This study investigates the second language (L2) acquisition of the English count/mass distinction by speakers of Korean and Mandarin Chinese, with a focus on the semantics of atomicity. It is hypothesized that L1-Korean and L1-Mandarin L2-English learners are influenced by atomicity in the use of the count/mass morphosyntax in English. This hypothesis is tested in two experiments, one comparing Korean and Mandarin speakers in their L2 (English) and the other investigating count/mass morphosyntax in native Korean and Mandarin Chinese. In both experiments, participants are tested on their suppliance of plural marking with count and mass NPs. The findings are fully consistent with the view of atomicity as a semantic universal: learners overuse plural marking with mass atomic nouns such as furniture more than with mass non-atomic nouns such as water. Even though plural marking is associated with atomicity in Korean but not in Mandarin, the same patterns are observed in L1-Korean and L1-Mandarin L2-English learners. We conclude that learners’ performance is not due to L1-transfer, but rather to the role of the semantic universal of atomicity in L2-acquisition.
AnY (2007) Korean tul and English all. In: ShieldsR (ed.) LSO Working Papers in Linguistics 7: Proceedings of WIGL (pp. 1–16). Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin-Madison.
2.
AmuzieGLSpinnerP (2013) Korean EFL learners’ indefinite article use with four types of abstract nouns. Applied Linguistics34: 415–34.
3.
AthanasopoulosP (2006) Effects of the grammatical representation of number on cognition in bilinguals. Bilingualism: Language And Cognition9: 89–96.
4.
BaekM (2002) A study on Korean plural senses. Discourse and cognition9: 59–78.
5.
BarnerDSnedekerJ (2005) Quantity judgments and individuation: Evidence that mass nouns count. Cognition97: 41–66.
6.
BloomP (1994) Possible names: The role of syntax–semantics mappings in the acquisition of nominals. Lingua92: 297–329.
7.
BorerH (2005) In Name Only: Structuring Sense: Volume 1. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
8.
BuntHC (1985) Mass terms and model-theoretic semantics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
9.
ChengL (2000) Moving just the feature. In: LutzUMüllerGvon StechowA (eds) Wh-scope marking. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp. 77–99.
10.
CheungPLiPBarnerD (2010) Individuation and quantification: Do bare nouns in Mandarin Chinese individuate? In: ClemensLELiuC-M (eds) Proceedings of the 22nd North American Conference on Chinese Linguistics (pp. 395–412). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University.
11.
ChengLSybesmaR (1998) Yi-wang Tang, yi-ge Tang: Classifiers and massifiers. Tsing Hua Journal of Chinese Studies3: 385–412.
12.
ChengLSybesmaR (1999) Bare and not-so-bare nouns and the structure of NP. Linguistic Inquiry30: 509–42.
13.
ChienYCLustBChiangC (2003) Chinese children’s comprehension of count-classifiers and mass-classifiers. Journal of East Asian Linguistics12: 91–120.
14.
ChierchiaG (1998a) Reference to kinds across languages. Natural Language Semantics6: 339–405.
15.
ChierchiaG (1998b) Plurality of mass nouns and the notion of ‘semantic parameter’. In: RothsteinK (ed) Events in Grammar. New York: Springer, pp. 53–103.
16.
ChierchiaG (2010) Mass nouns, vagueness and semantic variation. Synthese174: 99–149.
17.
ChoiSIoninTZhuY (under review) Interpretation of count and mass NPs by L2-English learners from generalized classifier L1s. In: RispoliMIoninT (eds) Proceedings of the 7th Conference on Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition North America (GALANA 7).Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
EllisR (2005) Measuring implicit and explicit knowledge of a second language: A psychometric study. Studies In Second Language Acquisition27: 141–72.
20.
GebhardtL (2009) Numeral classifiers and the structure of DP. Unpublished PhD Thesis, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.
21.
GordonP (1985) Evaluating the semantic categories hypothesis: The case of the count/mass distinction. Cognition20: 209–42.
22.
HikiM (1990) The judgment of noun countability by Japanese college students: Where is the difficulty?JACET Bulletin21: 19–38.
23.
HikiM (1991) A study of learners’ judgment on noun countability. Unpublished PhD Thesis, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA.
24.
HuaDLeeTHT (2005) Chinese ESL learners’ understanding of the English count–mass distinction. In: DekydtspotterLSprouseRLijestrandA (eds) Proceedings of the 7th Generative Approaches to Second Language Acquisition Conference. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project, pp. 138–49.
25.
HwangSLardiereD (2013) Plural-marking in L2 Korean: A feature-based approach. Second Language Research29: 57–86.
26.
IljicR (1994) Quantification in Mandarin Chinese: two markers of plurality. Linguistics32: 91–116.
27.
ImaiMMazukaR (2003) Reevaluating linguistic relativity: Language-specific categories and the role of universal ontological knowledge in the construal of individuation. In: GentnerDGoldin-MeadowS (eds) Language in mind: Advances in the study of language and thought. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 429–64.
28.
InagakiS (2014) Syntax–semantics mappings as a source of difficulty in Japanese speakers’ acquisition of the mass–count distinction in English. Bilingualism: Language and cognition17: 464–77.
