Kanno, Kazue Hamada, Masumi Huh, Sorin Jung, Heeyeong - Sfsu

Processing Strategies used in L2 production
Kazue Kanno, Masumi Hamada, Sorin Huh and Heeyeong Jung
University of Hawaii at Manoa
1. Introduction
Because speech planning and production takes place in a very short time span, there is a need to maximize
processing efficiency. This need is even greater for L2 learners because of their disfluency. This raises the question
of what kind of strategies L2 learners employ in order to facilitate the demands of speech production.
Various factors are thought to play a role in facilitating language comprehension and/or production. Of
particular relevance to our presentation is Ueno & Polinsky’s (2009) suggestion that the number of arguments in a
sentence is a key factor. They propose the following two strategies, both designed to minimize the number of overt
arguments that language users need to produce in the course of speech:
(i) Intransitive bias—intransitive verbs are preferred to transitive verbs:
This strategy reduces the processing load by utilizing more one-place predicates. It is used by head-final
languages such as Japanese as a way to reduce the number of preverbal arguments.
(ii) Pro-drop bias—null arguments are preferred to overt arguments:
This strategy reduces the processing load by reducing the number of overt arguments through the use of prodrop;
it is more common with two-place predicates than with one-place predicates.
The present study investigates how L2 learners of Japanese who are not fully proficient in the language go
about reducing processing load. Specifically, it addresses the question of whether the spontaneous speech of such
learners reflects use of the two strategies proposed by Ueno and Polinsky.
2. Method
2.1 Data used
The data for our study comes from two sets of OPI interview corpora. One consists of interviews with Japanese
native speakers, and the other is composed of interviews with English-speaking learners of Japanese as a second
language. For this particular study, we examined 5 files of native speakers interviews, and 10 files of intermediatelevel
second language learners.
2.2 Targeted structures
Ueno and Polinsky targeted only main clauses, but given the fact that spontaneous speech often involves
incomplete sentences, we decided to target independent clauses—i.e., main clauses, coordinate clauses, and certain
dependent (non-embedded) clauses with absolute tense (e.g., clauses followed by ~(n)kedo, ..kara, and ..shi). A
total of 549 such clauses were extracted from the native speakers’ interviews, and a total of 1,108 from the ten L2
learners’ interviews.
2.3 Coding
The extracted clauses were coded for predicate type (e.g., one-place predicate, two-place predicate, etc.), for
whether they contain subject and/or object pro-drop, for whether they contain a heavy constituent, and for the
location of such constituents. Coding for constituent weight is relevant because this fact is frequently mentioned in
the literature as a determinant of processing difficulty (e.g., Arnold et al., 2000, Yamashita, 2002). For our purposes,
constituents are considered “heavy” when they contain a clause—e.g., a quotative clause, a noun modified by a
relative clause, etc.
3. Results
3.1. Intransitive bias
The use of the intransitive bias strategy predicts that the proportion of one-place predicates should be higher
that of two- or three-place predicates. However, our results show the opposite preference. Just 36% of the clauses
produced by native speakers had one-place predicates, and just 43% of the clauses used by second language learners
were of this type. Our results are thus not consistent with what the intransitive bias predicts.

3.2. Pro-drop bias
The use of this strategy predicts a higher proportion of pro with two- or three-place predicates than with oneplace
predicates. Both our groups exhibit a higher percentage of pro subjects with two- and three-place predicates
than with one-place predicates (82% vs. 48% for native speakers and 75% vs. 29% for the second language
learners). These results are consistent with what the pro-drop bias predicts.
3.3. Constituent weight
Out of 549 clauses produced by the native speakers, 158 (29%) contained at least one heavy constituent. In
contrast, only 94 out of 1,108 clauses (8%) produced by the L2 learners contained a heavy constituent.
More interestingly, the heavy constituents produced by the native speakers tend to occur with pro (about 60%
of the time), whereas no clear tendency was observed in the L2 learners’ production.
4. Discussion
There are three key findings. First, our results show that the intransitive bias is absent in the spontaneous
production of native speakers as well as L2 learners. This calls into question the production-based motivation for
this bias, if in fact such a bias actually exists.
Second, our results show that the pro-drop bias is clearly present, both in native speakers and in L2 learners, as
indicated by the high proportion of this phenomenon with two- and three-place predicates. Based on this, we
conclude that L2 learners as well as native speakers utilize this strategy to facilitate the demands of production.
Our third finding has to do with the factors underlying the use of zero pronouns. It seems that the native
speakers use zero pronouns to compensate for the processing cost associated with the production of heavy
constituents elsewhere in the sentence. In contrast, second language learners use zero pronouns more generally to
simply reduce processing load.
References
Arnold, J. E., Wasow, T., Losongco, A. & Ginstrom, R. (2000). Heaviness vs. newness: The effect of structural complexity and
discourse status on constituent ordering. Language, 76, pp. 28-55.
Ferreira, V. V. & Dell, G. S. (2000). Effect of ambiguity and lexical availability on syntactic and lexical production. Cognitive
Psychology, 40, 296-340.
Ueno, M. & Polinsky, M. (2009). Does headedness affect processing? A new look at the VO-OV contrast. J. Linguistics, 45,
675-710.
Yamashita, H. (2002). Scrambled sentences in Japanese: Linguistics properties and motivations for production. Text, 22, 597-
633.