Cover not available

Article published In: Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism
Vol. 9:3 (2019) ► pp.468–503

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
authorization required

Aspectual interpretation and mass/count knowledge in Chinese-English bilinguals

 | National Institute of Education
 | National Institute of Education
Published online: 2 November 2017
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.16032.yin
Abstract
Given recent interest in interface properties in bilingual acquisition, this study examined Chinese-English adolescent bilinguals' acquisition of English telicity – a property whose semantic interpretation (aspectual completion versus incompletion) is influenced by morphosyntax (mass/count distinction). Differences between Chinese and English exist in both mass/count (Chierchia, G. (1998). Reference to kinds across language. Natural Language Semantics, 6(4), 339–405. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar) and telicity (Soh, H. L., & Kuo, J. Y. -C. (2005). Perfective aspect and accomplishment situations in Mandarin Chinese. In H. J. Verkuyl, H. de Swart, & A. van Hout (Eds.), Perspectives on aspect (pp. 199–216). Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). Despite existing L2 literature on telicity and mass/count, the relationship between these two areas in learning has not been adequately addressed. A naturalness rating task (on telicity) and a grammaticality judgment task (on mass/count) were administered on 120 bilingual participants (11 and 14 year olds). Our results overall show that mass/count knowledge was acquirable whereas telicity was only partially so. There was a small correlation between these two areas of knowledge. We discuss our results in terms of the role of linguistic input, interface variation, methodological issues, and the nature of telicity marking in Chinese.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Learning of the syntax-semantics interface
      • 2.1.1Co-acquisition of properties
    • 2.2Telicity and cross-linguistic differences
    • 2.3Mass/count distinction and cross-linguistic differences
    • 2.4L2 Studies on telicity and mass/count knowledge
  • 3.Research questions
  • 4.The study
    • 4.1Participants
    • 4.2Task for telicity (semantics)
    • 4.3Task for mass/count (morphosyntax)
    • 4.4Results
      • 4.4.1Telicity (semantics)
      • 4.4.2Mass/count knowledge (morphosyntax)
      • 4.4.3Relationship between telicity and mass/count
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Summary of study
    • 5.2Variation within interfaces
    • 5.3Co-acquisition of properties
    • 5.4Reconfiguration of telicity
    • 5.5Morphosyntax precedes semantics
  • Notes
  • References
References (68)
References
Bao, Z. (2005). The aspectual system of Singapore English and the systemic substratist explanation. Journal of Linguistics, 41(02), 237–267. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2015). The making of vernacular Singapore English: System, transfer and filter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Presss. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Barner, D., & Snedeker, J. (2005). Quantity judgments and individuation: evidence that mass nouns count. Cognition, 97(1), 41–66. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bloom, P. (1994). Syntax-semantics mappings as an explanation for some transitions in language development. In Y. Levy (Ed.), Other children, other languages: Issues in the theory of language acquisition (pp. 41–75). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Borer, H. (2005). The normal course of events. Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Borgonovo, C., Garavito, J. B. de, & Prévost, P. (2015). Mood selection in relative clauses. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 37(01), 33–69. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cheng, L. L. -S., & Sybesma, R. (1999). Bare and not-so-bare nouns and the structure of NP. Linguistic Inquiry, 30(4), 509–542. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Chierchia, G. (1998). Reference to kinds across language. Natural Language Semantics, 6(4), 339–405. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Clahsen, H., & Hong, U. (1995). Agreement and null subjects in German L2 development: new evidence from reaction-time experiments. Second Language Research, 11(1), 57–87. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Coppieters, R. (1987). Competence differences between native and near-native speakers. Language, 63(3), 544–573. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dekydtspotter, L., Sprouse, R. A., & Anderson, B. (1997). The interpretive interface in L2 acquisition: The process-result distinction in English-French interlanguage grammars. Language Acquisition, 6(4), 297. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dekydtspotter, L., Sprouse, R. A., & Thyre, R. (2000). The interpretation of quantification at a distance in English-French interlanguage: Domain specificity and second language acquisition. Language Acquisition, 8(4), 265. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dekydtspotter, L., & Sprouse, R. A. (2001). Mental design and (second) language epistemology: adjectival restrictions of wh-quantifiers and tense in English-French interlanguage. Second Language Research, 17(1), 1–35. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dixon, L. Q., Zhao, J., & Joshi, R. M. (2012). One dress, two dress: Dialectal influence on spelling of English words among kindergarten children in Singapore. System, 40(2), 214–225. