Abstract
This study tests how patterns of temporal reference in the linguistic expression of advanced Chinese learners of English co-vary with their nonverbal event categorisation. 42 learners were asked to retell videos with achievement-type events and activities in English. Results from expression showed pronounced crosslinguistic influence in learners’ infrequent combination of ongoingness with achievements, when compared with the English controls. Categorisation data signals that L1-modulated preferences also underlie learners’ nonverbal judgements. Crucially, the main new finding is covariation between the frequency of combined forms in learners’ retellings and how close their overall categorisation choices are to the target control group’s.
Funding statement: Research reported in this article was funded from the ECF-2014-459 grant awarded to the first author by the Leverhulme Trust.
Acknowledgement
We wish to thank the two anonymous reviewers for the time and diligence they spent on a previous draft. We feel fortunate in that, based on their detailed comments, they both clearly have excellent knowledge of research that is specific to linguistic relativity in SLA. It took us a while to address each of the issues they raised, but in our view the invested time was worth it, and we hope the current version is in many ways stronger than its predecessor and that they feel that their time was well spent. Many thanks also to Julie Lawrence for countless inspiring discussions on covariation.
References
Allan, Dave. 2004. Oxford placement test 2: Test pack. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Alonso Alonso, Rosa (ed.). 2016. Crosslinguistic influence in second language acquisition. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781783094837Search in Google Scholar
Andersen, W. Roger & Yasuhiro Shirai. 1996. The primacy of aspect in first and second language acquisition: The pidgin-creole connection. In William C. Ritchie & Tej K. Bhatia (eds.), Handbook of second language acquisition, 527–570. San Diego: Academic Press.10.1016/B978-012589042-7/50018-9Search in Google Scholar
Athanasopoulos, Panos. 2011. Cognitive restructuring in bilingualism. In Aneta Pavlenko (ed.), Thinking and speaking in two languages, 29–65. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781847693389-004Search in Google Scholar
Athanasopoulos, Panos, Ljubica Damjanovic, Julie Burnand & Emanuel Bylund. 2015. Learning to think in a second language: Effects of proficiency and length of exposure in English learners of German. The Modern Language Journal 99. 138–153.10.1111/j.1540-4781.2015.12183.xSearch in Google Scholar
Bardovi-Harlig, Kathleen. 2014. Documenting interlanguage development. In ZhoaHang Han & Elaine Tarone (eds.), Interlanguage: Forty years later, 127–146. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/lllt.39.08ch6Search in Google Scholar
Bylund, Emanuel & Panos Athanasopoulos. 2014. Linguistic relativity in SLA: Toward a new research program. Language Learning 64(4). 952–985.10.1111/lang.12080Search in Google Scholar
Bylund, Emanuel & Panos Athanasopoulos. 2015. Televised Whorf: Cognitive restructuring in advanced foreign language learners as a function of audio-visual media exposure. Modern Language Journal 99(1). 123–137.10.1111/j.1540-4781.2015.12182.xSearch in Google Scholar
Carroll, Mary, Jorge Murcia-Serra, Marzena Watorek & Alessandra Bendiscioli. 2000. The relevance of information organization to second language acquisition studies: The descriptive discourse of advanced adult learners of German. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 22. 441–466.10.1017/S0272263100003065Search in Google Scholar
Dietrich, Rainer, Wolfgang Klein & Colette Noyau (eds.). 1995, The acquisition of temporality in a second language. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/sibil.7Search in Google Scholar
Flecken, Monique, Christiane von Stutterheim & Mary Carroll. 2013. Principles of information organization in L2 use: Complex patterns of conceptual transfer. IRAL 51. 229–242.10.1515/iral-2013-0010Search in Google Scholar
Flecken, Monique, Katja Weimar, Mary Carroll & Christiane von Stutterheim. 2015. Driving along the road or heading for the village? Conceptual differences underlying motion event encoding in French, German, and French-German L2 users. The Modern Language Journal 99. 100–122.10.1111/j.1540-4781.2015.12181.xSearch in Google Scholar
Gennari, Silvia P., Steven Sloman, Barbara Malt & Tecumseh Fitch. 2002. Motion events in language and cognition. Cognition 83. 49–79.10.1016/S0010-0277(01)00166-4Search in Google Scholar
Goschler, Juliana & Anatol Stefanowitsch (eds.). 2013. Variation and change in the encoding of motion events. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/hcp.41Search in Google Scholar
Gumperz, John J. & Stephen C. Levinson (eds.). 1996. Rethinking linguistic relativity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Search in Google Scholar
Jarvis, Scott. 2011. Conceptual transfer: Crosslinguistic effects in categorization and construal. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 14(01). 1–8.10.1017/S1366728910000155Search in Google Scholar
Kersten, Alan, Christian Meissner, Julia Lechuga, Bennett Schwartz, Justin Albrechtsen & Adam Iglesias. 2010. English speakers attend more strongly than Spanish speakers to manner of motion when classifying novel objects and events. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 139(4). 638–653.10.1037/a0020507Search in Google Scholar
