In:The Second Language Acquisition of English Tense, Aspect and Modality
Dalila Ayoun
[Not in series 243] 2025
► pp. v–viii
Table of contents
PrefaceIX
AcknowledgementsXI
Chapter 1.Tense, aspect, modality/mood1
1.1Introduction: Concepts and terminology1
1.1.1Time and tense1
1.1.2Aspect2
1.1.3Mood and modality5
1.2Tense, aspect and verbal inflections6
1.2.1Present tense and aspect in French and English9
1.2.2Future tense and aspect in French and English13
1.2.3Past tense and aspect in French and English15
1.3Modality in French and English20
1.3.1Types of modality20
1.3.2Expressing modality in English21
1.3.3Expressing modality in French24
1.4Summary26
Chapter 2.Tense, aspect, mood, modality: Theoretical and applied perspectives28
2.1Introduction28
2.2From the morpheme-order studies to the Aspect hypothesis28
2.3Internal and external interfaces: Theoretical and applied perspectives32
2.3.1A generative theoretical perspective32
2.3.2Monolingual and bilingual child acquisition34
2.3.2.1Syntax-discourse interface: Pronominal anaphora35
2.3.2.2Syntactic-semantic interface: Lexical aspect35
2.3.2.3Morphology-phonology interface: Spelling36
2.3.2.4Syntax-lexicon interface: Nominal compounds and denominal adjectives36
2.3.2.5Morphosyntax and pragmatics interface: Nominal reference36
2.3.3Adult L2 acquisition: The Interface Hypothesis38
2.3.4TAM properties: Internal and external interfaces39
2.4Cognitive linguistics: A usage-based perspective41
2.5Summary43
Chapter 3.Review of the literature: L2 English TAM studies44
3.1Introduction44
3.2Tense-aspect studies: Various L1 backgrounds45
3.3Modality studies: Various L1 backgrounds49
3.3.1English corpora49
3.3.2Studies with learner corpora51
3.3.3Studies with both large and learner corpora55
3.3.4Empirical studies56
3.3.5Classroom studies57
3.4Studies with Francophone ESL or EFL participants58
3.4.1Tense-aspect studies59
3.4.2Modality studies62
3.5Summary63
Chapter 4.Methodology and pretest results64
4.1Introduction64
4.2Research questions and hypotheses65
4.2.1Research questions68
4.2.2Hypotheses68
4.2.2.1The Interface hypothesis69
4.2.2.2The Feature Reassembly hypothesis69
4.3Methodology71
4.3.1Participants71
4.3.2Tasks and procedure73
4.3.2.1Pretest74
4.3.2.2Production task: Written narratives74
4.3.2.3Cloze tests75
4.3.2.4Sentence completion tasks75
4.4Results: Pretest76
Chapter 5.Results of the production task80
5.1Overall written narrative results by groups80
5.1.1Overall written narrative results: Session 280
5.1.2Overall written narrative results: Session 383
5.1.3Overall written narrative results: Session 485
5.2Production by verb forms: Lexical predicates88
5.2.1Production by verb forms: Lexical predicates — session 288
5.2.2Production by verb forms: Lexical predicates — session 391
5.2.3Production by verb forms: Lexical predicates — session 492
5.3Production by modal auxiliaries93
5.3.1Production by modal auxiliaries: Session 293
5.3.2Production by modal auxiliaries: Session 394
5.3.3Production by modal auxiliaries: Session 495
5.4Qualitative error analysis96
5.4.1EFL group’s errors97
5.4.2ESL group’s errors102
5.5Summary104
Chapter 6.Results of the cloze tests105
6.1Cloze test results: Session 3105
6.2Cloze test results: Session 4111
6.3Cloze test results: Session 5113
6.4Summary116
Chapter 7.Results of the sentence completion tasks118
7.1Sentence completion task results: Session 2118
7.2Sentence completion task results: Session 5123
7.3Summary131
Chapter 8.Discussion and conclusion132
8.1Introduction132
8.2Addressing the research questions133
8.2.1Contrasts and systematicity133
8.2.2Inflectional morphology137
8.2.4Modal auxiliaries145
8.2.5Sentence structure146
8.2.6Elicitation task effect150
8.3Addressing the Interface and the Feature Reassembly hypotheses153
8.3.1The Interface hypothesis154
8.3.2The Feature Reassembly hypothesis156
8.4Conclusion158
Chapter 9.Directions for future research160
9.1Modality160
9.2Present temporality161
9.3Future temporality162
9.4Methodologies162
References167
Appendices
Appendix A.Stimuli190
Appendix B.Verb forms — written narratives196
Appendix C.ANOVAs for written narratives205
Appendix D.Cloze test results — session 3214
Appendix E.Modal auxiliary production by groups219
Appendix F.ANOVA — Modal auxiliary production by groups223
Appendix G.Chi-square tests — Completion task — session 2227
Appendix H.Completion task — session 5229
Appendix I.Samples of the written narratives235
Name index
Subject index
