句型和长度对第二语言口语流利度的交互影响

Interactional Effects of Sentence Type and Length on Second Language Oral Fluency

为探究第二语言口语组词断句的认知机制,研究考查了不同复杂度的句型及长度对学习者在组块加工作用下汉语口语流利度的影响。研究对象是英语为母语的低水平学习者、高水平学习者和汉语母语者各15人。流利度测量指标是看后复述句子的停顿率和语流长度。结果显示,相较于长度,句型复杂度对学习者汉语口语流利度的负面影响更大。句型越复杂,学习者的停顿率就越高。句子长度对高水平学习者的语流长度有一定的正面影响,其产出的语流长度会随着其所复述的句子长度的增加而增加。这种正面影响会随着句子认知加工难度的增大,即句型复杂度的增加而增强。低水平学习者需和高水平学习者一样,习得母语者的压缩组块策略,根据句法结构及其长度,来伸缩调整口语产出的组块大小。

To explore the cognitive mechanism of phrasing in speaking Chinese as a second language,this study examines how learners employ their chunking capability to handle different types and lengths of Chinese sentences in oral production.Fifteen lower-level learners and fifteen higher-level learners from English-speaking countries participated in the sentence recall experiment,with another fifteen native speakers of Chinese as the baseline group.Pause rate and chunk size were calculated to assess participants'Chinese oral fluency at the sentence level.Results show an increase of learners'pause rate when the syntactic structure of a sentence becomes more complex,whereas under this cognitive-demanding situation,the increase of sentence length conversely boosts higher-level learners'chunk size.Learners'over-dependency on sentence length displays their inferior cognitive processing ability as compared to that of native speakers in Chinese oral production.This can be improved with the use of compressed chunking strategy by adjusting the size of chunks according to the syntactic structure and the length of a sentence rather than producing every sentence with the same size of chunks.