Relative pronoun in the acquisition of English relative clauses by Chinese EFL learners

The paper focuses on the properties of relative pronouns in the acquisition of relative clause by Chinese EFL learners. Based on the NPAH （noun phrase accessibility hierarchy）, comparison and contrast of some aspects of English and Chinese relative pronoun, the paper conducts two experiments, and has proved the hypotheses that students＇ performance generally follows the hierarchy of NPAH and students do have problems with relative pronoun involving prepositions. Besides, some pedagogical implications for foreign language teaching are discussed.

An Article Review： Impact of Explicit Instruction on EFL Learners＇ Implicit and Explicit Knowledge： A Case of English Relative Clauses

This review discusses Nezakat-Alhossaini, Youhanaee, and Moinzadeh＇s research study entitled ＂Impact of Explicit Instruction on EFL Learners＇ Implicit and Explicit Knowledge： A Case of English Relative Clauses.＂ This study was chosen for evaluation because it strives to attach significance to explicit instruction in L2 acquisition, unlike other more recent research, which seeks to reinforce implicit instruction as it is viewed as the idealistic goal of language learning （Rebuschat ＆ William, 2009）. The present review will be developed by means of an evaluation of Alhossaini and her colleagues＇ study, consisting of a concise summary of the study, a classification of the philosophical perspective, the selection of criteria, and the strengths and weaknesses of the study. In this review, I hope that I succeed to broadly navigate the research enterprise, commencing with the philosophical perspective of research, such as the epistemological and ontological stances shaping the philosophical perspective and then colouring the research. By reviewing this study, I would also hope that I successfully evaluate the research quality by using appropriate criteria in an attempt to suggest potential directions for further research （under strengths and weaknesses of the study）.

Chinese Subject-Relative Clauses Are Easier to Comprehend Than the Object-Relative Clauses in Natural Situations

Studies on Indo-European languages argue that subject relative clauses （SRCs） are easier to process than object relative clauses （ORCs）, and the processing preference for SRCs was manipulated by the animacy of the noun phrases （NPs） in the internal-clause and in the main clause. This paper aims at investigating the difficulty in Chinese RCs processing by subjective ratings and the results showed： （1） As European languages, Chinese RCs processing also shows a preference for SRCs, which was consistent with experience-based account, as well as NPAH in part. （2） A strong animacy effect from the head noun phrases （NPs） was found during Chinese RCs processing. In all, compared with other accounts, experience-based account offers more reasonable explanations about Chinese RCs comprehension in natural situations.

Study of Taiwan Residents children＇s application of noun and relative clauses in their oral responses

Over the past years studies have pointed out that 5 to 6-year-old children are able to use complex sentences in their oral language. Complex sentences may contain different kinds of subordinate or embedded clauses such as noun clauses, adverbial clauses or relative clauses, which again may be respectively divided into smaller units in terms of function and form. It is interesting therefore to investigate how subordinate clauses are applied by 5 to 6-year-old Chinese-speaking children. The present study, which is based on the verbal responses of 10 Taiwan Residents upper-level kindergarteners aged from 5.5 to 6.5 years, aims to investigate specifically how two kinds of subordinate clauses, namely noun and relative clauses, are applied in children＇s speech. Data analysis shows that of the 4 kinds of noun clauses, only object noun clauses are applied by the child-respondents. With their much more complex syntactic constructions, noun clauses, compliment noun clauses and appositive noun clauses do not appear in their oral responses at all. Concerning relative clauses and their derived participle phrases, none of the respondents apply any V＋的＋N construction in their verbal responses. The VO＋的＋N construction is used by 7 respondents, while the S＋的＋N construction is used by 5 respondents.

Relative Clause Preference in Learners of Chinese as a Second Language

It has been debated whether preference for subject-extracted relative clauses in language processing is a universal rule, with evidence from both first and second language acquisition studies. But very few studies focus on learners of Chinese as a second language. The current research studied Chinese subject/object-extracted relative clauses processing among the learners of Chinese as a second language by a self-paced reading experiment. The results demonstrate a faster and more accurate processing of subject-extracted relative clauses in both subject and object modifying conditions, adding more evidence to the universal preference for the subject-extracted relative clauses. Both Frequency-Based Accounts and Memory-Based Accounts are discussed related to the current findings.

