Who shot whom? Psycholinguistic processing of syntactic ambiguity in L2 and the role of cognitive control: a self-paced reading experiment
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5935/2218-0761.20240022Keywords:
Syntactic ambiguity, L2 processing, self-paced reading, cognitive control, good enough approachAbstract
We investigated how Spanish speakers with English as a second language (L2) process syntactic ambiguities. According to the Good Enough speaker approach, ambiguities may remain unresolved while performing a reading task, maintaining multiple possible interpretations (Ferreira 2002). Our self-paced reading experiment employed a 2x3 mixed design with two experimental conditions: 1) syntactic ambiguity ‒within-subjects condition (ambiguous, disambiguated N1, disambiguated N2), and 2) comprehension questions, ‒ between-subjects condition (relative clause and superficial). Additionally, we included a Flanker task to measure cognitive control. The analysis incorporated linear mixed-effects modelling. The study results show that participants require more reaction time to process the ambiguous condition in N1 compared to N2. Furthermore, it was observed that accuracy in the Flanker task is associated with longer reaction times in reading. These results suggest that greater cognitive control is associated with longer reading times, indicating a trade-off between speed and accuracy in L2 processing.
Downloads
References
Abutalebi, J. y David W. Green. 2007. Bilingual language production: The neurocognition of language representation and control, en Journal of Neurolinguistics, 20(3): 242-275. 166
Bialystok, Ellen y Fergus I. M. Craik. 2010. Cognitive and linguistic processing in the bilingual mind, en Current Directions in Psychological Science, 19(1): 19-23.
Christianson, Kiel. 2016. When language comprehension goes wrong for the right reasons: Good enough, underspecified, or shallow language processing, en Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 69(5): 817-828.
Clahsen, Harald, y Claudia Felser. 2006. Grammatical processing in language learners, en Applied Psycholinguistics, 27(1): 3-42.
Cunnings, Ian. 2017. Parsing and working memory in bilingual sentence processing, en Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 20(4): 659-678.
Dussias, Paola E. y Nuria Sagarra. 2007. The effect of exposure on syntactic parsing in Spanish–English bilinguals, en Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 10(1): 101-116.
Ferreira, Fernanda; Karl G. D. Bailey y Vittoria Ferraro. 2002. Good-enough representations in language comprehension, en Current Directions in Psychological Science, 11(1): 11-15.
Ferreira, Fernanda; Kiel Christianson y A. Hollingworth. 2001. Misinterpretations of garden-path sentences: Implications for models of sentence processing and reanalysis, en Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 30(1): 3-20.
Ferreira, Fernanda y Nikole D. Patson. 2007. The 'good enough' approach to language comprehension, en Language and Linguistics Compass, 1(1-2): 71-83.
Frazier, Lyn y Keith Rayner. 1982. Making and correcting errors during sentence comprehension: Eye movements in the analysis of structurally ambiguous sentences, en Cognitive Psychology, 14(2): 178- 210.
Festman, Julia; Antoni Rodriguez-Fornells y Thomas F. Münte. 2010. Individual differences in control of language interference in late bilinguals are mainly related to general executive abilities, en Behavioral and Brain Functions, 6: 1-12.
Green, David W. 1998. Mental control of the bilingual lexico-semantic system, en Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 1(2): 67-81.
Hopp, Holger. 2010. Ultimate attainment in L2 inflection: Performance similarities between non-native and native speakers, en Lingua, 120(4): 901-931.
Kroll, Judith F. y Ellen Bialystok. 2013. Understanding the consequences of bilingualism for language processing and cognition, en Journal of Cognitive Psychology, 25(5): 497-514.
Lemhöfer, Kristin y Mirjam Broersma. 2012. Introducing LexTALE: A quick and valid lexical test for advanced learners of English, en Behavior Research Methods, 44: 325-343.
Lew-Williams, Casey y Anne Fernald. 2010. Real-time processing of gender-marked articles by native and non-native Spanish speakers, en Journal of Memory and Language, 63(4): 447-464.
Levy, Benjamin J.; Nicole D. McVeigh, Andrés Marful y Michael C. Anderson. 2007. Inhibiting your native language: The role of retrieval-induced forgetting during second-language acquisition, en Psychological Science, 18(1): 29-34.
Linck, Jared A.; John W. Schwieter y Gretchen Sunderman. 2012. Inhibitory control predicts language switching performance in trilingual speech production, en Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 15(3): 651-662.
MacDonald, Maryellen C.; Neal J. Pearlmutter y Mark S. Seidenberg. 1994. The lexical nature of syntactic ambiguity resolution, en Psychological Review, 101(4): 676.
McDonald, Janet L. 2006. Beyond the critical period: Processing-based explanations for poor grammaticality judgment performance by late second language learners, en Journal of Memory and Language, 55(3): 381-401.
Misra, Maya; Taomei Guo, Scott C. Bobb y Judith F. Kroll. 2012. When bilinguals choose a single word
to speak: Electrophysiological evidence for inhibition of the native language, en Journal of Memory and Language, 67(1): 224-237.
Novick, Jared M.; John C. Trueswell y Sharon L. Thompson-Schill. 2005. Cognitive control and parsing: Reexamining the role of Broca's area in sentence comprehension, en Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience, 5(3): 263-281.
Prior, Anat y Tamar H. Gollan. 2011. Good language-switchers are good task-switchers: Evidence from Spanish-English and Mandarin-English bilinguals, en Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 17(4): 682-691.
Roberts, Leah y Claudia Felser. 2011. Plausibility and recovery from garden paths in second language sentence processing, en Applied Psycholinguistics, 32(2): 299-331.
Rossi, Sonja; Maren F. Gugler, Angela D. Friederici y Anja Hahne. 2006. The impact of proficiency on syntactic second-language processing of German and Italian: Evidence from event-related potentials, en Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 18(12): 2030-2048.
Slattery, Timothy J.; Patrick Sturt, Kiel Christianson, Masaya Yoshida y Fernanda Ferreira. 2013. Lingering misinterpretations of garden path sentences arise from competing syntactic representations, en Journal of Memory and Language, 69(2): 104-120.
Swets, Benjamin; Tom Desmet, Charles Clifton y Fernanda Ferreira. 2008. Underspecification of syntactic ambiguities: Evidence from self-paced reading, en Memory & Cognition, 36: 201-216.
Tokowicz, Natasha y Brian MacWhinney. 2005. Implicit and explicit measures of sensitivity to violations in second language grammar: An event-related potential investigation, en Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 27(2): 173-204.
World Medical Association. 2013. Declaration of Helsinki: Ethical principles for medical research involving human subjects, en JAMA, 320): 2191-2194.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Cuadernos de la ALFAL
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
You are free to:
- Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
- The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
Under the following terms:
- Attribution — You must give appropriate credit , provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made . You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
- NonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes .
- NoDerivatives — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modified material.
- No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits.
Notices:
You do not have to comply with the license for elements of the material in the public domain or where your use is permitted by an applicable exception or limitation .
No warranties are given. The license may not give you all of the permissions necessary for your intended use. For example, other rights such as publicity, privacy, or moral rights may limit how you use the material.