The Effects of Topic Familiarity, Mode, and Pausing on Second Language Learners' Comprehension and Focus on Form

Abstract

Research in first language and second language (L2) comprehension has demonstrated that both learner and input variables contribute to the ease with which a message is understood. Questions remain, however, as to how these variables affect the way L2 learners process linguistic form during comprehension. This study examines how one learner variable (topic familiarity) and two input variables (mode and pausing) affect learners' comprehension and their processing of a new morphological form (the Spanish future tense) in the input. Two hundred sixty-six participants in an accelerated beginning Spanish course either read or listened to a short narrative in Spanish on either a familiar topic or an unfamiliar one. Additionally, half of the listening groups encountered 3-second pauses between each sentence. After listening to or reading the passages, the participants performed two comprehension tasks (recall protocol and multiple-choice test) and two form-assessment tasks (form-recognition task and tense identification/translation). The results revealed that, although all three variables affected learners' comprehension, only mode affected learners' processing future tense morphology. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the conference Form-Meaning Connections in Second Language Acquisition held in Chicago in February, 2002+ This paper is based on my doctoral dissertation completed at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign+ I am extremely grateful to Bill VanPatten for his guidance during the entire process of the research project as well as to James

Output and English as a Second Language Pragmatic Development: The Effectiveness of Output-focused Video-based Instruction

“…It is likewise important that researchers take into account the differences between the ways learners process oral and written language when designing pragmatic studies that involve multiple modes of exposure to input (Leeser, 2004). It may be that learners who focus on the input they are receiving (e.g., the -Output group in the present study) are better able to assimilate some pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic features needed for pragmatically successful production.…”

What makes listening difficult? Factors affecting second language listening comprehension

“…Leeser (2004) examined how long silent pauses (3 seconds long) at the end of each sentence in listening passages affected comprehension items specifically examining the recognition of verb tense as well as more general comprehension. While silent pauses were found to be useful for general comprehension (i.e., recall of idea units in a free recall task) when the topic of the passage was unfamiliar, they had a detrimental effect when the topic was familiar.…”

“…However, these results also highlight the potential for pauses to be distracting, which would explain the inferior performance of listeners receiving the familiar passage with pauses compared to the familiar passage without pauses. Leeser (2004) also pointed out that pauses are likely to alleviate time pressure caused by a normal-to-fast speech rate, allowing for better listening comprehension; in those cases where the speech rate is slow, pauses may have no effect.…”

“…In some written languages, though not all, word boundaries are marked with clearly visible spaces. In spoken language these boundaries must be inferred from a variety of lexical and phonological cues (Cutler, Dahan, & van Donselaar, 1997;Leeser, 2004;Weber & Cutler, 2006). Also, written text tends to involve more planning and editing before it reaches an audience, whereas spoken information is often spontaneous (Richards, 1983).…”

Enhanced input, individual output, and collaborative output: Effects on the acquisition of the English subjunctive mood

“…These perspectives have inspired many studies aimed at finding evidence regarding the facilitative effects of collaborative tasks in second language learning (Donato, 1994;Kowal & Swain, 1994;Storch, 1998;Swain, 2000;Leeser, 2004;Watanabe & Swain, 2007;Kim & McDonough, 2008;Reinders, 2009;Nassaji & Tian, 2010). Swain and Lapkin (2001), for example, compared the effectiveness of two focuson-form tasks, jigsaw and dictogloss.…”