| Throughout the extensive researches of second language(L2) vocabulary acquisition, the overwhelming majority focuses on the exploration of the teaching methods of L2 vocabulary, learner' individual difference, as well as learning style. The mechanism of how L2 vocabulary are acquired has rarely been discussed. It was not until recent years that the acquisition mechanism of L2 vocabulary has become a subject of lively debate. According to the Adult L2 Vocabulary Acquisition Model proposed by Jiang(2000), the acquisition of second language vocabulary can be divided into three stages, namely, the formal stage, the lemma mediation stage and the full integration stage. Within the framework of Jiang's model, this study aims to investigate whether L1 semantic transfer happens in the acquisition of English same-translation pairs as for Chinese EFL(English as Foreign Language) learners. In order to answer the research question, a triangulation method was adopted, which includes three experiments, namely two behavioral experiments and one ERPs experiment.Experiment One is a L1 priming L2 experiment.Materials include 30 pairs of same-translation words and their corresponding Chinese equivalents(e.g.solve-resolve-??).Twelve Chinese graduate students majoring in English were chosen as participants.Participants are required to perform a lexical decision task,in which they need to judge whether the target word given is a word or a pseudoword.The reaction time is recorded for data analysis.Experiment Two is a L2 priming L1 experiment.Materials include 60 pairs of same-translation words,the corresponding Chinese equivalents,and 60synonyms(e.g.solve-resolve-tackle-??).Participants also need to perform a lexical decision task,in which they decide whether the target word is a word or a pseudoword.Similar to Experiment One,the reaction time is recorded for data analysis.The interval between Experiment One and Experiment Two is one week.Experiment Three is an ERPs experiment which adopts an one-factorial within subjects design. Materials adopted in this experiment originate from Experiment One. With reference to COCA corpus, 45 pairs of same-translation words are adapted into sentences with their specific collocation usages. Sentences are adapted to three conditions, namely, collocational congruent, collocational incongruent and filler sentence. These sentences are then arranged into a final-word paradigm. Each sentence is composed of a sentence stem and a final word. A Latin-square design is adopted to randomly assign materials to nine blocks. Seventeen English-major graduate students are selected to participate in the experiment. EEG was recorded after the onset of the final word. The present study mainly focuses on the ERPs components of N400 and P600 since they serves as an index of semantic processing and integration.The above three experiments were conducted in the Key Lab of Cognitive Neuroscience and Foreign Language Learning at Sichuan International Studies University(SISU). The experiment programming was realized by E-prime 2.0. The data of ERPs experiment were collected by Neuroscan4.5. The statistical methods of t-test, three-way ANOVA and post hoc comparison are employed to accomplish off-line data analysis. The results of three experiment are as follows:(1) The results of Experiment One show that, the reaction time of judging same-translation Word A and Word B has no significant difference, t=-1.072, p=.311. It can be said that the Chinese translation equivalent exerts the same priming effect on the processing of same-translation pairs, which further indicates that participants failed to distinguish the subtle semantic differences of same-translation pairs.(2) The results of Experiment Two show that, there is no significant differences in the reaction time of judging the L1 target words under the priming of same-translation Word A and Word B, F(1, 9)=3.481, p=.095. Whereas, the reaction time of judging the L1 target words reveals marginal significant differences under the priming of Word A and the synonym, FA(1, 9)=4.944, pA=.053;the reaction time of judging the L1 target words reveals significant differences under the priming of Word B and the synonym, FB(1, 9)=5.459, pB=.044. The above results indicate that participants failed to distinguish the semantic differences of same-translation pairs for the reason that L1 translation equivalents was activated during L2 same-translation words processing.(3) In Experiment Three, a 3-way repeated measure of N400 amplitude reveals that, the main effect of sentence type is significant: F(2, 28)=11.291, p=.000. The post hoc comparison results show that there is no significant difference between “collocational congruous” and “collocational incongruous” conditions: F(1, 134)=2.218, p=.139. Besides, a 3-way repeated measure of P600 amplitude reveals that the main effect of sentence type is significant: F(2, 28)=18.264, p=.000. The post hoc comparison results show that there is no significant difference between “collocational congruous” and “collocational incongruous” conditions: F(1, 134)=2.005, p=.159. In sum, the results of Experiment Three indicate that participants failed to distinguish semantic differences of same-translation pairs and misused the collocations of same-translation pairs. It can be inferred that participants acquired English same-translation words with the aid of L1 translation equivalents, which lead to the occurance of semantic transfer.Based on the results of previous experiments, the present study may carefully draw the conclusion that, the acquisition of same-translation pairs was influenced by the corresponding L1 translation equivalents. Since the L2 semantic slot has long been occupied by the L1 translation equivalents, it becomes difficult for bilinguals to develop an autonomous semantic network of L2 entry its own, or in other words, bilinguals could hardly detect or distinguish the semantic differences of same-translation pairs. In sum, “semantic transfer” can be regarded as an important cognitive mechanism of same-translation word acquisition. |
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