Processing Relative Clauses in Chinese:Evidence from Event-Related Potentials

The interpretation of Chinese relative clauses has become of significant interest in sentence processing research, since some studies found that Chinese comprehension patterns violate the well-known universal subject relatives preference proposed by NAPH theory and proved by cross-linguistic studies. The current study uses the neuropsychological measure of ERP. It supports such a language-specific phenomenon, with the results showing that both subject- and object- modifying subject relatives eliciting larger ERP components than object relatives. The results suggest that object relatives are easier to process than subject relatives at both modifying positions, challenging the claim of universal subject preference for all languages. In addition, this study casts doubts on CWO and working memory-based DLT models despite results being compatible with them, and concludes that none of the current models are comprehensive enough to account for the data. Finally, this study offers a piece of evidence for the garden path effect caused by the surface NVN word order in the Chinese relative clause. All in all, this study adds to the evidence that processing preference is not universal. It contributes to a comprehensive model of how complex structures are processed.

Interlingual Factors in Chinese College Students' Acquisition of English Relative Clauses

语言研究者曾从不同角度研究了英语关系从句的习得。目前研究者普遍认为:关系从句的习得由三方面的因素决定——语际、语内和语言普遍性。本研究旨在探讨其中的一个重要因素——语际因素。以英汉关系从句形成策略为基础,本研究提出了三个问题及三个相应的假设,并以112名中国大学生为研究对象,以三项测试(写作、选择题以及语法判断题)为研究手段,从语际方面对中国大学生英语关系从句的习得进行了试验性的研究。利用社会科学统计软件(SPSS),本文对研究结果进行了分析,研究发现:中国大学生英语关系从句输出不足,并且在使用方面犯有一些由语际因素所造成的错误。针对以上研究结果,本文为今后的教学和研究提出了建议。

Study on Chinese College EFL Learners' Comprehension and Production of English Relative Clauses:Testing Three Hypotheses

This study considers both comprehension and production of the English restrictive relative clauses （RC） by EFL learners in Chinese context. Different tests were employed respectively in data collection, namely a sentence combination test and a grammaticality judgment test, aiming to test the hypotheses about the acquisition of English relative clauses. The participants were 30 first-year college students randomly selected in a university of Shanxi province. The results showed that Chinese EFL learners do not follow the orders of RC acquisition predicted by any of the three hypotheses, Parallel Function Hypothesis （PFH）, Perceptual Difficulty Hypothesis （PDH）, and Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy Hypothesis （NPAHH）. They also showed that the participants performed better in the sentence combination test than in the grammaticality judgment test, and in both tests the easiest type of RC is O-DO, and the most difficult ones are O-OPREP and S-IO.

ON THE CAUSES OF VARIATION IN RELATIVE CLAUSES PRODUCED BY CHINESE ENGLISH MAJORS

SLA researches show that interlanguage variation is caused by multiple factors. Following the multi-factor approach, the present research has investigated the effects of three specific factors on the acquisition and production of relative clauses by Chinese English Majors: types of the subordinate clauses (single or double/embedded), syntactic functions of the relative pronouns and the time pressure. Results show that the subjects' performances varied significantly when conditions changed, and it was found that the syntactic functions of the relative pronouns and the time pressure had great influence on such variation, but different types of the subordinate clauses had no influence at all. Besides, more detailed study found that another two factors might also have certain effects: (1) the existence of context of discourse; (2) different object functions of the relative pronouns. Findings of the present research could provide implications for the improvement of ways to evaluate the language proficiency of English learners.

TYPOLOGICAL MARKEDNESS AND AVOIDANCE IN CHINESE COLLEGE STUDENTS' PRODUCTION OF ENGLISH RELATIVE CLAUSES

Research on students' avoidance in the production of English relative clauses is of vital importance, which can help researchers and teachers know better how students learn languages. However, there are only few experimental studies on it and no consensus has been achieved. When it comes to Mainland Chinese foreign language learners, hardly any relevant research on such a phenomenon has been conducted so far. This paper has analyzed a sample of materials out of Chinese Learner English Corpus, and used sentence-completion and sentence-joining tests to investigate 37 college students' behavior on four types of relative clauses, in order to explore the relationship between their avoidance and typological markedness.

