The role of pragmatics in the acquisition of reflexive binding in L2

This study investigates the effects of pragmatic constraints on the acquisition of the binding of English reflexives by adult Turkish L2 learners. Pragmatically biased and pragmatically neutral sentences are compared to determine whether pragmatic bias towards a non-local antecedent overrides the parameter setting of English and causes learners to choose as possible antecedents NPs outside the binding domain. The study uses an acceptability judgment test with 27 sentences divided into nine clause types, including neutral vs biased types, finite vs nonfinite types, and biclausal vs triclausal types. Group results indicate that pragmatically biased sentences compel the subjects to consider pragmatic information to the extent that it can override their syntactic intuitions. Acquisition theories need to account for the role that pragmatic information plays in the assignment of possible antecedents for reflexives. This study incorporates Huang's (1994) pragmatic theory of anaphora in which the interpretation of a reflexive is subject to the I-principle, a pragmatic strategy which finds an antecedent for the reflexive that gives the most informative, stereotypical interpretation in keeping with our knowledge about the world.