Crosslinguistic Influence and Second Language Learning

Kevin McManus

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9780367357825
• eBook ISBN: 9781000452013
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

Crosslinguistic Influence and Second Language Learning provides a comprehensive overview of what is currently known about prior language knowledge and experience in second language learning. Three bodies of research are critically reviewed to achieve this goal: (i) theories of language learning that attribute critical roles to prior experience in explaining second language development, (ii) empirical studies of second language learning that have investigated roles for crosslinguistic influence, and (iii) instructional studies that have supported second language learning by addressing the negative effects of crosslinguistic influence. Using this foundation, new research directions and theorization in the field of second language acquisition are proposed. This book will serve as an excellent resource for students and scholars with interests in (instructed) second language learning, applied linguistics, cognitive psychology, psycholinguistics, and language education.

1

Introducing Crosslinguistic Influence

DOI: 10.4324/9780429341663-1

1.1 Introduction

This book presents a comprehensive overview of crosslinguistic influence in adult second language learning. Succinctly, research about crosslinguistic influence seeks to describe and theorize the ways in which a speaker’s cumulative experience with one or more languages can influence their processing and use of other languages. This can include, for instance, the extent to which a speaker’s experience with Polish and/or Spanish might influence their use of Mandarin Chinese. In the field of second language acquisition (SLA), researchers have studied crosslinguistic influence in variety of ways, including how first language (L1) experience shapes second language (L2) learning, how L2 learning changes L1 use, as well as how the combined experiences of L1 and L2 learning influence the learning of an additional language (for reviews, see Jarvis, 2016; Jarvis & Pavlenko, 2008; Odlin & Yu, 2016). As we will see, researching crosslinguistic influence in these different ways is necessary for informing how we think about L2 learning, including proposals about the structure and organization of a speaker’s language system. It is also one reason why our Polish–Spanish–Chinese example excluded the labels L1 and L2: Crosslinguistic influence is not restricted to L1 effects on L2 learning; it involves understanding all types of experience on language use. The aim of this book is to explore some of the key questions that crosslinguistic influence research seeks to address, including:

• How do adults build knowledge of an additional language?
• Does learning a new language lead to broader changes in a speaker’s existing language system or do the systems of L1 and L2 knowledge appear to be unconnected?
• Might connections among different languages emerge and change over time?
• Can instruction help L2 learners overcome some of the negative effects of crosslinguistic influence?

In terms of situating crosslinguistic influence in the broader context of what we know about L2 learning, theoretical and empirical studies have, for a long time now, attributed critical roles to prior language knowledge and experience in making sense of how adults learn and use an additional language (for reviews, see Gass et al., 2020; VanPatten et al., 2020). This evidence base includes studies of how L2 speakers process and attend to language as well as analyses of what the language input looks like. Together, the findings from these lines of research have led to clear and testable theories about the routes and rates of L2 learning (see Chapter 2) and approaches to L2 instruction that are grounded in how speakers use language (see Chapter 4).

In this book, our aim is to advance new research directions and theorization in the field of SLA by critically reviewing what is known about prior language knowledge and experience in L2 learning.¹ We work toward this goal through a comprehensive review of three connected bodies of research: (i) theories of language learning that attribute critical roles to prior experience in explaining L2 development, (ii) empirical studies of L2 learning that have investigated roles for crosslinguistic influence, and (iii) instructional studies that have been designed to support L2 learning by addressing the negative effects of crosslinguistic influence.

We begin our review by briefly describing what we mean by “language” (Section 1.2), which is followed by a discussion of “learning a second language” (Section 1.3). Here, we note some important debates from the field of SLA about what it means to learn a new language. We then move on to discussing connected issues in crosslinguistic influence research that we will further unpack in subsequent chapters, including “prior knowledge and experience” (Section 1.4), “transfer” (Section 1.5), “cross-language relationships” (Section 1.6), “directions of crosslinguistic influence” (Section 1.7) and “explicit instruction and crosslinguistic influence” (Section 1.8). We end this chapter with an overview of the book.

1.2 Language

It is well known that theories about the nature, forms, and purposes of language are plentiful (e.g., Bybee, 2010; Chomsky, 1965; Tomasello, 2003). Some of these theories contain points of agreement (e.g., learning a particular language requires exposure to that language), but there is also considerable disagreement, including the extent to which some properties of language might be universal and/or innate and what role general cognition might play in the development of language knowledge (for reviews, see Ambridge & Lieven, 2011; Kempe & Brooks, 2016). In this section, our aim is to outline some of the key ideas about language as discussed in this book.

This book is grounded in functionalist understandings of language, in which “the surface conventions of natural languages are created, governed, constrained, acquired, and used in the service of communicative functions” (Bates & MacWhinney, 1981, p. 192, see also Christiansen & Chater, 2016; Tomasello, 2003). Under this view, communicating ideas, functions, meanings, and intentions is what drives speakers to learn and use language.

