Prototypical influence in second language acquisition: What now for the Aspect Hypothesis

Abstract

This paper presents empirical evidence on the development of aspect byEnglish-and German-speaking university learners of French L2 collected from a spoken narrative task and a sentence interpretation task. Contrary to the Aspect Hypothesis's predictions, this study's results suggest that increased use of prototypical pairings goes in hand with increased L2 proficiency. Following a small but growing number of studies, this study questions the route of L2 development proposed by the Aspect Hypothesis.Prototypical influence in second language acquisition 301

L1-L2 Differences in the Acquisition of Form-Meaning Pairings in a Second Language

“…Future research using picture-based narratives should investigate how different prompt types (adverb, verbal) and their frequency affect L2 production. Third, although this paper is part of a larger study on the L2 development of aspect morphology in French L2 (see McManus, 2011aMcManus, , 2013, the present analysis is based on data collected from one instrument.…”

“…The AH predicts learners' early use of aspect morphology will be heavily influenced by lexical aspect: perfective morphology (e.g., passé composé) will be initially used with telic predicates, and imperfective morphology (e.g., imparfait), with atelic predicates. It is claimed that, as L2 proficiency increases, learners begin to use aspect morphology, irrespective of a predicate's lexical class (although see Domínguez, Tracy-Ventura, Arche, Mitchell, & Myles, 2013;McManus, 2013). Furthermore, Andersen's (1984) one-to-one principle has been shown to be insightful in predicting initial form-meaning mappings.…”

Using Explicit Instruction About L1 to Reduce Crosslinguistic Effects in L2 Grammar Learning: Evidence From Oral Production in L2 French

“…SLA research shows patterns of learning associated with IMP's different viewpoint aspect meanings that can be attributed to different cue validities in L1 and L2 (Ayoun, , ; Howard, ; Kihlstedt, ; McManus, , ). Given that IMP is used to express both past ongoingness and past habituality, research indicates (a) that these viewpoint aspect meanings are not acquired together, and (b) that the acquisition order of these meanings appears to be influenced by L1 background: Ongoingness is acquired before habituality for English‐speaking learners (Howard, ), but habituality is acquired before ongoingness for Swedish‐speaking learners (Kihlstedt, ).…”

“…A MAJOR FOCUS OF SECOND LANGUAGE acquisition (SLA) research to date has sought to understand the competition and relationships between a learner's different languages (Calabria et al., ). This research has repeatedly shown that the use of a single language activates a speaker's other known languages (Marian & Spivey, ; Wu & Thierry, ), that prior first language (L1) knowledge and experience can influence second language (L2) use (e.g., selective attention to linguistic cues; Ellis & Sagarra, ; MacWhinney, ), and that L1–L2 differences can influence the route and rate of L2 morphosyntactic development and processing (Avery & Marsden, 2019; Isabelli, ; McManus, , ; Murakami, ; Roberts & Liszka, ). However, despite major advances in what we know about the cognitive effects and mechanisms of learning a second language, little research has systematically examined the next step in this program: How can this understanding about the competition and relationships among a learner's different languages be used to facilitate L2 learning and teaching?…”

“…We compared three types of EI and comprehension practice designed to improve English‐speakers’ use of the Imparfait (IMP) in L2 French, a target feature well‐documented to be late‐acquired due to complex L1–L2 form–meaning mapping differences (Bartning, , ; Howard, ; Kihlstedt, ; McManus, , ): One group received EI about the L2 plus extensive comprehension practice of L2 sentences; a second group received the same L2 EI, L2 comprehension practice, plus additional comprehension practice of L1 sentences; and a third group received the same L2 EI, L2 comprehension practice, L1 comprehension practice, plus additional L1 about the EI. This design allowed us to compare (a) EI about L2 form–meaning mappings with EI about both L2 and L1 form–meaning mappings and (b) comprehension practice of L2 sentences with comprehension practice of both L2 and L1 sentences.…”