Advocates a "process" viewpoint of language use for second language proficiency testing and explores its potential for greater insights from five perspectives: text linguistics and discourse analysis; interlanguage; expectancy; negotiation and interaction; and communication strategies. (Author/CB)

Reports a study of native Spanish speakers' acquisition of the ability to discriminate lexically in English between similar items with different characteristics. The study also examined the role of first-language interference in the process. (MSE)

Presents the results of an experiment which examined the temporal characteristics of voiceless plosives in American English, Arabic, and Arabic-accented English. Results showed that Arabic-accented English departed from the target language goal and constituted an articulation type characterizable as more Arabic than Arabic itself. (Author/SED)

Discusses an alternative framework for handling language testing and proposes some tentative hypotheses concerning principles of language testing. Suggests that taking account of both interlanguage domain engagement and contextualization in testing research, production, and interpretation allows for a richer conceptualization of the language…

This study examined the interlanguage syntax of Arabic speaking learners of English in the area of the noun phrase, focusing on the closed system elements that can occur before or after the noun head, the noun head and pronouns in line with Quirk and Greenbaum's (1977) treatment of the noun phrase. Participants were 25 Arabic speaking English…

The demise of the behaviorist paradigm and the rise of the social, cognitive, and interactionist models of second language acquisition (SLA) have led to the understanding that constructivist mechanisms are part of the process. Given the variety of empirical findings and understandings research in the field has yielded, this study attempts to offer…

Describes a study undertaken to assess interference from two languages for learners of French. Suggests that susceptibility to interference is related to a number of factors, such as level of proficiency in the target language, and the degree and type of similarity between the target and the base language. (MES)

Attempts to demonstrate the strategies used by the second language learner in deciphering unfamiliar linguistic material. (AM)

Questions the value of the theory of interlanguage for language learning research. (AM)

The consensus of opinion seems to be that the processes of mother tongue acquisition are essentially analogous to those of second language (SL) acquisition. These processes, however, seem to work best in childhood years. A theory of adult SL learning should try to incorporate interlanguage. (CFM)

Presents the results of a study investigating the acquisition of English tense and aspect by Persian speakers. A cross-sectional study of 45 second language learners at three levels of proficiency was conducted using a grammaticality judgment task. Findings showed that the acquisition of tense and aspect followed the universal entailment of…

Suggests a methodology for studying second language acquisition that is concerned with gaining insight into the use, development, and possible fossilization of interlanguage in important real-life situations. Specific interest is focused on the understanding ability of the non-native speaker to use English in discussing a technical field. (65…

The validity of 2 implicational universals regarding constituent order in questions is tested in the English speech of 14 native speakers of Japanese, Turkish, and Korean. The interlanguage evidence is found to be generally supportive of the 2 universals. (31 references). (Author/VWL)

Analysis of language production skills of French immersion students in grades 1-6 over 3 years revealed rapid growth of oral competence in the first three years of acquisition, followed by a much slower annual rate of progress. Lexical and syntactic structures most difficult to acquire emerge in five distinct patterns. (50 references) (Author/MSE)

Reports the findings of a longitudinal study in interlanguage phonology examining the production of two structures in a markedness relationship, bilateral and trilateral onsets, the latter being more marked than the former. The study specifically tests the Interlanguage Structure Conformity Hypothesis by measuring the acquisition of the onsets in…