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Understanding the symptoms and sources of variability in second language sentence processing

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2016

ALISON GABRIELE ,
ROBERT FIORENTINO  and
LAUREN COVEY
ALISON GABRIELE*
Affiliation:
University of Kansas
ROBERT FIORENTINO
Affiliation:
University of Kansas
LAUREN COVEY
Affiliation:
University of Kansas
*
Address for correspondence: Alison Gabriele, University of Kansas, Linguistics Department, 1541 Lilac Lane, Blake Hall 427, Lawrence, KS 66045[email protected]
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Extract

Cunnings (2016) proposes that differences between native (L1) and second language (L2) sentence processing can best be explained in terms of susceptibility to effects of interference and an overreliance on discourse level cues during memory retrieval. Cunnings’ argument that difficulty in retrieval operations may provide a better explanation than a syntactic deficit account for explaining certain L1-L2 differences is convincing. However, the proposal for the ‘overuse’ of discourse is too broad and needs to be refined in terms of the specific contexts and conditions under which learners have difficulty. We also believe that difficulty with cue-based retrieval is still a characterization of the symptoms of differences between L1-L2 processing, and does not necessarily address the source of the variability.

Type
Peer Commentaries
Information
Bilingualism: Language and Cognition , Volume 20 , Issue 4 , August 2017 , pp. 685 - 686
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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References

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