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ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: COMPARISON OF AN INTEGRATIVE INDUCTIVE APPROACH, PRESENTATION-AND- PRACTICE APPROACH, AND TWO HYBRID APPROACHES TO INSTRUCTION OF ENGLISH PREPOSITIONS Charles M. Mueller, Ph.D., 2012 Directed By: Dr. Robert DeKeyser, Second Language Acquisition Certain semantic categories, such as the polysemous senses of English prepositions, present specific problems for adult second language (L2) learners, whether they attempt to acquire these meanings through implicit learning mechanisms or through explicit mechanisms associated with incidental learning or instruction. This study examined research on categorization and practice, along with results of learner corpus analyses, to arrive at a characterization of the learning problem posed by English prepositions. An experiment then assessed the effectiveness of a novel pedagogical intervention called semantic highlighting (SH), which employed an inductive, integrative approach to the acquisition of procedural knowledge while accounting for some of the distinctive features of the learning problem posed by polysemy and semantic complexity. A between-subject comparison examined the performance of a control group and four treatment groups. One treatment group (D-P) received explicit explanations of the senses of various prepositions, followed by practice with immediate feedback. Another group (SH) received only a practice session in which cues, referred to here as “semantic highlighting” (SH), were used to draw participants’ attention to concrete form-meaning mapping as it applied to the target sentences. The other two treatment groups received hybrid instruction with explicit explanations preceding SH practice (D-SH) or with SH practice preceding explicit explanations (SH-D). Acquisition was measured using a fill-in-the-blanks (FB) test and a written sentence-elicitation (SE) test that was scored using a target-language use analysis (Pica, 1984). Two ANCOVAs, using pretest scores as a covariate, showed significant differences between groups on the FB measure (p < .001) and SE measure (p < .001) at an alpha level of .025. On the FB test, results indicated an advantage for the SH (p < .001) group relative to the SH-D group. On the SE measure, the SH group outperformed the D-P (p = .010), SH-D (p = .013), and D-SH (p = .002) groups. The results suggested that the SH treatment, and possibly the D-SH treatment, as well, constitute viable alternatives to a conventional presentation-and-practice approach when teaching complex semantic targets. The results were further discussed in terms of implications for theoretical accounts of explicit instruction and categorization. COMPARISON OF AN INTEGRATIVE INDUCTIVE APPROACH, PRESENTATION-AND-PRACTICE APPROACH, AND TWO HYBRID APPROACHES TO INSTRUCTION OF ENGLISH PREPOSITIONS by Charles Mark Mueller Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2012 Advisory Committee: Professor Robert DeKeyser, Chair Professor Kira Gor Professor Michael Long Professor Steven Ross Dean’s Representative: Professor Minglang Zhou ©Copyright by Charles Mark Mueller 2012 ii Acknowledgements Many people contributed to the completion of this dissertation, and so it is a pleasure to thank all who helped me along the way. First, I would like to acknowledge funding from the Hermine and Luc Secretan Memorial Graduate Support Fellowship, and express my gratitude to Kira Gor for assisting me with the application. I would also like to express my gratitude to Robert, Mike, Kira, and Steve for their guidance and patience throughout the years. Robert has always been a sterling example of a researcher dedicated to the pursuit of understanding and knowledge. His tremendous dedication to his students is impressive. I feel I have also benefitted greatly from Mike’s ability to provide a broad overview of the SLA field and its developments. His deep insights and encyclopedic knowledge have been an inspiration. I have also benefitted greatly from my discussions with Andrea Tyler. Her work on applying the theoretical insights from Cognitive Linguistic to pedagogical problems has provided a useful model for much of my own research. Thanks also to Xiaojiao Liu for assistance with development of the Chinese language portions of the materials. I would like to express my gratitude to Nan Jiang for arranging for my research in China, and to Chunmei Li, Min Sun, and Qiufang Wen for all of their help with data collection and for their useful comments on my materials. Finally, I would like to thank my family. They have always stood behind me with constant words of encouragement and support. Without them, none of this would have been possible. iii Table of Contents Acknowledgments………………………………………………………………… ii Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………. iii List of Tables…………………………………………………………………….... vi List of Figures…………………………………………………………………….. vii Chapter 1: Introduction…………………………………………………………… 1 Chapter 2: Cognitive Linguistics and the Usage-based Framework……………… 4 Chapter 3: Theoretical Accounts of Polysemy……………………………………. 