Cognitive linguistic theories propose that the forms of a language that speakers learn and use can be described and conceptualized as constructions or form-meaning mappings (Bybee, 2010; Goldberg, 2006, 2019; Tomasello, 2003). A construction can denote a specific meaning (when one form expresses a single meaning; e.g., avocado) or sets of meanings (when one form can express more than one meaning; e.g., -s; see Table 1.1 for examples). The linguistic form of a construction and its use in communication is built up over time through usage and agreed upon by a community of speakers (Beckner et al., 2009; Christiansen & Chater, 2016). Constructions are therefore socially learned, a process that can lead to changes in the form of a construction (e.g., phonetic reduction, grammaticalization, see Bybee, 2010) and in the meaning of a construction (e.g., constructional change, will- “intend” > “future”, see Traugott & Trousdale, 2013).

Table 1.1Examples of Constructions in English

Construction	Examples
Morpheme	pre-, -s
Word	avocado, fish
Complex word	daredevil, shoo-in
Idiom (filled)	go great guns
Idiom (partially filled)	jog <somebody’s> memory
Ditransitive (double object) Passive	he wrote her a letter the cat was chased by the wasp

As Table 1.1 shows, constructions can vary in terms of their functional and syntactic complexity and include morphemes, words, complex words, and more abstract syntactic frames (e.g., ditransitives and passives). Constructions can be relatively concrete, as in fish, while others can be more abstract. For example, the sentence she gave Ellie a present is made up of individual constructions (she, Ellie, a, present, gave) that when ordered in this specific way (Subject Verb Object Object) express the meaning of something being transferred (Ellis et al., 2016).

Building on this understanding of constructions as the building blocks of language, the language input that speakers are exposed to and use are a critical source for building knowledge of that language (Ellis, 2006a; Goldberg & Casenhiser, 2008; MacWhinney, 2008). However, exposure to a language alone is not enough. Domain-general learning mechanisms are needed to support the learning of a language (Bates & MacWhinney, 1989; Bybee, 2010; Christiansen & Chater, 2016). The cognitive mechanisms used by humans to learn language are described as domain-general because humans are understood to learn a language in the same ways that they learn any other ability or skill.

Examples of the cognitive mechanisms used by humans to learn and use language include rich memory storage, analogy, categorization, and cross-modal association (Bybee, 2010; Christiansen & Chater, 2016). When speakers encounter instances of language in the environment, for example, categorization is used to match those instances (e.g., sounds, text, images, gestures) to existing experiences with language that are already represented and stored in memory. This process allows messages to be decoded, interpreted, and also for new information to be associated with existing experiences. Our ability to categorize information cooperates with a range of other cognitive processes, including rich memory storage. Work in connectionism indicates that representations are stored and organized in self-organizing maps (Kohonen, 1990; Li et al., 2004; Shirai, 2019), which are networks of representations stored as neurons or units. These networks are activated when input is received and compete for selection based on their specifications and how well they match to the input. Categorization and rich memory storage are just some of the domain-general cognitive mechanisms used by humans to learn language.

In sum, language learning involves the building of language knowledge through exposure to instances of language as used in communication. Language learning is supported by powerful sets of domain-general cognitive mechanisms.

1.3 Learning a Second Language

In discussions of L2 learning in adulthood, we should remind ourselves that all speakers do this with an established system of language knowledge built up from prior experience using some other language (typically L1). This is an important difference between child L1 learning and adult L2 learning. In crosslinguistic influence research, therefore, our goal is to describe and explain in what ways a speaker’s prior knowledge of language and experiences using language shape new language learning.

In the field of SLA, research has repeatedly shown that adults regularly construct knowledge about a new language that is different from that built for L1 use (Alonso , 2016; Jarvis & Pavlenko, 2008; Odlin, 1989). Examples of this include instances where the same forms in L1 and L2 (e.g., articles, verb forms) express different or additional meanings. Articles in English (a, the) and languages like French (un “a”, la “the”), German (ein “a”, die “the”), and Spanish (un “a”, la “the”) are examples of this L1–L2 difference. Even though all these languages can express definiteness or specificity with articles (e.g., a cat vs. the cat or eine Katze vs. die Katze), in languages like Spanish and German articles also express information about grammatical gender (e.g., in German die “the” is used with feminine nouns, das “the” with neuter nouns, and der “the” with masculine nouns; Durrell, 2011). One consequence of this L1–L2 difference is that speakers of Spanish or German, for example, can use articles to anticipate or predict upcoming nouns, but speakers of languages like English that lack grammatical gender do not (Kaan, 2014). This crosslinguistic difference is due to agreement conditions between articles and nouns that are present in languages like Spanish. This means that when Spanish speakers encounter the feminine determiner...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Information
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introducing Crosslinguistic Influence
• 2 Theoretical Models of L2 Learning
• 3 Studies of L2 Development
• 4 Instructed L2 Learning
• 5 Reflections and Future Directions
• Recommended Reading
• References
• Index