Volume 9, Issue 2

A major claim in the constructionist approach to language acquisition is that grammar is learned by pairings of form and function. In this study we test this claim by examining how L2 learners of Mandarin Chinese acquire the bei passive construction, a construction that is associated with the meaning of adversity. Our goal is to find out whether L2 learners make the association between the passive and adversity. Participants performed a sentence choice task under four conditions: an adversative context with an adversative verb, an adversative context with a neutral verb, a neutral context with a neutral verb and a positive context with a neutral verb. In each context participants were asked to select either the bei passive construction or its active counterpart. We found that high-level learners consistently chose the bei passive significantly more in adversative contexts than in non-adversative contexts regardless of the connotations of the verbs, while low-level learners made the distinction half of the time. In addition, while low-level learners did not yet associate adversity with the form of the construction, high-level learners did. We conclude that L2 learners do learn the bei passive construction as a form-meaning pair. The constructionist approach is supported. 摘要 构式语法理论认为, 语法的形式与意义是一同习得的。在此理论基础上, 本研究考察了汉语二语学习者“被”字构式的习得情况。“被”字构式常带有不幸、消极的意义, 那么学习者能否习得这种形式-意义的配对体呢?为了解决这一问题, 我们设计并安排了句子选择的任务。被试需在四种情况下根据情境选择 “被” 字句或其相应的主动语态。这四种情况分别为: 消极意义语境匹配消极意义动词, 消极意义语境匹配中性意义动词, 中性意义语境匹配中性意义动词, 以及积极意义语境匹配中性意义动词。我们发现无论动词属何种语义, 高水平学习者在消极语境中的 “被” 字句使用均显著高于非消极语境; 低水平学习者在一半的情况下也更多地使用了“被”字句。与高水平学习者相比, 低水平学习者尚未将 “被”字句的消极意义与其形式联系起来。基于以上, 我们认为二语学习者在学习汉语“被”字句是以形式和意义的配对体习得的。该研究证实了构式语法的习得理论。

The roles of interaction have been studied for several decades. Recent studies have turned to investigate “the details of which components of interaction might be more or less effective in which contexts with which learners” (Loewen, Shawn & Masatoshi Sato. 2018. Interaction and instructed second language acquisition. Language Teaching 51(3). 285–329: 286). This case study, based on three unstructured interactions outside the classroom between two L2 Mandarin Chinese learners, investigates the learning opportunities these interactions brought about in terms of helping them to increase in control over forms that had already been encountered inside the classroom. Using the concept of the language-related episode (Swain, Merrill & Sharon Lapkin. 1998. Interaction and second language learning: Two adolescent French immersion students working together. The Modern Language Journal 82(3). 320–337), this study sets focus on learning opportunities for lexis- and grammar-related items. It finds learning opportunities arise as the two peers negotiate for meaning motivated by the need to comprehend, strive to use the L2 to express/co-express themselves, and improve their form through the other’s feedback. In addition, lexis-related learning is found to be very positive in this study. The dictionary played an indispensable role in facilitating the learners when they encountered lexis-related issues. Further, it enabled the learners to learn new vocabulary when driven by communicative needs. In comparison, the grammar-related learning is found to be relatively complicated. And the fact the learners had nowhere to resort to concerning grammatical issues attributed to it. In terms of the different types of interactions, compared to learning through negotiation for meaning and feedback, output and co-construction/collaboration were found to be most productive in promoting the learning.

Recent developments in the study of crosslinguistic influence have started to account for how the dynamic interaction between language and cognition influences transfer phenomena. This study examined the acquisition and use of referring expressions in narratives produced by 80 English-dominant learners of Chinese representing two proficiency levels (Low vs. High) and two linguistic backgrounds (Foreign Language vs. Heritage Language), as compared to two baseline groups of 40 Chinese native speakers (NSs) and 40 English NSs. Results showed that, while heritage language learners (HLLs) demonstrated a more idiomatic use of referential forms to introduce new characters and maintain reference to them than did foreign language learners (FLLs) at the same low-proficiency level, the advantage of early language exposure diminished at the high-proficiency level when HLLs were compared to High FLLs who had prolonged in-country experience. Meanwhile, three types of production errors persisted, including (i) failing to use definite reference when obligatory for simple bare nouns, (ii) struggling to supply item-specific classifiers, and (iii) avoidance of zero anaphora, when discourse coherence would prefer such a strategy. All three of these features involve the restructuring of L1 preferences to accommodate L2-specific patterns due to L1-L2 typological differences. 摘要 跨语际影响研究近年来已经开始关注语言和认知之间的交互作用如何影响语际迁移本研究透过与 40位母语为中文和 40位母语为英语的对照组相比,考察 80位英语为强势语言的中文学生在看图说故事任务中习得和使用指称词的情况, 80位学习者包括低级和高级水平以及华裔和非华裔四组学生。研究结果发现在同样低级水平阶段,华裔学生较非华裔学生更能够自然恰当地使用指称词介绍新人物,并维持对人物的指称。然而到了高级水平阶段,华裔学生跟具长期居住中文地区经验的非华裔学生相比,华裔学生较早接触中文的语言优势逐渐消退。此外,研究发现三种类型的指称词误用情况特别显著,包括:(一)在定指情况误用简单名词作指称;(二)未能根据指称对象使用正确的量词;(三)未能正确使用零指称方式维持中文语句连贯。上述三种误用现象都涉及学习者惯用语和目标语在指称词使用上的语言类型差异,学习者必须调整自己熟悉的惯用语语用思维以适应目标语中特殊的指称方式。

