Source(s) of syntactic cross-linguistic influence (CLI): The case of L3 acquisition of English possessives by Mazandarani–Persian bilinguals

Abstract

This study investigates the role of previously acquired linguistic systems, Mazandarani and Persian, in the acquisition of third language (L3) English at the initial stages. The data have been obtained from 31 students (age 13–14 years), testing the placement of attributive possessives in a grammaticality judgment task, an element rearrangement task and an elicited oral imitation task. The participants consist of three groups: The first two groups have Mazandarani as the first language (L1) and Persian as the second language (L2), but differ from each other with respect to the language of communication, Mazandarani and Persian, respectively. The third group has Persian as the L1 and Mazandarani as the L2, with Persian as the language of communication. English and Mazandarani pattern similarly in the target structures. That is to say, possessors precede possessed nouns and possessive adjectives come before nouns. In contrast, in Persian, possessives occur post-nominally. The results of this study reveal that none of the proposals tested (e.g. the L1 Factor, Hermas, 2010, 2014a, 2014b; the L2 Status Factor, Bardel and Falk, 2007; Falk and Bardel, 2011; the Cumulative Enhancement Model (CEM), Flynn et al., 2004; the Typological Proximity Model (TPM), Rothman, 2010, 2011, 2013, 2015) could account for the results obtained. This study provides support that at the initial stages of L3 acquisition, syntactic transfer originates from the language of communication, irrespective of order of acquisition.

The scalpel model of third language acquisition

“…Finally, I briefly discuss the results of another study that examined crosslinguistic influence in the acquisition of attributive possessives in L3 English by three bilingual Mazandarani–Persian groups: Fallah, Jabbari, and Fazilatfar (2016). All the participants were 13- to 14-year-old males, Mazandarani was the native language for two of the groups, and they had acquired L2 Persian to near-native-like levels, according to self-reports, starting at the age of seven.…”

“…The authors are careful to make the use versus dominance distinction, arguing that the first two groups are completely bilingual in Persian and Mazandarani, the only difference between them being time/percentage of communicative usage of one or the other language. Thus, Fallah et al (2016) is another study contributing some evidence both against wholesale typology-based transfer and against facilitative transfer only.…”

Role of Regional Language Background and Speech Styles on the Production of Voice Onset Time (VOT) in English among Indonesian Multilinguals

“…Multilingual transfer is, therefore, unique as it embodies multidirectional interaction of three language systems (Cenoz, 2001;Clyne, 1997;Herdina & Jessner, 2002;Sanz et al, 2015). Recent developments in this area have led to the proliferation of studies that favor multilingual acquisition in adulthood with an increased interest in morphology and syntax (for further discussion, see Antonova-Ünlü & Sağın-Şimşek, 2015; Bardel & Falk, 2007;Flynn et al, 2004;García-Mayo & Slabakova, 2012;Sereno & Jongman, 1997) and with a lack of research on phonology (Fallah et al, 2016;Jaensch, 2011). Besides, previous major works have relied heavily on Western language pairings (see Gut, 2010;Llama et al, 2010;Mayo & Slabakova, 2015;Mayr & Montanari, 2015;Missaglia, 2010;Rah, 2010;Sanchez, 2015).…”

Language control in the context of L3 acquisition

“…Syntactic dissociability renders the process of transfer potentially probabilistic. It is likely to be actually probabilistic because individuals will use a given structure in the language that is the source of transfer more or less frequently and differential usage will affects its accessibility for transfer (see Fallah, Jabbari & Fazilatfar, 2016). Further, there is evidence of the mutual influence of one language on another including the syntactic level (see Kroll, Dussias, Bice & Perrotti, 2015 for an excellent review).…”