29.
InagakiSBarnerD (2009) Countability in absence of count syntax: Evidence from Japanese quantity judgments. In: InagakiSHirakawaMHirakawaY (eds) Papers from the Eighth Annual Conference of the Japanese Society for Language Sciences (Studies in Language Sciences 8). Tokyo: Kurosio, pp. 111–25.
30.
IoninTKoHWexlerK (2004) Article semantics in L2 acquisition: The role of specificity. Language Acquisition12: 2–69.
31.
IoninTZubizarretaMLBautista MaldonadoS (2008) Sources of linguistic knowledge in the second language acquisition of English articles. Lingua118: 554–76.
32.
IwasakiNVinsonDPViglioccoG (2010) Does the grammatical count/mass distinction affect semantic representations? Evidence from experiments in English and Japanese. Language And Cognitive Processes25: 189–223.
33.
JackendoffR (1991) Parts and boundaries. Cognition41: 9–45.
34.
KoHIoninTWexlerK (2010) The role of presuppositionality in the second language acquisition of English articles. Linguistic Inquiry41: 213–54.
35.
KimC (2005) The Korean plural marker tul and its implications. Unpublished PhD Thesis, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, USA.
36.
KongS (2012) Adult English speakers’ acquisition of Chinese count–mass classifiers. Journal of Chinese Linguistics40: 442–77.
37.
KwonSZribi-HertzA (2004) Number from a syntactic perspective: Why plural marking looks ‘truer’ in French than in Korean. In: BonamiOCabredo HofherrP (eds) The 5th Colloque de Syntaxe et Sémantique à Paris (pp. 133–58). Paris: Thesus.
38.
LangackerRW (1999) Grammar and Conceptualization. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
39.
LandmanF (1989) Groups, I. Linguistics and Philosophy12: 559–605.
40.
LandmanF (1991) Structures for Semantics. SLAP 45. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
41.
LardiereD (2009) Some thoughts on a contrastive analysis of features in second language acquisition. Second Language Research25: 173–227.
42.
LiYA (1999) Plurality in a Classifier Language. Journal of East Asian Linguistics8: 75– 99.
43.
MontrulS (2001) Agentive verbs of manner of motion in Spanish and English as second languages. Studies in Second Language Acquisition23: 171–206.
44.
NemotoN (2005) On mass denotations of bare nouns in Japanese and Korean. Linguistics43: 383–413.
45.
NicolasD (1997) Count nouns, mass nouns and their acquisition. Mémoire de troisième année de doctorat [special comprehensive examination], McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
46.
OdlinT (1989) Language transfer: Cross-linguistic influence in language learning. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
47.
O’NeillRCorneliusETWashburnGN (1991) American Kernel Lessons: Advanced Students’ Book. New York: Longman.
48.
PapafragouA (2005) Relations between language and thought: Individuation and the count/mass distinction. In: LefebvreCCohenH (eds) Handbook of Categorization in Cognitive Science. New York: Elsevier, pp. 256–71.
49.
ParadisC (2001) Adjectives and boundedness. Cognitive Linguistics12: 47–65.
50.
ParadisC (2005) Ontologies and construals in lexical semantics. Axiomathes15: 541–73.
51.
QuerJ (1998) Mood at the Interface. Amsterdam: Holland Academic Graphics.
52.
RiveroML (1975) Referential properties of Spanish noun phrases. Language51: 32–48.
53.
SchwartzBSprouseR (1994) Word order and nominative case in nonnative language acquisition: A longitudinal study of (L1 Turkish) German Interlanguage. In: HoekstraTSchwartzBD (eds) Language Acquisition Studies in Generative Grammar: Papers in Honor of Kenneth Wexler from the 1991 GLOW Workshops. Philadelphia, PA: John Benjamins, pp. 317–68.
54.
SchwartzBSprouseR (1996) L2 cognitive states and the Full Transfer/Full Access model. Second Language Research12: 40–72.
55.
SlabakovaR (2008) Meaning in the Second Language. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
56.
SnapeN (2008) Resetting the nominal mapping parameter in L2 English: Definite article use and the count–mass distinction. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition11: 63–79.
57.
SojaN (1992) Inferences about the meanings of nouns: The relationship between perception and syntax. Cognitive Development7: 29–46.
58.
WhiteL (2003) On the nature of interlanguage representation: Universal Grammar in the second language. In: DoughtyCLongM (eds) Handbook of Second Language Acquisition. London: Blackwell, pp. 19–42.
59.
WierzbickaA (1985) Oats and wheat: The fallacy of arbitrariness. In: HaimanJ (ed) Iconicity in Syntax. Amsterdam: John Benjamins (also in A Wierzbicka (1988) The semantics of grammar. Amsterdam: John Benjamins).
60.
YiB (2010) Numeral classifiers and the mass/count distinction. Unpublished manuscript, University of Toronto, Canada.
61.
YoonKY (1993) Challenging prototype descriptions: Perception of noun countability and indefinite vs. zero article use. International Review of Applied Linguistics31: 269–89.
62.
ZhengH (2011) About the plural marker tul in Korean. Studies in Linguistics19: 281–302.
