While it is known that heritage speakers diverge from the homeland baseline, there is still no consensus on the mechanisms triggering this divergence. We investigate the impact of two potential factors shaping adult heritage language (HL) grammars: (1) cross-linguistic influence (CLI), originally proposed for second language acquisition (SLA), and…

This study investigates whether there are different first-language-second-language (L1-L2) dependency resolutions by focusing on less-studied crosslinguistic variances in L2 acquisition of Chinese, a null-subject language, by speakers of English, a non-null-subject language. The overt subject pronoun of a Chinese main clause has free orientation…

This study sets out to investigate possible effects of previously learned languages on the acquisition of English as a third language by examining six prepositions (in, on, at, behind, over, to) when they denote spatial relations. Two picture description tasks were employed to find out which of the two known languages (L1 and/or L2) is the major…

Many studies have explored the second language (L2) acquisition of relative clauses (RCs) and whether L2 speakers transfer a resumptive strategy from first language (L1) to L2. While evidence seems to suggest that there are significant L1-L2 differences in the processing of RCs, relatively little is known about the source of non-target-like L2…

This study investigates the acquisition of null subjects by Mandarin Chinese native speakers ('Chinese NSs' hereafter), with different levels of L2 English proficiency, at initial stages of L3 Italian acquisition. The aim is to find out if, when acquiring Italian null subjects, Chinese NSs resort to their L1, which, like the L3, allows null…

Traditionally, transfer is described as interference and consequently as an unintentional mechanism. More recently, however, the perception of control in transfer has changed and it is now commonly accepted that transfer can occur both automatically and strategically. Studies have previously employed think-aloud protocols during writing tasks to…

This study uses both offline and online tasks in order to investigate whether second language learners of English from an article-less first-language (Mandarin) are able to integrate the indefinite article into their grammar despite the lack of articles in their first language. This article reports on two studies, one on learners' sensitivity to…

This paper compares the initial state of second language (L2) and third language (L3) acquisition for English articles to examine the influence of L2 proficiency on positive transfer from L2 to L3. We tested 36 L1 Turkish/L2 German adolescent learners of L3 English (L3 group), 41 L1 Turkish adolescent learners of L2 English (L2 group), and 10…

This study explores the source of transfer in third language (L3) English by two distinct groups of Catalan-Spanish bilinguals, simultaneous bilinguals and late bilinguals. Our study addresses two research questions: (1) Does transfer come from the first language (L1), the second language (L2), or both? and (2) Does age of acquisition of the L2…

Variability in the form of article (i.e., a and the) omissions and stressing has been attributed to a mismatch between first (L1) and second language (L2) prosodic and syntactic structures. An overlap between the L1 and L2 systems, on the other hand, is expected to contribute to native-like article productions. This case study aims to explore the…

This article investigates phenomena related to subject pronoun realization in the English interlanguage of Macedonian learners. Preliminary research indicates that learners tend to omit the subject pronoun in both referential and non-referential contexts. It can be presumed that such interlanguage features are due to crosslinguistic influence,…

Despite the numerous studies on English article acquisition, the acquisition sequence, differences, and difficulties by English-as-a-second language learners (ELLs) remain to be further explored. With a detailed literature review, this study investigated the acquisition sequence, differences, and difficulties of English articles by ELLs with…

Early bilingualism is thought to facilitate language learning [Klein, E. C. (1995). "Second versus third language acquisition: Is there a difference?" "Language Learning", 45(3), 419-466; Cromdal, J. (1999). "Childhood bilingualism and metalinguistic skills: Analysis and control in young Swedish-English bilinguals."…

This study investigates the role of previously acquired linguistic systems, Mazandarani and Persian, in the acquisition of third language (L3) English at the initial stages. The data have been obtained from 31 students (age 13-14 years), testing the placement of attributive possessives in a grammaticality judgment task, an element rearrangement…