How do advanced learners of English understand a complex scope ambiguity? : a case of negation and focus construction

概要

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Important contribution of non-syntactic factors (e.g. pragmatics and prosody) in L1 processing has been established in Koizumi (2009) on the 'not-because' scope ambiguity (e.g. Sarah didn't cry because she was in public vs. Sarah didn't cry because she was lonely), which manipulated its implicit prosody and pragmatics by if-subordination. The present paper reports an investigation of how advanced L2 learners of English, whose L1 has different syntactic and prosodic properties from English, might comprehend this complex ambiguity. The present interim summary of the ongoing investigation suggests that their processing tendencies share many properties shown in the results from the L1 perceivers, although it also highlights further points calling for consideration in order to reveal what sorts of strategies are available for advanced L2 learners to make use of in order to resolve a complex ambiguity, and how they might become available during the course of their L2 acquisition process.
一般社団法人電子情報通信学会の論文
2013-07-27