Children's Second Language Acquisition of English Complex Syntax: The Role of Age, Input, and Cognitive Factors

Abstract

The goal of this study was to determine (a) the similarities and dissimilarities between child L2 and L1 acquisition of complex sentences and (b) the individual difference factors predicting L2 children's acquisition of complex sentences. We analyzed language samples from 187 English L2 children with diverse L1s (Agemean = 5;10 [years;months]; English exposuremean = 17 months). Children used various types of complex sentences at all levels of L2 exposure, including sentences with relative clauses, which are late-acquired by L1 learners. Mixed logistic regression modeling revealed that longer exposure to English in school, richer English environments outside school, larger L2 vocabulary, superior verbal memory and visual analytic reasoning contributed to greater use of complex sentences. L1 typology did not impact complex sentence use in the L2. Overall, L2 children used more complex sentences within a few months of English L2 exposure than what is reported for L1 children aged 2;0–4;0, revealing an advantage for an older age of acquisition. The predictive role of input and cognitive factors, as well as vocabulary, in children's use of complex sentences is more consistent with constructivist than generativist accounts of L2 syntactic acquisition.

Internal and External Factors in Heritage Language Acquisition: Evidence From Heritage Russian in Israel, Germany, Norway, Latvia and the United Kingdom

“…The success in the acquisition of the majority language is typically linked to input at school. It has been repeatedly shown that more exposure to the majority language at school reliably predicts vocabulary size, accurate morphology, narrative skills, and greater use of complex sentences in that language (Goldberg et al, 2008;Paradis, 2011;Paradis and Kirova, 2014;Paradis et al, 2017). At the same time, the link between the acquisition of the majority language and its use in the home is not that strong.…”

Predicting Language Proficiency in Bilingual Children

“…Research on language proficiency in bilingual children has revealed a significant impact of language exposure, socio-economic status, and memory, although the interplay of all these factors has seldom been explored. Many studies tend to focus on predicting vocabulary, and until recently most research was based on relatively homogeneous home-language groups (although see Floccia et al, 2018 andParadis, Rusk, Duncan, &Govindarajan, 2017).…”

Typological structure as a Model to Study Languages in Contrast

“…The implementation of the aforementioned studies and other works in the same field the efficiency of linguistic complexity measures while creating readability classification of texts in specific language (Hancke et al, 2012) with accuracy of almost 90% or classifying different age groups (Vajala & Meurers, 2014) with accuracy of 95,9%. Age groups and linguistic complexity are also under study in some methodological researches and interlinguistic studies (Paradis, et al, 2017). In addition, linguistic complexity features are used in the systems that are designed for written production scoring: e-rater (electronic essay rater) system integration (Attali & Burnstein, 2006); integration in proficiency level assessment of the texts produced by learners of specific L2 (Vajala and Loo, 2013); Native Language Identification task integration (Bykh & Meurers, 2016;Bykh, Vajala, et al, 2013); partially used in related fields -as a part of studies devoted to neurodegenerative disorders (Pakhomov et al, 2011).…”