F. Sadighi, THE ACQUISITION OF ENGLISH RESTRICTIVE RELATIVE CLAUSES BY CHINESE, JAPANESE, AND KOREAN ADULT NATIVE SPEAKERS, IRAL. International review of applied linguistics in language teaching, 32(2), 1994, pp. 141-153
Citations number
24
Categorie Soggetti
Language & Linguistics","Education & Educational Research
Research on the acquisition of English restrictive relative clauses (E
RRCs) among L1/L2 learners has shown that universal linguistic factors
substantially determine the learning processes rather than the peculi
arities of particular languages and learning situations (cf. Sheldon,
1974a, 1974b, and 1977; Houston, 1978; Sadighi, 1982, and 1986). To th
is end, this study examines the comprehension of ERRCs containing thre
e universal factors - Interruption, Word Order Re-Arrangement, and Par
allel function. The subjects are Chinese, Japanese, and Korean adult n
ative speakers whose languages employ pre-nominal RC formation strateg
y, a sharp contrast with the post-nominal strategy of English. The fin
dings of this study support the dominance of language universals in th
e course of language acquisition regardless of particular languages' s
pecificities. Additionally, universals are seen to be accessible to bo
th adults and children, and they remain intact maturationally (cf. Ble
y-Vroman, R. W., Felix, S. W., and Ioup, G. I., 1988; and duPlessis, J
., Solin, D., Travis, L. and White, L., 1987).