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Part of
Generative SLA in the Age of Minimalism: Features, interfaces, and beyond
Edited by Tania Leal, Elena Shimanskaya and Casilde A. Isabelli
[Language Acquisition and Language Disorders 67] 2022
► pp. 287–314

A different type of RC attachment resolution

Comparing bilingual and trilingual processing

 | University of Southampton
 | University of Southampton
This study investigates attachment resolution of ambiguous relative clauses (RC) by second (L2) and third (L3) language speakers of English and Russian. Participants’ sensitivity to the language of testing, social conventions, and a linguistic effect of the matrix verb (perception, non-perception) is investigated. Monolingual controls confirm the established cross-linguistic variation: high attachment in Russian and low attachment in English. Non-native speakers demonstrate a tendency to perform in the target-like manner in their non-native languages. Both native and non-native speakers favor high attachment after a perception matrix verb. Neither monolinguals nor L2/L3 learners rely on social conventions to interpret ambiguous RCs. In other words, non-native sentence comprehension appears to be sensitive to syntactic cues prompted by a perception verb in RC resolution.
Keywords: non-native processing, bilingual, trilingual parsing, structural, top-down, projection, bottom-up
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Theoretical motivation
  • 3.Method
    • 3.1Participants
    • 3.2Materials
    • 3.3Procedure
    • 3.4Data analysis
    • 3.5Results
  • 4.Discussion
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 17 August 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lald.67.12sok
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