The purpose of this study is to explore the use of Mandarin utterance-final particles in online teacher-student interactions. The interactions were carried out by 15 preservice teachers who were graduate students at the Department of Chinese as a Second Language and 6 learners of Chinese as a second language in Singapore. After four online-interaction sessions (24 classes in total), we tagged utterance-final particles in the sentences of the corpus produced from conversation between the teachers and students. The results show that utterance-final particles spoken by students are Ma (嗎) >  A (啊) >  O (喔) >  Ba (吧) >  Ye (耶) >  Ne (呢) =  La (啦) >  Wa (哇), in the order of decreasing frequency. Yo (唷) or Ma (嘛) did not appear in the students’ speech. The utterance-final particles were used in 15% of the total number of turns by the students, and their most frequently used particles were Ma (嗎) and A (啊), each accounted for 36% of their total number of utterance-final particles. Utterance-final particles produced by the preservice teachers are Ma (嗎) >  Ne (呢) > A (啊) >  O (喔) >  Ba (吧) >  Ye (耶) >  Ma (嘛) >  Luo (囉) >  La (啦) =  Wa (哇) >  Yo (唷), in the order of decreasing frequency. The utterance-final particles were used in 37% of the total number of turns by the preservice teachers, and their most frequently used utterance-final particle was Ma (嗎), which accounted for 58% of their total number of utterance-final particles. This study also looked into the factors that may influence the use of utterance-final particles, such as regional Mandarin variations (Taiwan vs. Mainland China), preservice teachers’ primary language (Mandarin or other languages), where the second language learners are originally from, and whether Chinese heritage students speak Mandarin at home. The rate using utterance-final particles of Taiwanese teachers was 8% higher than that of Mainland Chinese teachers, and this result agrees with our general impression on utterance-final particles occur more frequent in Taiwanese Mandarin. The heritage students who speak Mandarin at home used utterance-final particles 2% more than those who do not. The teachers whose primary language is Mandarin used 11% more of the utterance-final particles than those who speak other languages. In addition, the rate using utterance-final particles of Taiwanese teachers was 8% higher than that of Mainland Chinese teachers, and this result agrees with our general impression on utterance-final particles occur more frequent in Taiwanese Mandarin. In this study, we realized that various factors may affect the frequency of using specific utterance-final particle, such as the power and solidarity between the speaker and the hearer, such as teacher to student. Additionally, our result shows that language background also plays a role in how a speaker uses utterance-final particles. In our future research, we will further analyze the factors that determine the frequency of Mandarin utterance-final particles.

提 要 本研究以四篇不同文本複雜度(Text complexity)之短文為實驗材料, 共31位日籍華語學習者以紙筆施測與有聲思考(Think Aloud), 探究華語學習者之二語程度(L2 proficiency)與文本複雜度對詞彙猜測和閱讀理解的影響。結果顯示: (一)各文本之文意理解和詞義選擇達顯著差異( F  = 8.290, p  = .000; F  = 28.226, p  = .000), 閱讀理解則否; (二)二語能力中的詞彙知識和句法知識分別與閱讀理解及詞彙猜測表現皆達顯著正相關( r  = .586, p  = .001; r  = .666, p  = .000; r  = .364, p  = .044; r  = 0.535, p  = .002), 句法知識可代表解釋44.4%的閱讀理解變異及28.6%的詞彙猜測表現變異; (三)不論詞義透明度高低, 猜測最常用知識來源皆為文本線索。

提 要 汉语难学的说法对于汉语作为外语的初学者负面影响是显而易见的。对于非汉字文化圈的汉语学习者来说，对汉字望而生畏的现象尤为普遍。汉字，特别是汉字字形和非字母线索的发音规律，通常给人汉语难学的第一印象。因此，他们初学汉语时往往希冀通过汉语拼音替代汉字，以此来绕过汉字这一汉语学习的“重大障碍”。有些汉语教师也有意无意地顺应汉语初学者的要求，在教学过程中采用汉语拼音替代汉字以化解学生汉语难学的心理。然而，这种忽略汉字对汉语学习重要作用的学习与教学方法事实上具有很强的误导作用，由于汉语存在大量的同音字，这种回避策略常常会给畏惧汉语的学习心理带来雪上加霜的负担。只有还原汉字在汉语学习中的本来面目才有可能有效促进汉语学习，降低学生汉语难学的心理障碍。对于成人汉语学习者来说，通过对汉语和其母语（以英语为例）两种语言的文字特征进行比较分析，采用汉字领先的教学方式，还原汉语拼音与英语音标等同的辅助作用，帮助学生采用灵活的方法摸索汉字意义与发音规律，用母语的语言知识来认识、理解和解构汉语，用自己熟悉的方式观察和学习汉语，从而减少汉语难学的心理障碍。在教学实践中我们发现，采用这种积极直面汉字的初学汉语方法能够帮助学生较快接受汉字，观察还发现：较快接受汉字而且较多使用汉字的初学者的进步幅度明显高于过多依赖拼音的学习汉语者。