Word Frequency Dominance and L2 Word Recognition/VocabatTokyo
Tamura, Y., Morita, M., & Nishimura, Y. (2016). Word frequency dominance and L2 word recognition in English. Paper presented at Vocab@Tokyo, Meiji Gakuin University, Tokyo, Japan.
Frequently occurred inflected forms • are processed as a whole • show frequency effects Background 19 Frequency Effects kid kids kid kids rule rules rule rules High frequent inflected forms Low frequent inflected forms faster
Time (RT) difference between • Plural dominant plurals and plural dominant singulars • Highly frequent inflected forms would not be decomposed but processed as a whole • Support dual-route model • New et al. (2004) • French and English • Support Baayen et al. (1997) Background 21 Frequency Dominance
inflected words would affect the processing of the base forms • Cumulative frequency (sg + pl) predicts the lexical decision time for native speakers of English • -> dual-route or decomposition • Surface frequency (sg only) predicts the lexical decision time for Japanese L2 learners of English • -> full-form strage? Background 22 Frequency Dominance
regularly inflected words? • Hypothesis • If… • frequent inflected forms < infrequent base forms -> highly frequent inflected forms are processed as a whole • frequent inflected forms > infrequent base forms -> inflected words are decomposed • frequent inflected forms > infrequent inflected forms -> frequency of the base forms matter Background 23 Research Questions
from British National Corpus (BNC) 2. 18 words which double or triple in frequency of singular form compared to plural form -> singular- dominant words The Present Study 27 Stimuli
plural form compared to singular form -> plural dominant words 4. 18 words whose frequency of singular and plural form was almost same. -> control words The Present Study 28 Stimuli
the three groups Table 2. Mean Frequency and SD in Parentheses The Present Study 29 Stimuli k singular plural base sg-domminant 18 69.865 (25.849) 21.684 (10.931) 91.549 (34.342) pl-dominant 18 22.571 (18.661) 69.898 (43.345) 92.469 (59.779) control 18 47.064 (23.202) 43.893 (24.664) 90.958 (46.185) Note. frequency is based on per million
Items singular-dominant plural-dominant control concept image parent proceeding topic element film ball pound kid rabbit trend science target standard tear bone secret jacket video pupil resident store lesson box hat individual finding principle firm colour map detail critic horse step bar context relation boot rule drug network station resource participant function sport college tower skill chemical plant document
or not • 54 test items (18*3) presented either in singular or plural form • Carefully counterbalanced • The same number of filler items were included The Present Study 31 Lexical Decision Task
the frequency dominance • Singular forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant • Plural forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant Discussion 42 Summary of the Results
the frequency dominance • Singular forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant • Plural forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant Discussion 43 Summary of the Results
the frequency dominance • Pl-dominant plurals did not show frequency advantage • L2 learners always decompose plural inflections Discussion 44 Morphological Processing
the frequency dominance • Singular forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant • Plural forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant Discussion 45 Summary of the Results
Surface frequency advantage was only found between sg-dominant and pl-dominant • No clear evidence of the surface frequency effect • Frequency of the inflected forms had no effect on the RT for the base forms Discussion 46 Morphological Processing
the frequency dominance • Singular forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant • Plural forms • sg-dominant = control < pl-dominant Discussion 47 Summary of the Results
No frequency advantage for pl-dominant plurals • No evidence of direct access to the plural forms • High frequency inflected words were decomposed • Access latency for inflected forms might be affected by base form frequency Discussion 48 Morphological Processing
frequency was controlled) • The results were entirely on the basis of lexical decision task -> priming task etc. might be needed Discussion 49 Limitations
regularly inflected words? • They decompose the inflected words irrespective of frequency dominance -> Obligatory decomposition? • No RT difference between control words and sg-dominant words • There still remains the possibility that L2 learners access abstract lexical entries which include both singular and plural forms Conclusion 52
Tamura Nagoya University [email protected] http://www.tamurayu.wordpress.com/ 53 • Base form frequency seems to matter • Inflected words always decomposed • L2 learners access abstract lexical entries (sg + pl forms)
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