Relative Clauses in Hong Kong English:A Corpus-based Perspective

This study, with the help of the International Corpus of English, contrastively explores uses of relative clauses by students in Hong Kong, Singapore and British English within the framework of world Englishes （Kachru, 2005, 1989; Kachru ＆ Nelson, 2006）. First, in the Hong Kong data, there is probably a tendency to use restrictive relative clauses led by WHICH in places, where non-restrictive relative clauses led by WHICH are normally expected. Second, there is another tendency in the employment of non-restricted relative clauses led by THAT in Hong Kong university students＇ written work and it is interesting to note that this phenomenon seems to be more widespread in Hong Kong student writing than in Singapore student writing and no such cases were found out in the British subcorpus. Given that some distinctive patterns traditionally considered as developmental errors in the language learning process may also be seen as evidence of linguistic variations, second language teachers may need some tolerance towards this variation and compromise between ＂autonomy＂ and ＂grammaticality＂ in today＇s society of world Englishes （McKay, 2008）.

An ERP Study in English Relative Clause Processing by Chinese-English Bilinguals

The processing of relative clauses receives much concern from linguists. The finding that object relatives are easier to process than subiect relatives in Chinese challenges the notion that subject relative clauses are preferred universally. A large body of literature provides theories related to sentence processing mechanisms for native speakers but leaves one area relatively untouched： how bilinguals process sentences. This study is designed to examine the case where the individuals with a Chinese L1 language background process subject-extracted subject relative clauses （SS） and subject-extracted object relative clauses （SO） by using event- related potentials （ERPs） to probe into the real-time language processing and presents a direct manifestation of brain activity. The findings from this study support the subject relative clause preference due to the strong influence of English relative clause markedness and bilinguals＇ relative lower working memory capacity.

THE TEACHING OF NON-RESTRICTIVE RELATIVE CLAUSES IN A CHINESE CONTEXT

This paper attacks the conservatism of grammar teaching in China.It takes the example of teachingnon-restrictive clauses in English and demonstrates that a communicative approach can and should beapplied even to such a linguistic subject.A procedure is suggested in which group work and problem-solving activities attempt to raise students’awareness of grammar problems and encourage them to findtheir own solutions.

On the pragmatic functions of non-restrictive relational clauses in English news report discourse

Traditional syntactic or semantic theories failed to provide a satistactory explanation for the unique features of non-restrictive relational clauses in people＇s daily use of English language. This paper would adopt the theoretical framework of pragmatics and use relevance theory as well as face theory to discuss the unique pragmatic functions of non-restrictive relational clauses in English news report discourse. The three major pragmatic functions are： （1） optimizing the relevance of information; （2） seeking for the consistence with readers; and （3） avoiding imposing the author＇s opinion on readers.

The Continuity of Head Nouns:The Difference in Relativizability between Korean and Chinese

The Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy cannot explain the difference in relativizability between Chinese and Korean in authentic discourse.Korean exhibits a higher preference for relativization compared to Chinese and this article aims to account for this difference from the perspective of topic continuity.Specifically,the continuity of head nouns within relative clauses is stronger in Korean than in Chinese.By analyzing the parameters of referential distance and potential interference,this study finds that the head nouns in Korean relative clauses display a broader range on the continuum of continuity compared to those in Chinese relative clauses.Furthermore,the difference in the strength of continuity of head nouns between Chinese and Korean relative clauses is attributed to the typological distinction between the Component-Integral Languages and Component-Metonymic Languages postulated within the framework of the Event-Domain Cognitive Model.

Strategies Used by Chinese Students of English in Constructing Clause and Rhetorical Relations of Text: A Study Based on a Sentence Reordering Activity

This study investigated how advanced Chinese students of English construct clause relations when construing English texts. A deconstructed text was distributed in class to 42 graduate students of linguistics, who were required to organize the clauses into a conceivably good text. The result suggests that these students seemed to rely on explicit cohesive words （anaphoric references and repetitions） rather than meaning relations in text construction. They seemed to have difficulties in using cataphoric contextual information and the popular discourse pattern from general to specific. This study calls for an enhanced awareness of logico-semantic relations in teaching and learning text construction.