The present study investigates the effect of the first language (L1) on learners by using the negative and the positive evidence in the classrooms while teaching English directional prepositions such as ‘to’ and ‘into’. It is assumed that Arabic has two versions of ‘to’. It has the directional interpretation without boundary-crossing which is equivalent to the English ‘to’; whereas, it also denotes a similar interpretation to English directional preposition ‘into’ which is unavailable in Arabic and involves boundary-crossing. The study considers two groups to examine the effect of the overlaps, who are at an intermediate stage of development; the experiment group (E.G.) and the control group (C.G.). The control group is the base to measure the effectiveness of the treatments on the experiment groups’ judgments. Hence, an Acceptability Judgment Task is devised to elicit participants’ judgments on the task items in the pretest and the posttest. Results show clear advantage of the negative evidence in the experiment group’s performance in the posttest in learning ‘to’ with and without boundary-crossing. There is a difference in the experiment group’s performance in the posttest in learning ‘into’ with the boundary-crossing event after receiving the positive evidence. Similarly, a difference was observed in the experiment group’s judgment with those of the control group in the comparison between ‘to’ and ‘into’ with the boundary-crossing event in the posttest.

This study focuses on trilateral reduplicated roots (CVCC), such as laff “wrap’”, and quadrilateral duplicated roots (CVCCVC), like waswas “whisper” and their reduplicated counterparts of the type C1VC2CC1VCc21 and C1VC2C1VC2 in the Urban Hijazi Arabic dialect (UHA dialect). This research centers on reduplication in the UHA dialect as a total duplication. Semantically, reduplication in this dialect displays three main functions: 1) intensifying reduplication, as in adjectives; 2) emphatic reduplication, as in nouns; and 3) iterative reduplication, as in verbs. The data were collected using interviews with native speakers of the UHA dialect via Blackboard and face-to-face meetings. The analysis of the data shows that sometimes the C1VC2C1VC2 pattern is a duplication at the surface level (i.e., pseudo-reduplication) because it has a genuine root and is underived from the trilateral roots whereas others are derived from trilateral roots and undergo the process of duplication. However, the C1VC2CC1VCC2 pattern shows that the second syllable is a copy of the original root. Nevertheless, both patterns show similar functions of reduplication in verbs, nouns, and adjectives. In addition, they reveal a similar derivational mechanism in changing parts of speech by adding the prefix y- to the verb, the prefix mu- to the adjective, and the suffix -a to the noun. In conclusion, this study confirms that not all quadrilateral duplicates originated from trilateral reduplicated roots. Also, the results are in line with the Basra linguists’ claims that roots in the Arabic language can be trilateral, quadrilateral, and so on.

This study examines the acquisition of non-pleonastic English constructions by first-language (L1) Saudi Arabic speakers in second language (L2) English comprising two types of pleonasm: acronym pleonasms and semantics pleonasms. It is known that Arabic speakers tend to use redundant expressions in their native language to emphasize their ideas or clarify foreign terms. This study focuses on whether advanced Saudi Arabic speakers can reset their L1 parameters in the final state of English non-pleonastic construction acquisition. The acceptability judgment task was devised to elicit participants’ judgments on these two types of pleonasms. Two groups joined the study: advanced Saudi Arabic speakers as the experiment group (n=40) and native English speakers as the control group (n=32). The experiment’s results suggested that the advanced Saudi Arabic speakers failed to reset the L1 parameters in their judgments on acronym pleonasms. However, the findings showed the Saudi Arabic speakers’ performance resembled that of the native English speakers with respect to semantics pleonasms. This study reveals that Saudi native speakers transfer their L1 properties in their L2 acquisition and fail to access UG to restructure their grammar because they lack extensive exposure to the L2 input of these constructions. The study supports the full transfer hypothesis in the acquisition of L2 constructions. In conclusion, this study provides valuable recommendations to the educational system in Saudi Arabia for implementing these constructions in curricula to enhance L2 input.

This study aims to examine nominal tautology functioned as human nature based on the assumptions by Wierzbicka (1987). It compares English and Arabic tautology on construction like Boys are boys. This study integrates Miki’s evocation function with two other core concepts namely a macro-frame and a micro-frame. In addition, the role of the context is closely investigated as it forms an essential component in the realization of nominal tautology as proposed by Gibbs and McCarrell (1990). All these notions are merged into one solid framework to comprehend the mechanism of tautology in the brain of the speakers/hearer in any given language. Acceptability Judgment Task is used as an instrument to elicit participants’ acceptable judgments and interpretations on human nature tautology. The study includes two groups; English native speakers (51 participants) and Arabic native speakers (34 participants). According to the analyses, the results show no difference between the study groups, in the realization of nominal tautology related to human nature at the level of the acceptability and the interpretation.

The study explores how Arabic has the same conflation pattern characteristics as English even though it belongs to Verb-framed Languages. A focused-group approach is used to evaluate the effect of the first language (L1) and the potential role of proficiency in the acquisition of the English directional preposition ‘to’ with manner-of-motion to goal construction. One group consists of Saudi speakers at two levels of development; an intermediate and advanced proficiency levels; whereas, the second group (control group) comprises of English native speakers. Acceptability Judgment Task associated with video animation clips is designed to elicit participants’ judgments in the depicted event. Results indicated that the intermediate Saudi speakers accept the directional preposition ‘to’ with and without boundary-crossing event, as is the case of their L1, which was opposite for the advanced and native English speakers for the without boundary-crossing event. The advanced Saudi speakers accept the constructions of encoding the manner with the motion and expressing the manner as the complement depicting an appropriate description of the event, reflecting L1 influence. All the group’s judgment varies based on the acceptance to conflate the manner with the motion overexpressing manner as a complement in an event without boundary-crossing.