L1 effects as manifestations of individual differences in the L2 acquisition of the Spanish tense-aspect-system

Abstract

Several hypotheses about aspect in Spanish SLA focus on postulating patterns a learner will go through. The Lexical Aspect Hypothesis (Andersen, 1986, 1991) and the Default Past Tense Hypothesis (Salaberry, 1999) are two examples discussed in recent studies (see e.g. Comajoan, 2013). This chapter shows that our results obtained via Grammaticality Judgments and a Production Task do not align completely with any of these hypotheses. Instead, individual differences (Dörnyei, 2006) must be considered, which a comparison between 61 German and 70 Romance speakers supports. Findings reveal some general attainment difficulties for all learners, but the emerging structures are not universal. Interestingly, our native control group (n = 15) also shows high variation, strengthening the observation that the selection of a tense-aspect form is heavily dependent on subjectivity.

The Aspect Hypothesis and the Acquisition of L2 Past Morphology in the Last 20 years

“…Learners produce a variety of tense-aspect forms even in past time contexts, which include (for English) past, past progressive, present, base, and other forms, including present perfect (Bardovi-Harlig, 2000; Bardovi-Harlig & Reynolds, 1995). In contrast, other studies report only three forms (Diaubalick & Guijarro Fuentes, 2017;Howard, 2004) or two (the preterite and imperfect, Domínguez, et al, 2013;González & Quintana, 2018;Izquierdo & Collins, 2008;Labeau, 2005). 8 These reports fail to show how developing verbal morphology fits into the larger system.…”

“…A similar issue arises from eliminating responses to items. Diaubalick and Guijarro Fuentes (2017) reported that 112 learners completed the production test, but they did not report how the 112 learners were distributed across proficiency levels. Nevertheless, the number of items should be constant for the entire group.…”

“…Camps (2005) and Comajoan (2006) captured the early stages of imperfect (for Spanish and Catalan, respectively) and provided a starting point for comparisons to higher proficiency learners such as those in Izquierdo and Collins (2008) and McManus (2013). Furthermore, the performance of truly advanced learners can shed light on the use of nonprototypical associations, namely the preterite with statives and the imperfect with achievements (e.g., Diaubalick & Guijarro Fuentes, 2017;Domínguez et al, 2013;Izquierdo & Collins, 2008;Salaberry, 2002. )…”

“…Tasks that generate too few tokens are also problematic. Using a 26-second film clip(Rastelli & Vernice, 2013), a 1-minute narrative(Muñoz & Gilabert, 2011), or three tokens per aspectual category(Diaubalick & Guijarro-Fuentes, 2017) may be equally fraught for issues of general task design. Attempting to make each of the three tokens clear contexts for the intended preterite or imperfect,Diaubalick and Guijarro Fuentes (2017) introduced adverbials in each context, which makes the test about the influence of adverbials or adverbials and lexical aspect, but not about the influence of aspectual category alone.…”

El Aspecto Léxico en El Uso De La Morfología Verbal De Pasado en Aprendices Anglohablantes De Español Como Segunda Lengua

“…E s bien conocido que los aprendices de segundas lenguas tienen dificultades para aprender a usar los tiempos verbales de pasado en español, y esto ha llevado a numerosos investigadores a tratar de averiguar el motivo que dificulta la adquisición de la morfología temporal (Andersen y Shirai, 1996;Bardovi, 1994;González y Quintana, 2018;Comajoan, 2013;Diaubalick y Guijarro 2017;Díaz et al, 2008;Domínguez et al, 2013;González, 2003González, , 2013Salaberry, 2000;Slabakova, 2001; entre otros). El aspecto es un componente temporal que permite presentar los eventos desde diferentes perspectivas, tanto de forma delimitada como no delimitada (Smith, 1997).…”