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Phd Thesis Onthe Effects of Working Memory Capacity on Second University of Southampton Research Repository Copyright © and Moral Rights for this thesis and, where applicable, any accompanying data are retained by the author and/or other copyright owners. A copy can be downloaded for personal non-commercial research or study, without prior permission or charge. This thesis and the accompanying data cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the copyright holder/s. The content of the thesis and accompanying research data (where applicable) must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holder/s. When referring to this thesis and any accompanying data, full bibliographic details must be given, e.g. Thesis: Author (Year of Submission) "Full thesis title", University of Southampton, name of the University Faculty or School or Department, PhD Thesis, pagination. Data: Author (Year) Title. URI [dataset] University of Southampton FACULTY OF HUMANITIES Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics Exploring the Effects of Working Memory Capacity on Second Language Oral Fluency and the Acceptability of Object Resumptive Pronouns on Adult Learners DOI: 10.5258/SOTON/D1533 doi:10.5258/SOTON/D1533 by Deida Perea Irigoyen ORCID ID 0000-0003-0424-7521 Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Applied Linguistics October 2020 University of Southampton Abstract FACULTY OF HUMANITIES Modern Languages and Linguistics Thesis for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy EXPLORING THE EFFECTS OF WORKING MEMORY CAPACITY ON SECOND LANGUAGE ORAL FLUENCY AND THE ACCEPTABILITY OF OBJECT RESUMPTIVE PRONOUNS ON ADULT LEARNERS Deida Perea Irigoyen The purpose of this thesis is to investigate if working memory capacity (WMC) plays an important role in the acquisition of second language (L2) aspects that represent a challenge for adult learners in oral production and grammatical comprehension. With this in mind, the main goal is to explore the effects of WMC on the L2 oral fluency and the acceptability of object resumptive (R) pronouns among adult Spanish-speaking learners of English. Research in second language acquisition has demonstrated that learners who start their acquisition process after puberty attain the L2 in a variable manner (Schmid, 2011). Emergentist theory, on the one hand, sustains that late L2 learners are able to reach automatized, meaning fast and efficient (Segalowitz & Segalowitz, 1993), processing levels. On the other hand, research with a generative approach has demonstrated that these learners can acquire L2 features that are abstract and can only be comprehended through deep L2 grammatical knowledge (cf. Rothman & Slabakova, 2017; White, 2003, 2007; White & Juffs, 1998). Therefore, it is important to explore if individual differences in cognition, particularly in working memory (WM), can explain the variability in the degrees of L2 attainment of these particular aspects amid adult L2 learners. Considering that WM serves to temporarily store information while underpinning higher-order skills (Baddeley, 2003a, 2003b, 2007, 2017), the proposal of this thesis is that a higher WMC allows adult learners to develop L2 automaticity and to cope with the parsing of certain L2 grammatical conditions. In order to test the effects of WMC in these aspects of L2 acquisition, two studies were conducted. For these studies, a group of intermediate (N = 22) and a group of advanced (N = 27) adult Spanish-speaking learners of English were considered; as well as a group of adult native speakers of English (N = 24). The first study explored the relation between WMC and the temporal measures of oral fluency (Kormos, 2006; Skehan, 2003; Tavakoli & Skehan, 2005). WMC was measured using a listening and a reading span task (Conwell et al., 2005; Redick et al., 2012). For oral fluency, a speech generation task (Daneman, 1991; Segalowitz, 2010) was employed to measure speed, breakdown, and repair fluency (Skehan, 2003). The results indicate that there is a significant equation found (F (2,18) = 5.098, p < .003) between WMC and the temporal measures of L2 oral fluency in the group of intermediate learners. The second study examines how WMC influences the acceptability of sentences with an object R pronoun (Leal-Mendez & Slabakova, 2012) condition. A grammaticality judgment task (Mackey & Gass, 2012; White, 2007) was designed to study the degree of acceptability of sentences with an object resumptive condition and with a gap in object resumptive position. It was observed that there is a significant equation (F (6,15) = 3.504, p < .023) between WMC and the sentences with a gap in object R position among the intermediate group of L2 learners. The findings of this thesis indicate that adult L2 intermediate learners with a higher WMC have better measures of L2 oral fluency (higher measures of speed fluency and lower measures of breakdown and repair fluency); also, intermediate learners with a higher WMC are more accepting of sentences with a gap condition as they do not have to rely on the R pronoun to alleviate the processing load of the long-distance sentence structure (cf. Alexopoulou & Keller, 2007, 2013). Table of Contents Table of Contents .......................................................................................................... i Table of Tables ................................................................................................................... vii Table of Figures ................................................................................................................... ix Introduction ............................................................................................... 1 Second language acquisition and late learners .......................................................... 1 General and specific objectives .................................................................................. 3 Predictions and research questions ........................................................................... 5 Overview of the contents in this thesis ...................................................................... 7 Review of the literature ............................................................................. 9 Cognitive perspectives on SLA that focus on late learners’ L2 developmental processes .................................................................................................................... 9 2.1.1 The emergentist perspective of SLA ................................................................ 10 The competition model within the emergentist framework ................ 13 The connectionist approach within the emergentist framework ......... 15 The convergence in emergentist approaches to SLA ............................ 17 The concept of second language automaticity within emergentist theory ............................................................................................................... 22 Emergentist research in aspects of L2 automaticity and its connection with working memory ........................................................................... 29 2.1.2 The generative approach to SLA ...................................................................... 32 The bases of the generative perspective to second language acquisition ............................................................................................................... 33 SLA research with a generative approach on late learners .................. 37 The relationship between the study of L2 grammar and working memory capacity within the SLA generative approach ........................ 39 Working memory capacity (WMC) ........................................................................... 41 2.2.1 Defining working memory ................................................................................ 42 i 2.2.2 Defining working memory capacity ................................................................. 49 2.2.3 Methods to measure working memory capacity ............................................. 56 2.2.4 Working memory capacity and language ........................................................ 61 2.2.5 Working memory capacity and second language acquisition ......................... 65 Second language oral fluency .................................................................................. 69 2.3.1 Defining second language fluency ................................................................... 69 2.3.2 Second language utterance fluency................................................................. 77 2.3.3 Second language oral fluency as an aspect of automaticity ........................... 85 2.3.4 Research on second language oral fluency ..................................................... 89 Resumptive pronouns .............................................................................................. 95 2.4.1 Description and definition of resumptive (R) pronouns .................................. 96 2.4.2 R pronouns from an SLA generative perspective ............................................ 99 2.4.3 R Pronouns and their implications for the L2 grammatical parser ................ 105 Methodology .......................................................................................... 112 Introduction ........................................................................................................... 112 Rationale and research objectives and questions of the present study
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