisition. / Linguistics and Modern Languages / M.A. (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL))

Diese Dissertation untersucht Transfereffekte aus der Muttersprache (L1) in der Verarbeitung von grammatischem Genus in der Zweitsprache (L2) bei Spätbilingualen. „Spätbilinguale“ lernen eine Zweitsprache nach der Kindheit, im Gegensatz zu „Frühbilingualen“. Forschungsergebnisse zeigten, dass der L2-Erwerb nach der Kindheit weniger erfolgreich ist als während der Kindheit und dass einige Strukturen, wie z.B. grammatisches Genus, besonders stark von Alterseffekten beeinträchtigt sind. Eine Erklärung für L2-Verarbeitungsschwierigkeiten ist negativer L1-Transfer. Deshalb konzentriert sich diese Dissertation auf L1-Transfereffekte in der Genusverarbeitung. Transfer tritt auf, weil alle Sprachen eines Sprechers aktiviert sind und im Wettbewerb um Selektion stehen. Ein Ziel dieser Dissertation ist, zu beschreiben, welche Faktoren Genustransfer beeinflussen. Für die L2-Genusverarbeitung wurde gezeigt, dass verschiedene Faktoren die Leistung beeinflussen, z.B. die L2-Kompetenz der Probanden, Aufgabenanforderungen und die syntaktische Distanz der übereinstimmenden Elemente. Genustransfer wird durch Faktoren wie Charakteristiken des L1-Genussystems, Transparenz des L2-Genussystems und Formähnlichkeit der Nomen in L1 und L2 beeinflusst. Außerdem könnte Genustransfer von der L2-Kompetenz und der Komplexität des L2-Genussystems abhängen. Es wurden ein behaviorales und ein EKP-Experiment durchgeführt. Genustransfer wurde über verschiedene Sprachpaare mit Genussystemen von unterschiedlicher Komplexität und Transparenz hinweg untersucht. Die experimentellen Aufgaben unterschieden sich bezüglich der Aufgabenanforderungen und syntaktische Strukturen mit unterschiedlicher struktureller Distanz wurden verwendet. Der Leistungsstand der Probanden wurde manipuliert. Anhand meiner Ergebnisse konnte ich identifizieren, welche (Kombination von) Faktoren Genustransfer erhöhen oder verringern und Genustransfer als das Ergebnis eines komplexen Wechselspiels von Faktoren beschreiben. / This thesis investigates first language (L1) transfer effects in second language (L2) grammatical gender processing of late bilinguals. “Late bilinguals” learn an L2 after childhood, in contrast to “early bilinguals”. Research has shown that L2 acquisition after childhood is usually less successful than during childhood and that some aspects of a language are more affected by age than others. One of the structures especially affected is grammatical gender. A possible explanation for L2 processing difficulties in late bilinguals is negative transfer from the L1. Therefore, this thesis focuses on L1 transfer effects in L2 gender processing of late bilinguals. Transfer arises because all languages of a speaker are activated and compete for selection. One aim of this thesis is to describe which (combination of) factors influence L1 gender transfer. Regarding L2 gender processing in general, different factors have been shown to affect performance, e.g., language proficiency of the subjects, task demands, and syntactic distance of the agreeing elements. Gender transfer is affected by factors such as characteristics of the L1 gender system, transparency of the L2 gender system, and form similarities of nouns in L1 and L2 (cognates vs. noncognates). Besides this, gender transfer might be mediated by L2 proficiency and the complexity of the L2 gender system. In this thesis, a behavioral and an ERP experiment were conducted. Gender transfer was investigated across different language pairs with gender systems of varying complexity and transparency. Experimental tasks differed in task demands and syntactic structures with varying agreement distances were used. Language proficiency of subjects was also manipulated. Based on my findings, I was able to identify which factors and which combination of factors increase or decrease gender transfer and to describe gender transfer as the result of a complex interplay of a combination of various factors.