6 3.1 Classical Models…………………………………………………………….. 6 3.2 Prototypes and Family Resemblance………………………………………… 7 3.3 Functional Features and Schemas…………………………………………… 10 Chapter 4: Evidence of Difficulties in the L2 Acquisition of Polysemy………… 18 Chapter 4.1 Error Analyses……………………………………………………… 20 Chapter 4.2 Effects of Instruction………………………………………………. 23 Chapter 4.3 Competence Deficits……………………………………………….. 24 Chapter 4.4 Critical Period Effects……………………………………………… 25 Chapter 5: Factors Leading to Difficulty……………………………………….… 28 Chapter 5.1 Complexity of Meaning…………………………………………….. 28 Chapter 5.2 Redundancy and Optionality……………………………………….. 29 Chapter 5.3 Effects of Non-optimal Strategies…………………………………... 30 Chapter 5.4 Opacity of Form-meaning Mapping………………………………… 30 Chapter 5.5 L1 Influence…………………………………………………………. 31 Chapter 6: Indications of L1 Influence in a Learner Corpus……………………… 34 Chapter 6.1 Crosslinguistic Comparison of Preposition Use……………………. 34 Chapter 6.1.1 Theoretical Background………………………………………….. 34 Chapter 6.1.2 Method…………………………………………………………… 35 Chapter 6.1.3 General Research Questions…………………………………….. 39 Chapter 6.1.4 Results…………………………………………………………… 39 Chapter 6.1.5 Discussion……………………………………………………….. 63 Chapter 6.2 Analysis of Chinese Learners of English…………………………….. 66 Chapter 7: Categorization…………………………………………………………. 70 7.1 Theories of Categorization…………………………………………………… 70 7.1.1 Rule-based Accounts……………………………………………………… 71 7.1.2 Prototype Accounts……………………………………………………….. 72 7.1.3 Exemplar-based Accounts………………………………………………… 73 7.1.4 Hybrid Accounts………………………………………………………….. 75 7.2 Attention and Categorization…………………………………………………. 77 7.3 Task Orientation, Category Type, and Performance Variables………………. 79 7.4 Generalizability of Categorization Findings…………………………………. 82 Chapter 8: Explicit Instruction and Practice………………………………………. 88 8.1 Cognitive Architectures………………………………………………………. 88 8.1.1 ACT-R (Adaptive Control of Thought—Rational)………………………. 89 8.1.2 Clarion (Connectionist Learning with Adaptive Rule Induction ON-line).. 92 8.2 AG Research…………………………………………………………………. 95 iv 8.3 Explicit Instruction and Practice in SLA…………………………………….. 100 Chapter 9: Potential Advantages for Instructional Treatments……………………. 109 9.1 Family-resemblance Versus Categories With Clear Criterial Features………. 111 9.2 Integrated Approach Versus Presentation-and-Practice Approach………….. 111 9.3 Inductive Learning to Maximize Proceduralization…………………………. 113 9.4 Holistic Versus Analytic Processing………………………………………….. 114 9.5 Individual Differences and Potential Interactions With Treatments…………. 116 9.6 Possible Synergies Between Instructional Approaches……………………… 117 Chapter 10: Semantic Analysis of Prepositional Senses in Instructional Targets… 119 10.1 Analysis of To………………………………………………………………. 123 10.1.1 Transfer………………………………………………………………… 123 10.1.2 Affecting Attitude or Behavior………………………………………….. 124 10.1.3 Perception……………………………………………………………….. 124 10.1.4 Contact…………………………………………………………………. 125 10.1.5 Limit……………………………………………………………………. 125 10.1.6 Attachment…………………………………………………………….. 126 10.2 Analysis of For…………………………………………………………….. 126 10.2.1 Oblique Intention……………………………………………………….. 126 10.2.2 Purpose…………………………………………………………………. 127 10.2.3 Grounds………………………………………………………………….. 128 10.2.4 Situational Valence………………………………………………………. 128 10.2.5 Benefit…………………………………………………………………… 132 10.2.6 Proxy……………………………………………………………………. 132 10.2.7 Exchange……………………………………………………………….. 133 10.3 Analysis of At……………………………………………………………… 134 10.3.1 Measure………………………………………………………………… 134 10.3.2 Search for Contiguity…………………………………………………… 135 10.4 Analysis of On and In……………………………………………………… 135 10.4.1 Resemblance to Visual Feature………………………………………… 135 10.4.2 Communicative Media as Support……………………………………… 136 10.4.3 Volitional Exceptional State……………………………………………. 137 10.4.4 Affecting Condition……………………………………………………. 137 10.5 Analysis of Over and Above……………………………………………….. 138 10.5.1 Control………………………………………………………………….. 139 10.5.2 Covering………………………………………………………………… 139 10.5.3 Preclusion of Potential for Contact or Influence………………………… 140 10.6 Analysis of With…………………………………………………………….. 141 10.6.1 Instrumentality…………………………………………………………… 141 10.6.2 Theme-marking…………………………………………………………. 141 Chapter 11: Hypotheses…………………………………………………………… 143 Chapter 12: Current Study……………………………………………………….. 146 12.1 Method…………………………………………………………………….