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Donaldson, B. (2011). Nativelike right-dislocation in near-native French. Second Language Research, 27(3), 361–390. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gabriele, A. (2010). Deriving meaning through context: interpreting bare nominals in second language Japanese. Second Language Research, 261, 379–405. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gabriele, A., & Canales, A. (2011). No time like the present: Examining transfer at the interfaces in second language acquisition. Lingua, 121(4), 670–687. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gil, D. (2003). English goes Asian: Number and (in) definiteness in the Singlish noun phrase. In F. Plank (Ed.), Noun phrase structure in the languages of Europe (pp. 467–514). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hilles, S. (1986). Interlanguage and the pro-drop parameter. Second Language Research, 2(1), 33–52. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hodgson, M. (2010). Locatum structures and the acquisition of telicity. Language Acquisition, 17(3), 155. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hua, D., & Lee, H. (2005). Chinese ESL learners’ understanding of the English count-mass distinction. In Proceedings of the 7th Generative Approaches to Second Language Acquisition Conference (GASLA 2004) (pp. 138–149).Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jackendoff, R. (1996). The proper treatment of measuring out, telicity, and perhaps even quantification in English. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 14(2), 305–354. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jiang, N. (2004). Morphological insensitivity in second language processing. Applied Psycholinguistics, 25(4), 603–634. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kaku, K., Liceras, J. M., and Kazanina, N. (2008). Progressing beyond the neutral perfective: Acquisition of English aspect by native speakers of Japanese. In R. Slabakova, J. Rothman, P. Kempchinsky, & E. Gavruseva (Eds.), Proceedings of the 9th Generative Approaches to Second Language Acquisition Conference, (pp. 90–102). Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lardiere, D. (2009). Some thoughts on the contrastive analysis of features in second language acquisition. Second Language Research, 25(2), 173–227. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lim, V. P. C., Liow, S. J. R., Lincoln, M., Chan, Y. H., & Onslow, M. (2008). Determining language dominance in English – Mandarin bilinguals: Development of a self-report classification tool for clinical use. Applied Psycholinguistics, 29(03), 389–412. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Liu, F. H. (1997). An aspectual analysis of ba. Journal of East Asian Linguistics, 6(1), 51–99. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Miller, K., & Schmitt, C. (2010). Effects of variable input in the acquisition of plural in two dialects of Spanish. Lingua, 120(5), 1178–1193. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ministry of Education Singapore (2010). English language syllabus. Retrieved from: [URL]
(n.d.). Mother tongue language policy. Retrieved from [URL]
Montrul, S., & Slabakova, R. (2002). The L2 acquisition of morphosyntactic and semantic properties of the aspectual tenses preterite and imperfect. In A. T. Perez-Leroux & J. M. Liceras (Eds.), The acquisition of Spanish morphosyntax (pp. 115–151). Dordrecht: Kluwer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Oshita, H. (1997). The Unaccusative trap: L2 acquisition of English intransitive verbs (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Southern California, USAGoogle Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rothman, J. (2009). Pragmatic deficits with syntactic consequences?: L2 pronominal subjects and the syntax – pragmatics interface. Journal of Pragmatics, 41(5), 951–973. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rothman, J., & Slabakova, R. (2011). The Mind-Context Divide: On acquisition at the linguistic interfaces. Lingua, 121(4), 568–576. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Peck, J., Lin, J., & Sun, C. (2013). Aspectual classification of Mandarin Chinese verbs: A perspective of scale structure. Language and Linguistics, 14(4), 663.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pelletier, F. (1979). Non-singular reference: Some preliminaries. In F. Pelletier (Ed.), Mass terms: Some philosophical problems (pp. 1–14). Dordrecht: Reidel. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pires, A., Rothman, J., & Santos, A. L. (2011). L1 acquisition across Portuguese dialects: Modular and interdisciplinary interfaces as sources of explanation. Lingua, 121(4), 605–622. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Platt, J. (1975). The Singapore English speech continuum and its basilect ‘Singlish’ as a ‘Creoloid’. Anthropological Linguistics 17(7), 363–374.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schwartz, B. D., & Sprouse, R. A. (1996). L2 cognitive states and the Full Transfer/Full Access model. Second Language Research, 12(1), 40–72. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Serratrice, L., Sorace, A., Filiaci, F., & Baldo, M. (2009). Bilingual children’s sensitivity to specificity and genericity: Evidence from metalinguistic awareness. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 12(02), 239–257. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Slabakova, R. (2000). L1 transfer revisited: the L2 acquisition of telicity marking in English by Spanish and Bulgarian native speakers. Linguistics, 38(4), 739. