Effect Of Foreign Language Aptitude, Working Memory Capacity On The Comprehension Of Garden Path Sentences In English And Chinese

Garden path sentences, due to its special local ambiguity, have long attracted attention of linguists and psychologists. The difficulty in human brain’s processing has achieved similar consensus, and most people think that the reason for this kind of processing difficulty is closely related with limited processing resources, processing burden and other factors. As a factor most closely related with processing resources, working memory first becomes the focus of academic study. Among them, a large quantity of qualitative researches were made about the impact of working memory capacity on on-time processing of garden path sentences (that is, the initial analysis), but whether it affects the learners of their ultimate presentation of garden path sentences (ultimate comprehension results) is still controversial. McDonald (2006), Chen&Gao (2009), and Chen&Xu (2010) found working memory capacity not only affects the initial analysis of the sentence, but also affects the final representation of understanding garden path sentences. However, Caplan&Waters (1996,2002) argued that the working memory capacity only influences the initial analysis of the sentence and it has no effect on the final representation. In addition, the foreign language aptitude, considered as a best predictor in second language learning, has not been surveyed as for the impact on the processing and comprehension of garden path sentences.In this study, the author selects110Chinese non-English majors as subjects to make an empirical study on foreign language aptitude, working memory capacity and comprehension of English&Chinese garden path sentences based on the capacity-constrained theory of Just and Carpenter (1992,1996). Then the statistical software SPSS17.0is used to do the data analysis. The experimental results indicate that:1) Foreign language aptitude yields more effects on the comprehension of garden path sentences in Chinese than on the understanding of English garden paths, which further verifies the finding of Skehan (1989,1998a) and others:the language aptitude is more related with native language learning than with foreign language learning.2) Working memory capacity is significantly correlated with learners’comprehension of garden path sentences in English (the result supports the capacity-constrained theory), but not related with the understanding of the garden path sentences in Chinese. What is worth noting is that the results confirm the above dispute in two opposite points of view. On the one hand, it verifies the findings of McDonald (2006), Chen&Gao (2009), and Chen&Xu (2010). That is, working memory capacity affects learners’ both initial processing of a garden path and ultimate representation for their second language. On the other hand, it verifies the argument of Caplan&Waters (1996,2002):working memory capacity does impact on learners’initial analysis of garden path, but does no effect on their ultimate representation of garden path for their native language.In view of the stability of working memory, it cannot get improved rapidly in a short time through training, however, the role of Garden paths in English learning cannot be ignored, so the author helps improve students’understanding of the garden path by exerting the explicit instruction which has been proved to be effective in complex sentence acquisition (especially in grammar). The instruction lasts for eight weeks. Paired sample test showed that the explicit instruction is conducive to a better understanding of garden path sentences in English and Chinese, and it helps to cultivate students’meta-language awareness, strengthen their grammatical function to some extent, all of which compensated for constrained working memory capacity and foreign language aptitude.In addition, qualitative analysis was done after collecting the retrospective reports from the cases to show the progress made after the instruction, so as to supplement the results of quantitative research.Finally, based on the two regression analysis, a model of paths of foreign language aptitude affecting working memory capacity and the comprehension of garden path sentences in English was tentatively drawn to clearly illustrate the interrelationships among foreign language aptitude, working memory capacity and the comprehension of garden path sentences in English. The direct contribution of working memory capacity on the understanding of English garden paths and foreign language aptitude is16.1%and1.1%respectively, while foreign language aptitude can account for22.7%of the result of the comprehension of garden path sentences in English. It further confirmed that the working memory should be incorporated into the foreign language aptitude to better predict the learners’language learning. In addition, the experimental results also supported the theory of working memory capacity-constrained theory, and the garden path instruction provides a basis for instructing local ambiguous sentences. What’s more, it would be helpful in establishing the L2acquisition mechanism suitable for Chinese learners. And the author’s additional comparative analysis between L1and L2garden path sentence is anticipated to parse the deep differences and similarities of the two languages on sentence level, which in turn helps teachers understand learners’ processing mechanism so as to better promote learners’ understanding of complex and ambiguous sentences.