Since the publication of Clahsen and Felser's ( 2006 ) keynote article on grammatical processing in language learners, the online study of sentence comprehension in adult second language (L2) learners has quickly grown into a vibrant and prolifi c subfi eld of SLA. As online methods begin to establish a foothold in SLA research, it is important that researchers in our fi eld design sentence-comprehension experiments that adhere to the fundamental principles of research design typical of sentence processing studies published in related subfi elds of the language sciences. In this article, we discuss and review widely accepted principles of research design for sentence processing studies that are not always followed in L2 sentence processing research. Particular emphasis is placed on the design of experimental items and distractors, the choice and design of the poststimulus distractor task, procedures for presenting stimuli to participants, and methods for trimming and analyzing online data, among others.

The current study compared the effects of two second language (L2) instruction typesprocessing instruction (VanPatten, 2004) and traditional output-based instruction-on the development of the Spanish past subjunctive among U.S. Spanish heritage language speakers and traditional L2 learners. After exposure to instruction, both the heritage learners and the L2 learners showed significant improvement on interpretation and production tasks. Only the L2 learners showed significant improvement for grammaticality judgments. Overall, the L2 learners outperformed the heritage learners. The results suggest that heritage speakers' language development may differ from that of L2 learners, although they also suggest that heritage speakers can benefit from focused grammar instruction.In the United States, heritage speakers are individuals who grew up in homes in which a language other than English was spoken and who have receptive and often some productive competence in the non-English (heritage) language (Valdes, 1997). Between 1990 and 2000, the U.S. Latino population grew 40% while the rest of the population increased 10%, a change that has profoundly impacted the American education system at all levels of instruction. Spanish courses designed for heritage speakers have existed since the 1970s and, Versions of this article were presented at the

The current investigation tested two predictions regarding second language (L2) processing at the syntax-discourse interface: (1) that L2 performance on measures of interface phenomena can differ from that of native speakers; and (2) that cross-linguistic influence can be a source of such divergence. Specifically, we examined the offline interpretation of ambiguous subject pronouns with intrasentential antecedents in Spanish and English, including discourse-syntactic constraints that are active in pro-drop Spanish and principles of discourse structure that affect pronominal reference in English. Two participant groups of English-speaking learners of L2 Spanish -an intermediate group and an advanced group -failed to show categorically native-like differentiation between null and overt pronouns in Spanish. Both groups, however, did show marginal effects for Discourse Structure (coordination or subordination of clauses), an effect that was also present in their native English. Furthermore, there was a significant interaction with the advanced group between Pronoun and Discourse Structure, so this group seemed to employ to a certain degree a hybrid strategy. This outcome suggests that pre-existing referential strategy persists even at an advanced level of L2 proficiency and may be a primary barrier to native-like performance, even after target-like L2 principles are acquired and begin to apply. Keywordspronominal reference, null subjects, pronoun interpretation, sentence comprehension, first language influence, non-native Spanish at University of New England on May 31, 2015 slr.sagepub.com Downloaded from

In this self-paced reading study, we first tested the cross-linguistic validity of the position of antecedent strategy proposed for anaphora resolution in Italian (Carminati, 2002) in a Latin American variety of Spanish. We then examined the application of this strategy by Spanish heritage speakers of the same dialect who were largely English dominant. Forty-five monolingual speakers of Mexican Spanish and 28 Spanish heritage speakers of Mexican descent read sentences in which null and overt subject pronouns were biased for and against expected antecedent biases. Our results suggest that Mexican monolinguals display distinct antecedent biases for null and overt pronouns. Furthermore, the Spanish heritage speakers, though not monolingual-like, did not violate discourse constraints on the resolution of overt pronouns, contra the findings of offline research (see Keating, VanPatten & Jegerski, 2011). We discuss the findings in terms of a processing-based account.