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Article published In:
Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism
Vol. 12:3 (2022) ► pp.280–309

Online processing and offline judgments of L2-English articles

ORCID logo | University of Wisconsin Madison

This study examines L1-Korean speakers’ online processing and offline judgments of L2-English articles using a self-paced task (SPRT) targeting implicit knowledge and an untimed acceptability judgment task (AJT) assessing explicit knowledge. SPRT results indicate that L1-Korean speakers exhibited targetlike online sensitivity to (in)appropriate use of articles, which provides evidence against the claim that L2-specific morphosyntactic structures cannot be utilized during online comprehension (Jiang, 2007). However, the same L2 speakers showed non-targetlike judgment patterns in the AJT. The discrepancy between online and offline performance is discussed in terms of the role of task effects on L2 performance and the development of implicit and explicit knowledge for L2 articles in the acquisition process. Methodological considerations for evaluating L2 knowledge are also discussed.

Keywords: English articles, task effects, implicit and explicit knowledge, online processing, offline judgments, self-paced reading
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.English articles
  • 3.Online processing of L2-English articles
  • 4.Task effects on L2 performance: Online vs. offline tasks
  • 5.Research questions and hypotheses
  • 6.Method
    • 6.1Test design and materials
    • 6.2Participants and procedures
    • 6.3Results
      • 6.3.1Acceptability judgment data
        • Native speakers
        • L2 speakers
      • 6.3.2Self-paced reading data
        • Native speakers
        • L2 speakers
  • 7.Discussion
  • 8.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 6 October 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.18053.cho
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