Learning to Process and Processing to Learn: Linguistic and cognitive processing in language acquisition.
Final Report Abstract
The CoLeaP project investigated the interaction of linguistic and cognitive factors in the comprehension and learning of complex sentences in English by young foreign language learners. Its central aim was to find out which linguistic or cognitive strategies contribute to the implicit, unconscious learning of a foreign language. On the one hand, the more experience learners have with sentences in a foreign language, the better they understand them. If you frequently read complex sentences, you become better at understanding them. We investigated how similar sentences have to be in order to give rise to this kind of training effect. For example, does experience with understanding complex questions help with understanding other complex sentences such as relative clauses? We also tested if these effects also occur between languages: Does experience with understanding complex sentences in German help with understanding complex sentences in English? General cognitive skills may also influence how successfully complex sentences are understood, so that learners with greater memory capacity or better attentional control may better understand complex sentences. To assess the relative importance of linguistic and general cognitive factors in the comprehension and learning of complex sentences, the project conducted two extensive studies with over 300 13-14 year-old students. Participants listened to English sentences while looking at pictures on screen. At the same time, a camera recorded their eye movements ("eye tracking"). In addition, they completed the same task in German and solved computerised tasks on cognitive skills such as memory and attention control. The first study of the project showed that learners who were better at understanding English questions also had a better understanding of the more difficult relative clauses in English. In contrast, the ability to understand German relative clauses played less of a role, and cognitive skills had no influence. Against this background, we investigated how targeted practice with English questions and German relative clauses influences the comprehension of English relative clauses in the second study. Learners who practised English questions improved to the same extent with relative clauses as those who practised with relative clauses themselves. Practice with German relative clauses showed lower learning effects in comparison. A central novel finding of the studies is that the learning effects already surfaced in the early, unconscious eye movements while the participants were still listening to the sentences. This suggests that learners can transfer unconscious language processing strategies from questions to relative clauses. These language processing strategies do double duty as language learning strategies in that they allow learners to unconsciously access the structure and meaning of complex sentences. Foreign language teachers can exploit these learning mechanisms by using targeted practice with sentences that learners have already mastered to prepare the ground for the learning of novel complex sentence structures.
Publications
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Differences between adolescent L2 and L3 learners in sentence processing. Paper presented at 12th International Conference on Third Language Acquisition and Multilingualism (IAM L3). Zagreb, Croatia, Sep 15-17.
Poarch G.J, Gastmann, F., Öwerdieck, D., Stier, D., Schimke, S. & Hopp, H.
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Linguistic and cognitive predictors of reanalysis in low-intermediate L2 learners. Poster presented at 4th International Symposium on Bilingual and L2 Processing in Adults and Children (ISBPAC 2022). Tromsø, Norway, Aug 4-5.
Hopp, H., Gastmann, F., Öwerdieck, D., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Non-canonical sentence processing in advanced L2 learners: No cognate facilitation, but evidence of revision effects. Poster presented at 4th International Symposium on Bilingual and L2 Processing in Adults and Children (ISBPAC 2022). Tromsø, Norway, Aug 4-5.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Processing of relative clauses in L2 learners: no influence of cognate status, but evidence of revision effects. Paper presented at the 31st Annual Conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA). Fribourg, Switzerland, Aug 24-27.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Different weightings of the agent-first strategy and a semantic cue in L1 and L2 sentence processing. PaperTalk presented at the 32nd Annual Conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA). Birmingham, UK, Aug 30-Sep 2.
Schimke, S., Poarch, G.J., Gastmann, F., Öwerdieck, D., Stier, D. & Hopp, H.
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Grammatical features in L1 German – L2 English sentence processing. Paper presented at the 32nd Annual Conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA). Birmingham, UK, Aug 30-Sep 2.
Öwerdieck, D. & Hopp, H.
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Limitations of the cognate effect: How L2 proficiency and stimulus frequency modulate adolescent second language learners’ word recognition. Paper presented at the 32nd Annual Conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA). Birmingham, UK, Aug 30-Sep 2.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Processing to learn noncanonical word orders: Exploring linguistic and cognitive predictors of reanalysis in early L2 sentence comprehension. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 46(3), 686-709.
Hopp, Holger; Schimke, Sarah; Gastmann, Freya; Öwerdieck, David & Poarch, Gregory J.
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Word recognition in adolescent L2 and L3 learners of English: A comparison of cognate processing. Poster presented at Morella Young Researchers Symposium on Multilingualism (MYRSM 2023). Morella, Spain, June 12-13.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Word recognition in adolescent second language learners: How L2 proficiency and stimulus frequency modulate the cognate effect. Paper presented at Evidence-based foreign language learning – Multilingualism in education (EBFL 2023). Ascona, Switzerland, June 7-10.
Gastmann, F., Poarch, G.J. & Schimke, S.
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Cross-language activation during lexical and syntactic processing: Evidence from adolescent second language learners of English. Invited talk at the PoLaR Lab (C-LaBL Guest Lecture Series). Tromsø, Norway, March 20.
Poarch, G.J.
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Does cross-linguistic lexical influence engender benefits or competition? Paper to be presented OpVaMS V Workshop, University of Wuppertal, Dec 12-13.
Gastmann, F., H. Hopp, G. Poarch & S. Schimke
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How Sentence Processing supports Language Learning. Plenary address at 5th International Symposium on Bilingual and L2 Processing in Adults and Children (ISBPAC 2024). Swansea, UK, May 23-24.
Hopp, H.
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Language co-activation in adolescent second language learners’ word recognition: Evidence from pupillometry. Poster presented at the Language Processing and Learning Workshop. Munich, Germany, March 7.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Learning from processing: Abstract structural priming across grammatical structures and languages in early L2 development. Paper presented at the 33rd Annual Conference of the European Second Language Association (EuroSLA), Montpellier, France, July 3-6.
Hopp, H., Schimke, S., Gastmann, F. & Poarch, G.J.
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Learning via processing: Structural priming across grammatical structures and languages in early L2 development. Plenary presented at the Language Processing and Learning Workshop. Munich, Germany, March 7.
Hopp, H., Schimke, S., Öwerdieck, D., Gastmann, F. & Poarch, G.J.
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Lexical access in adolescent second language learners: Evidence from behavioral lexical decision and directions for future psychophysiological research. Poster presented at the BCN Winter Meeting. Groningen, The Netherlands, Feb 1.
Gastmann, F., Schimke, S. & Poarch, G.J.
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Parser-grammar collaborations across and within languages: Processing to learn non-canonical word orders in an L2. Paper presented at Fourth Workshop on Optionality and Variation in Multilingual Syntax (OpVaMS). University of Wuppertal, Jan 31-Feb 2.
Hopp, H.
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Processing to learn: Exploring linguistic and cognitive predictors in noncanonical sentence comprehension. Plenary presented at the Language Processing and Learning Workshop. Munich, Germany, March 7.
Schimke, S., Poarch, G.J., Gastmann, F., Öwerdieck, D., Stier, D. & Hopp, H.
