The Influence of the Mother Tongue on the Acquisition of Simple Prepositions in Italian As a Second Language
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11606/issn.2238-8281.i48p6-34Keywords:
Language transfer, L1 interference, L2 Italian, PrepositionsAbstract
The (mis)use of prepositions is one of the most problematic areas of L2 (second language) Italian grammar (Katerinov, 1975) and L1 (first language) transfer has been found to affect the learning of prepositions mediated by various factors, including L1 background, length of instruction, task type (Jarvis, 2000), and gender (Llach, 2010). This study investigates native English and English-Spanish learners’ L1 influence on the acquisition of L2 Italian prepositions. Twenty-four native monolingual English and 24 bilingual Spanish-English students, enrolled in Italian courses in a public university in the U.S., participated in this study. The study also examined the effect of increased L2 (length of exposure) on the acquisition of Italian prepositions by comparing the beginning and intermediate-level learners’ performances. Finally, the study established whether there are any gender differences in the learning outcomes. The participants’ knowledge of Italian prepositions and L1 transfer patterns was evaluated through four tasks: translation, fill-in-the-blank, multiple-choice, and grammaticality judgment. The findings show that both L2 experience and L1 background play an important role on the acquisition of L2 Italian prepositions while gender does not represent an influencing factor. The error analysis shows that the effect of L1 negative transfer decreases with an increased L2 proficiency level. Finally, the task types do not affect the learning outcomes and transfer patterns.
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