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Part of
Research on Second Language Processing and Processing Instruction: Studies in honor of Bill VanPatten
Edited by Michael J. Leeser, Gregory D. Keating and Wynne Wong
[Studies in Bilingualism 62] 2021
► pp. 261–294

Chapter 9
PI and the French causative and passive constructions

Examining transfer-of-training effects using eye tracking

| The Ohio State University
| The University of Newcastle
| Auburn University

We examined whether French L2 learners trained with processing instruction (PI) or traditional instruction (TI) on the French causative, would transfer training effects to the passive construction. Experiment 2 included explicit information (EI) but not Experiment 1. Accuracy results and eye movement patterns showed PI had a positive impact on participants’ processing of the causative, but neither treatment had any effect on the passive. The null effect could be attributed to the low number of tokens used and to the nature of the passive structure. Furthermore, PI training on the causative might have trained learners to rely on the necessary cues to process causative sentences correctly, but this might not have been sufficient to decrease reliance on the first noun principle.

Keywords: eye tracking, processing instruction, transfer-of-training effects, French causative, French passive, explicit information
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Background and motivation
    • PI: Secondary and cumulative effects
      • Token frequency effects
    • Transfer-of-training effects with and without EI
  • The present study
    • Primary and secondary structures
      • Primary structure
      • Secondary structure
    • Wong and Ito (2018)
  • Experiment 1
    • Methods and procedures
      • Participants
      • Eye-tracking stimuli
      • PI training items
      • TI training items
      • Procedure
    • Analyses and results
      • Accuracy
      • Eye-movement patterns
  • Experiment 2
    • Method
    • Participants
    • Materials
    • Procedure
    • Analyses and results
      • Accuracy
      • Eye-movement patterns
  • Discussion
  • Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 17 March 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/sibil.62.09won
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