Syntactic Parsing of Relative Clauses and Wh-Questions in L2 Italian

Author

Pamela Franciotti, The Graduate Center, City University of New YorkFollow

Date of Degree

9-2023

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Program

Linguistics

Advisor

Gita Martohardjono

Committee Members

Martin Chodorow

Virginia Valian

Subject Categories

First and Second Language Acquisition | Psycholinguistics and Neurolinguistics

Keywords

L2 grammar, sentence processing, L2 parsing strategies, L2 Italian, filler-gap dependencies

Abstract

This dissertation aims to research similarities and differences between L1 and L2 parsing strategies, the interaction between L2 grammatical representations and the parser during development and the effect of the L1 grammar in L2 parsing. To this aim, the study investigates the processing of relative clauses (RCs) and wh-questions in L1 English-L2 learners of Italian by testing whether: (i) L2 learners present the well-attested subject/object asymmetry in the processing of RCs and wh-questions, whereby subject-extracted dependencies are easier to process over object ones; (ii) a number feature mismatch between the two NPs hypothesized to attenuate the processing effort incurred by object RCs in L1 child and adult Italian has the same facilitatory effect in L2 processing; (iii) L2 learners are sensitive to verbal agreement to activate a structural reanalysis when it flags an OVS word order in RCs and wh-questions and can successfully recover from a subject initial interpretation. Four self-paced reading experiments, measuring both reading times and post-reading accuracy of responses to comprehension questions, were administered to a group of L1 English-L2 Italian learners at different levels of proficiency, as well as to a control group of Italian native speakers. Main results from the study show that, while learners experience a S/O asymmetry in both RCs and wh-questions as evidenced by native speakers, they are not facilitated in the processing of object RCs with number mismatched NPs as attested in native processing. Moreover, results reveal that only more advanced learners are sensitive and identify verbal agreement as indicating a word order structural reanalysis, while all learners, regardless of level of proficiency, eventually struggle in the reconstruction of the OVS word order in the offline comprehension of both RCs and wh-questions. These research findings demonstrate that in general, L2 learners adopt the same parsing strategies in the L2 as native speakers do in their L1 and support the hypothesis that syntactic principles drive parsing in the L2. Importantly, findings from this study also establish that although there exists an interaction between grammatical properties and the parser in L2 Italian, the interaction is not only modulated by proficiency level and L1 grammar influence, but it is particularly depended upon mastery of L2 grammar-specific properties (i.e., verbal morphology, VS word order) which in L2 development may not yet be fully acquired and stable. Overall, this research calls for a deeper investigation of the mapping between the L2 lexicon and the L2 syntax in second language processing.

Recommended Citation

Franciotti, Pamela, "Syntactic Parsing of Relative Clauses and Wh-Questions in L2 Italian" (2023). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/5558