Klein, Wolfgang, Ping Li & Henriette Hendriks. 2000. Aspect and assertion in Mandarin Chinese. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 18. 723–770.10.1023/A:1006411825993Search in Google Scholar
Kurinski, Elena & Maria Sera. 2011. Does learning Spanish grammatical gender change English-speaking adults’ categorization of inanimate objects? Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 14. 203–220.10.1017/S1366728910000179Search in Google Scholar
Langacker, Ronald. 2008. Cognitive grammar: A basic introduction. New York: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195331967.001.0001Search in Google Scholar
Lucy, John. 2016. The implications of linguistic relativity for language learning. In Rosa Alonso Alonso (ed.), Crosslinguistic influence in second language acquisition, 53–70. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781783094837-006Search in Google Scholar
Lupyan, Gary. 2012. Linguistically modulated perception and cognition: The label-feedback hypothesis. Frontiers in Psychology 3. 54.10.3389/fpsyg.2012.00054Search in Google Scholar
MacWhinney, Brian. 1997. Second language acquisition and the competition model. In Annette M. B. De Groot & Judith F. Kroll (eds.), Tutorials in bilingualism: Psycholinguistic perspectives, 113–142. New York: Psychology Press.Search in Google Scholar
Malt, Barbara & Steven Sloman. 2003. Linguistic diversity and object naming by non-native speakers of English. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 6. 47–67.10.1017/S1366728903001020Search in Google Scholar
Odlin, Terence. 2005. Crosslinguistic influence and conceptual transfer: What are the concepts? Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 25. 3–25.10.1017/S0267190505000012Search in Google Scholar
Odlin, Terence. 2010. Conclusion: On the interdependence of conceptual transfer and relativity studies. In ZhaoHong Han & Teresa Cadierno (eds.), Linguistic relativity in SLA: Thinking for speaking. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781847692788-010Search in Google Scholar
Papafragou, Anna, Justin Hulbert & John Trueswell. 2008. Does language guide event perception? Evidence from eye movements. Cognition 108. 155–184.10.1016/j.cognition.2008.02.007Search in Google Scholar
Park, Haein & Nicole Ziegler. 2014. Cognitive shift in the bilingual mind: Spatial concepts in Korean–English bilinguals. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 17(2). 410–430.10.1017/S1366728913000400Search in Google Scholar
Pavlenko, Aneta. 2011. Overview of the field. In Aneta. Pavlenko (ed.), Thinking and speaking in two languages, 237–257. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.10.21832/9781847693389-010Search in Google Scholar
Pavlenko, Aneta. 2014. The bilingual mind and what it tells us about language and thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139021456Search in Google Scholar
Perry, Lynn K. & Gary Lupyan. 2013. What the online manipulation of linguistic activity can tell us about language and thought. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience 7. 14–17.10.3389/fnbeh.2013.00122Search in Google Scholar
R Development Core Team. 2016. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. Vienna, Austria: R Foundation for Statistical Computing.Search in Google Scholar
Selinker, Larry. 1972. Interlanguage. IRAL 10. 209–231.10.1515/iral.1972.10.1-4.209Search in Google Scholar
Selinker, Larry. 1992. Rediscovering Interlanguage. London: Longman.Search in Google Scholar
Selinker, Larry. 2014. Interlanguage 40 years on: Three themes from here. In ZhaoHong Han & Elaine Tarone (eds.), Interlanguage forty years later, 221–246. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/lllt.39.12ch1Search in Google Scholar
Shirai, Yasuhiro & Roger W. Andersen. 1995. The acquisition of tense-aspect morphology: A prototype account. Language 71(4). 743–762.10.2307/415743Search in Google Scholar
Vanek, Norbert & Henriette Hendriks. 2015. Convergence of temporal reference frames in sequential bilinguals: Event structuring unique to second language users. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 18. 753–768.10.1017/S1366728914000765Search in Google Scholar
Vendler, Zeno. 1957. Verbs and times. The Philosophical Review 66. 146–160.10.7591/9781501743726-005Search in Google Scholar
von Stutterheim, Christiane & Monique Lambert. 2005. Cross-linguistic analyses of temporal perspectives in text production. In Henriette Hendriks (ed.), The structure of learner varieties, 203–230. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.10.1515/9783110909593.203Search in Google Scholar
Whorf, Benjamin Lee. 1941. The relation of habitual thought and behavior to language. In Language, culture and personality: Essays in memory of Edward Sapir, L. Spier (ed.), reprinted in John B. Carroll (1956), Language, Thought and Reality: Selected Writings of Benjamin Lee Whorf, 134–159. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. (Original work published 1939).Search in Google Scholar
Xiao, Richard & Tony McEnery. 2004. Aspect in Mandarin Chinese: A corpus-based study. Amsterdam: Benjamins.10.1075/slcs.73Search in Google Scholar
Zhao, Yun & Brian MacWhinney. 2010. Competing cues: A corpus-based study of English tense-aspect acquisition. BUCLD Proceedings 34. 503–514.Search in Google Scholar
© 2017 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
