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- Vallerossa, Francesco, 1992-
(författare)
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Learning aspect in Italian as a third language : Transfer patterns among multilingual learners in the Swedish context
- 2023
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis explores the impact of previously acquired or learned background languages (BL) on the learning of Italian as a third language (L3) among undergraduate students in the Swedish context. Focusing on the learning of past tense-aspect (TA) inflectional categories in Italian, the thesis investigates the influence of Swedish, English and Romance languages, French or Spanish, in light of four factors. The typology factor entails the linguistic similarity between the L3 and the BLs. The language status factor examines the different roles played by first (L1) and second (L2) languages. The proficiency factor refers to proficiency in both the L2s and the L3. The prototype factor deals with different combinations of grammatical and lexical aspect, defined as prototypical and non-prototypical. Eight Italian native speakers and 36 undergraduate students learning Italian in Sweden were included in the studies making up the thesis. The learner group had knowledge of Swedish and English. A majority had additional knowledge of a Romance language, which allowed for a distinction to be made between a non-Romance and a Romance group. The participants completed a background questionnaire and a test battery of seven tests consisting of three C-tests (French, Spanish, and Italian), three interpretation tests of aspectual contrasts (English, French, and Italian), and an oral retelling story test in Italian. The data were analyzed quantitatively, by means of descriptive and inferential statistics, and qualitatively, through content analysis. Study I probed the impact of typology, L3 proficiency and prototypes on oral production data. At low-proficiency levels, prior L2 knowledge of a Romance language favored the emergence of imperfective morphology in L3 Italian while learners at high-proficiency levels were sensitive to prototypes. Based on interpretation data, Study II went further into the role of typology, L2 proficiency and prototypes, revealing a beneficial effect of English and Romance languages, except with non-prototypical associations. Study III looked into typology and L2/L3 proficiency. Four categories, differently distributed depending on L2/L3 proficiency, unfolded from written introspection data submitted to qualitative content analysis: explicit rules, intuition, other languages and uncertainty/unknown. Study IV, closely examining three participants with different acquisition orders of Swedish, English and French, showed an interaction of the language status with L3 proficiency, typology and prototypes. Overall, the results indicate that all BLs impact the learning of prototypical associations, while the L1 alone influences learning of non-prototypical associations. Further, the typology factor and the L2 proficiency factor are crucial for transfer of forms and transfer of meanings, respectively. The influence of the BLs is prevalent at early acquisition stages while advanced stages are uniformly shaped by prototypes. Also, learners gradually add different layers of information to their explicit knowledge of tenses. The results align with L3 accounts arguing for property-by-property hybrid transfer. The thesis further connects L3 transfer research focusing on linguistic and conceptual transfer to research on learning TA morphology. In light of the above contributions, the thesis recommends explicit crosslinguistic instruction aiming to foster positive transfer through tailor-made use of the learners’ BLs.
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| 2. |
- Vallerossa, Francesco, et al.
(författare)
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Learning aspect in Italian as additional language. The role of second languages
- 2023
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Ingår i: International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching. - : Walter de Gruyter GmbH. - 0019-042X .- 1613-4141. ; 61:3, s. 1139-1171
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The study examines the role played by English and Romance languages (L2s) when learning grammatical aspect in Italian as additional language (Ln). Swedish university students of Italian (n = 34), divided according to knowledge of a Romance L2 and English aspectual knowledge, completed an interpretation task of aspectual contrast in Italian. Eight native speakers served as a control group. The findings showed that knowledge of a Romance language as L2 and high English aspectual knowledge exerted a differential influence on learning aspect in Italian. This outcome is discussed in the light of a consistent form-meaning relationship between the L2s and Italian. Yet, with a mismatch between grammatical and lexical aspect, the learners' judgments differed from the native speakers' judgments. Thus, our findings also support the idea of the existence of differential learning paths sustained by the L2s when learning complex aspectual configurations.
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| 3. |
- Bardel, Camilla, et al.
(författare)
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Aspects of lexical sophistication in advanced learners' oral production vocabulary acquisition and use in l2 french and italian
- 2012
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Ingår i: Studies in Second Language Acquisition. - 0272-2631 .- 1470-1545. ; 34:2, s. 269-290
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article reports on the design and use of a profiler for lexical sophistication (i.e., use of advanced vocabulary), which was created to assess the lexical richness of intermediate and advanced Swedish second language (L2) learners' French and Italian. It discusses how teachers' judgments (TJs) of word difficulty can contribute to the methodology for lexical profiling and compares two methods, one purely frequency based and one modified on the basis of TJs of word difficulty. It has been suggested elsewhere that factors other than frequency play an important role in vocabulary acquisition. Here it is argued that cognates and thematic vocabulary related to teaching materials, although infrequent in target language (TL) corpora, should not necessarily be considered advanced and that analyses of learners' lexical sophistication would benefit from integrating these aspects. In this study, the frequency-based method normally used in lexical profiling was modified by recategorizing some low-frequency words considered easy by many teachers. On the basis of the TJs, a basic vocabulary, which consisted mainly of high-frequency words but also of cognates and thematic words, was defined, which was based on the fact that teachers judged certain low-frequency cognates and thematic words as relatively easy. Using the modified method, learners' lexical profiles were found to be more homogeneous within groups of learners at specific proficiency levels. The superiority of the new method over the purely frequency-based one was shown when comparing effect sizes. It is argued that this method gives a more correct picture of advanced L2 lexical profiles.
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| 7. |
- Forsberg Lundell, Fanny, et al.
(författare)
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Beyond advanced stages in high-level spoken French L2
- 2014
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Ingår i: Journal of French Language Studies. - 0959-2695 .- 1474-0079. ; 24:2, s. 255-280
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The aim of this study is twofold: first, to find evidence for additional advanced stages in L2 French. The continuum of Bartning and Schlyter (2004) is taken as a point of departure. It is hypothesized that a number of linguistic criteria will account for high-level proficiency. It was earlier found that besides morpho-syntax, formulaic sequences and information structure are interesting phenomena for highly proficient learners (Bartning, Forsberg and Hancock, 2009). Three more measures are now added, i.e. perceived nativelikeness, lexical richness and fluency. The second aim of this study is to contribute to the debate on the possibility of nativelike attainment. The study shows that several measures are prone to characterise nativelike performance in highly proficient users among whom some attain nativelikeness.
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| 8. |
- Gudmundson, Anna, 1974-
(författare)
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Acquisition of grammatical gender and number agreement in Swedish learners of L2 Italian : regularity and frequency effects
- 2013
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Ingår i: Language, Interaction and Acquisition. - : John Benjamins Publishing Company. - 1879-7865 .- 1879-7873. ; 4:2, s. 231-254
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This corpus-based study examines gender and number agreement in oral productions of Swedish learners of L2 Italian. The main aim is to investigate how regularity and frequency effects influence learning. The theoretical framework is inspired by a functionalist approach focusing on the role of form–function mappings in the learner’s input. Regularity and frequency are interpreted in terms of the availability, reliability, and validity of the mappings between the different noun endings and their functions: masculine singular, feminine singular, masculine plural, and feminine plural. The results show a significant correlation between reliability and accuracy rate, but no statistically significant correlation between availability or validity and accuracy rate. An interaction between longitudinal development and reliability is noted.
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