New Paper Comes Out

Zhang, Liulin. (2018). Non-salient form in Chinese as a second language instruction: Input flood of Chinese notional passive construction. Chinese as a Second Language Research, 7(2), 249-276. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/caslar-2018-0010.

Implicit instruction alone simply does not work in teaching some linguistic forms because the target form may not even be noticed. In this case, to make the input count, some explicit instruction is necessary.

Abstract:

Drawing upon the frequency effect and the noticing hypothesis in language acquisition, input flood treatment was introduced to second language instruction involving artificially increased incidence of the target items in the audio or visual texts that learners are exposed to, with the expectation that this artificial increase will aid learners in noticing and then acquiring the form. Targeting at Chinese notional passive construction (NPC), the present study employs pre-post testing to assess the effect of input flood, and employs think-aloud protocol (including source attributions) analysis during the posttest to detect participants’ awareness of the linguistic knowledge underlying their choices. Results from experiment 1 show that in comparison with the marked 被bèi construction (BEIC), NPC is extremely difficult to be noticed in incidental exposure, rendering the input flood treatment helpless in participants’ acquisition of NPC. However, it is found in experiment 2 that the effect of input flood can be elicited with a little amount of explicit instruction, which is indicative of an indispensable role of explicit instruction in teaching non-salient language forms. Besides, the linguistic knowledge demonstrated by participants regarding the selectional constraints between NPC and BEIC is primarily unconscious and is inherent among intermediate and advanced Chinese learners.

摘要：

通过人为增加目标项目在语言输入中的频率，输入流教学法是基于语言习得过程中的频率效应和注意假设而提出的，旨在帮助第二语言学习者注意到并进而习得目标结构。针对汉语中的无被动标记的意念被动结构，本研究采用前测-后测设计评测输入流的效用，在后测进行过程中，采用有声思维法考察被试的语法知识。实验一的结果显示，相较于有标记的“被”字结构，无标记的意念被动结构即便在输入流中频率极高也几乎不会被注意到——输入流无法辅助被试习得意念被动结构。然而实验二表明输入流的效用可以由少量显性教学引导出，揭示了显性教学在第二语言教学中对于非显著形式有不可替代的作用。此外，有声思维研究显示，被试对于他们自己所掌握的意念被动结构的使用规律并无意识。