Effects of structural priming and lexical residual activation on the acquisition of the English “noun + relative clause” by L1 chinese learners

Abstract

This study investigated L1 Chinese learners’ acquisition of the English “Noun + Relative Clause” based on Structural Priming (SP) (Bock, 1986; Bock, 1989; Bock & Griffin, 2000) and Lexical Residual Activation (LRA) (Cleland, 2003; Levelt et al., 1999). It was hypothesized that, based on SP, when L1 Chinese learners were primed by the English “Noun + Relative Clause”, when the priming and the target structures shared different head nouns, they would produce more “Noun + Relative Clause” than when they were primed by the English “Adj + Noun”, and the priming effect was significant. Also, based on SP and LRA, when the priming and the target structures shared the same head noun, the increasing priming effect would be enhanced.

The participants were 90 first year non-English major Chinese students attending Guizhou University of Finance and Economics, and 10 native English speakers. A picture description task was used to elicit data. The results showed, that after having been primed by the English “Noun + Relative Clause” when the priming and target structure shared different head nouns, the L1 Chinese learners produced more “Noun + Relative Clause” than “Adj + Noun”, and the priming effect was significant (p < 0.05). When the priming and the target structures shared the same head noun, the increasing priming effect was enhanced, and the enhancement was significant (p < 0.05). The hypotheses were therefore confirmed.

The study contributed to Second Language Acquisition in that SP and LRA would facilitate L1 Chinese learners’ acquisition of English “Noun + Relative Clause”, although this structure is non-exist in the learners’ L1. The study also gave pedagogical implications in that application of SP and LRA would facilitate as well as enhance the acquisition of L2 structures.