Optional that in complementation by German and Spanish learners

Abstract

This study examines the factors that govern the variable presence of the complementizer that in English object-, subject-, and adjectival complement constructions as in (1) to (3): 1 (1) a. I thought that Nick likes candy. b. I thought Ø Nick likes candy. (2) a. The problem is that Nick doesn't like candy. b. The problem is Ø Nick doesn't like candy. (3) a. I'm glad that Stefan likes candy. b. I'm glad Ø Stefan likes candy. The conditions under which native speakers (NS) decide to realize or drop the complementizer have been intensively studied (e.g., Jaeger 2010; Tagliamonte and Smith 2005; Thompson and Mulac 1991; Torres Cacoullos and Walker 2009), while few studies have investigated this phenomenon in non-native speakers (NNS) (e.g., Durham 2011; Wulff, Lester, and Martinez-Garcia 2014). In the present study, we therefore address the following research questions:-What factors govern that-variation in intermediate-level German and Spanish L2 learners of English?-How do these learners' preferences compare to those of native speakers? More specifically, under what conditions, how much, and why do learners deviate from native speaker behavior?

Particle Placement in Learner Language

“…The results of the multiple regression approach paint a complex picture in which processing demands, input effects, and L1 typology jointly shaped the degree to which learners’ choices of constructions were nativelike or not. In that regard, this study aligns with previous corpus research on alternations in L2 production, including the genitive alternation, prenominal adjective order, the double object alternation, gerundial versus infinitival complementation, and the variable realization of the complementizer that in subject, adjectival, and direct object relative clauses (Gries & Wulff, ; Martinez‐Garcia & Wulff, ; Wulff, , ; Wulff & Gries, , in press; Wulff, Gries, & Lester, ; Wulff, Lester, & Martinez‐Garcia, ).…”

Code-Switching Strategies: Prosody and Syntax

“…Furthermore, besides adhering to monolingual rates, bilinguals’ English maintains the constraints on complementizer use. English complementizer that presence is subject to lexical, discourse and structural factors (see, e.g., Shank et al, 2016 : 202–213; Wulff et al, 2018 : 100–101 and references therein). The conditioning factors indicate that English that is used to demarcate clauses when both have semantic or propositional content ( Torres Cacoullos and Walker, 2009 : 29).…”

“…Beyond the particular prediction, inconsistent with CS models assuming that one language dominates is, for one, that the distribution of main-and-complement clause sentences by language is about even between English and Spanish ( Figure 1 ), which renders inconsequential such a posited asymmetry between the two languages within the corpus. Remember, too, that there is no overextension of that , unlike Spanish-speaking L2 learners ( Wulff et al, 2018 : 118): bilinguals’ English maintains monolingual English patterns for prosodic integration and for complementizer that rate ( Figure 2 , Figure 3 ). Furthermore, the bidirectionality of the multi-word CS indicates that these bilinguals have real choices, not imposed by language dominance ( Figure 4 ; cf.…”

“…In English, complementizer that is present only sometimes. Rates of complementizer that presence range approximately between just 10% and 30% in corpora of spoken English (e.g., 9%, n = 4,106, Tagliamonte and Smith, 2005 : 299; 21%, n = 2,820, Torres Cacoullos and Walker, 2009 : 20; 34%, n = 3,681, Wulff et al, 2018 : 105). Complementizer absence, as in (6), is thus the majority variant.…”

Myth or reality? Some directions on translation universals in recent corpus based case studies

“…The subsequent focus of this paper is on the recurrent hypotheses within translation studies on the existence of translation universals. De Sutter and Marie (2020) hypothesize that “activeness will appear as part of interaction effects, not as main effects.” This hypothesis is based on the work of Wulff et al (2018) which built a large comparable corpus of native and nonnative student writing. This comparable corpus comprised almost 274,000+ and 164,000+ tokens, taking 198 essays from Dutch component of International Corpus Learner English (ICLE).…”