The Effects of Processing Instruction and Traditional Instruction on L2 Online Processing of the Causative Construction in French

Abstract

While previous research has shown that processing instruction (PI) can more effectively facilitate the acquisition of target structures than traditional drill practice, the processing mechanism of PI has not been adequately examined because most assessment tasks have been offline. Using eye-tracking, this two-experiment study compared changes in processing patterns between two types of training: PI and traditional instruction (TI) on intermediate-level L2 learners’ acquisition of the French causative. Both experiments used a pretraining/posttraining design involving a dichotomous scene selection eye-tracking task to measure eye-movement patterns and accuracy in picture selection while participants processed auditory sentences. Neither group received explicit information (EI) in Experiment 1 while both experimental groups in Experiment 2 received EI before processing sentences. Results of Experiment 1 revealed the PI group had significantly higher accuracy scores than the TI group. A change in eye-movement pattern was also observed after training for the PI group but not for the TI group. In Experiment 2, when both groups received EI, PI subjects were again significantly more accurate than TI subjects, but both groups’ accuracy scores were not reliably higher than subjects in the PI and TI groups in Experiment 1 who did not receive EI. Eye-movement patterns in Experiment 2 showed that both TI and PI started to shift their gaze to the correct picture at the same point as PI subjects did in Experiment 1. This suggests that EI helped the TI group start entertaining the correct picture as a possible response sooner but the EI did not help the PI group process the target structure sooner than the TI group.

The Role of Task-Essential Training and Working Memory in Offline and Online Morphological Processing

“…Studies on PI and other forms of task-essential training (e.g., Filgueras-Gomez 2016) have traditionally used offline pretests/posttests as the primary assessment measures and inferred that changes in learners' accuracy are directly relatable to changes in processing behavior. Yet, recent research suggests that these measures are not well suited to observing changes in learners' processing behaviors, because traditional offline tasks often test the application of an explicit rule (Wong and Ito 2018;see VanPatten 2015a) or the eventual interpretation of an utterance. They, therefore, do not assess either the degree to which participants used individual redundant cues for meaning or how they processed cues in real time.…”

“…This makes them more appropriate for testing task-essential training's contribution to the development of processing strategies and implicitly gained knowledge (see Keating and Jegerski 2015). Recent research has consequently begun to employ psycholinguistic methodologies to investigate the effects of task-essential training (Dracos and Henry 2018;Henry 2015;Issa and Morgan-Short 2019;Lee and Doherty 2018;Marsden 2017, 2018;Wong and Ito 2018).…”

“…Much of this research has investigated forms related to the word order and subject-first biases in L2 processing (see VanPatten 2015b). In general, these studies have shown that PI increases learners' attention to the target forms and helps learners allocate attention more efficiently (Henry 2015;Issa and Morgan-Short 2019;Lee and Doherty 2018;Wong and Ito 2018), and that this attention is linked to learning gains. However, the extent of PI's influence varies somewhat within and across these studies.…”

“…Yet, this inference raises two issues that merit further research. First, while prior studies have shown consistent benefits of task-essential training in offline assessments, recent scholarship has shown conflicting results regarding training's effects on the development of morphosyntactic processing strategies in online processing (e.g., Marsden 2017, 2018;Wong and Ito 2018). Thus, it is not clear to what extent such treatments alter processing strategies in real time.…”

Structured Input vs. Structured Output Task’s Effects on the Acquisition of the English Causative Forms: Discourse-Level. Structured Input vs. Structured Output Task’s Effects on the Acquisition of the English Causative Forms: Discourse-Level.

“…The structured input group outperformed the traditional instruction group on the interpretation posttest whereas, both groups made equal gains on the production post-test. Wong and Ito (2018) compared changes in processing patterns between L2 learners receiving structured input and traditional instruction on acquiring the French causative. In this pre-and post-test experimental study, a dichotomous scene selection eye-tracking activity was utilized to measure eye movement patterns and accuracy in selecting pictures while learners were processing auditory sentences.…”