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2005). What is so difficult about telicity marking in L2 Russian? Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 8(01), 63–77. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2006). Learnability in the second language acquisition of semantics: a bidirectional study of a semantic parameter. Second Language Research, 22(4), 498–523. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2008). Meaning in the second language. Berlin; New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Slabakova, R., Kempchinsky, P., & Rothman, J. (2012). Clitic-doubled left dislocation and focus fronting in L2 Spanish: A case of successful acquisition at the syntax – discourse interface. Second Language Research, 28(3), 319–343. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Smith, C. S. (1997). The parameter of aspect. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Snape, N. (2008). Resetting the nominal mapping parameter in L2 English: Definite article use and the count – mass distinction. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 11(01), 63–79. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Soh, H. L., & Kuo, J. Y. -C. (2005). Perfective aspect and accomplishment situations in Mandarin Chinese. In H. J. Verkuyl, H. de Swart, & A. van Hout (Eds.), Perspectives on aspect (pp. 199–216). Dordrecht, the Netherlands: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sorace, A. (2011). Pinning down the concept of “interface” in bilingualism. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 1(1), 1–33. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sorace, A., & Filiaci, F. (2006). Anaphora resolution in near-native speakers of Italian. Second Language Research, 22(3), 339–368. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sorace, A., & Serratrice, L. (2009). Internal and external interfaces in bilingual language development: Beyond structural overlap. International Journal of Bilingualism, 13(2), 195–210. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sorace, A., Serratrice, L., Filiaci, F., & Baldo, M. (2009). Discourse conditions on subject pronoun realization: Testing the linguistic intuitions of older bilingual children. Lingua, 119(3), 460–477. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Statistics Singapore (2015). Population trends. Retrieved from [URL]
Stringer, D., Burghardt, B., Seo, H. -K., & Wang, Y. -T. (2011). Straight on through to Universal Grammar: Spatial modifiers in second language acquisition. Second Language Research, 27(3), 289–311. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tai, H. Y. (1984). Verbs and times in Chinese: Vendler’s four categories. In D. Testen & V. Mishra (Eds.), Papers from the Parasession on Lexical Semantics (pp. 289–296). Chicago Linguistic Society.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tenny, C. L. (1994). Aspectual roles and the syntax-semantics interface. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Thompson, E. (2006). The structure of bounded events. Linguistic Inquiry, 37(2), 211–228. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Umeda, M. (2008). Second language acquisition of Japanese wh-constructions (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). McGill University, Canada.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wee, L., & Ansaldo, U. (2004). Nouns and noun phrases. In L. Lim (Ed.), Singapore English: A grammatical description (pp. 57–74). Amsterdam; Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
White, L. (1985). The “pro-drop” parameter in adult second language acquisition. Language Learning, 35(1), 47–61. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(1991). Adverb placement in second language acquisition: some effects of positive and negative evidence in the classroom. Second Language Research, 71, 133–161. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2003). Second language acquisition and Universal Grammar. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2011). Second language acquisition at the interfaces. Lingua, 121(4), 577–590. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Whong, M., Gil, K. H., & Marsden, H. (Eds.). (2013). Universal Grammar and the second language classroom. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yin, B. (2012). Investigating Chinese speakers’ acquisition of telicity in English (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). University of Southern California, USA.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yuan, B. (2010). Domain-wide or variable-dependent vulnerability of the semantics – syntax interface in L2 acquisition? Evidence from wh-words used as existential polarity words in L2 Chinese grammars. Second Language Research, 26(2), 219–260. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (3)

Cited by three other publications

Kasher, Natasha & Aviya Hacohen
2023. A star is drawn: Testing the culmination inferences of Russian perfective accomplishments. Glossa: a journal of general linguistics 8:1 DOI logo
Liang, Yahong & Zaoli Yang
2022. English Interpretation Learning System Combining Cognitive Ability and Collaborative Filtering Algorithm. Mathematical Problems in Engineering 2022 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Wu, Chiao-Yi, Beth Ann O’Brien, Suzy J. Styles & Shen-Hsing Annabel Chen
2020. The Impact of Bilingualism on Skills Development and Education. In Transforming Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, ► pp. 47 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 24 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue