@misc{VerissimoHeyerJacobetal.2017, author = {Ver{\´i}ssimo, Joao Marques and Heyer, Vera and Jacob, Gunnar and Clahsen, Harald}, title = {Selective effects of age of acquisition on morphological priming}, series = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, journal = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, number = {486}, issn = {1866-8364}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-412611}, pages = {13}, year = {2017}, abstract = {Is there an ideal time window for language acquisition after which nativelike representation and processing are unattainable? Although this question has been heavily debated, no consensus has been reached. Here, we present evidence for a sensitive period in language development and show that it is specific to grammar. We conducted a masked priming task with a group of Turkish-German bilinguals and examined age of acquisition (AoA) effects on the processing of complex words. We compared a subtle but meaningful linguistic contrast, that between grammatical inflection and lexical-based derivation. The results showed a highly selective AoA effect on inflectional (but not derivational) priming. In addition, the effect displayed a discontinuity indicative of a sensitive period: Priming from inflected forms was nativelike when acquisition started before the age of 5 but declined with increasing AoA. We conclude that the acquisition of morphological rules expressing morphosyntactic properties is constrained by maturational factors.}, language = {en} } @misc{ClahsenFleischhauer2014, author = {Clahsen, Harald and Fleischhauer, Elisabeth}, title = {Morphological priming in child German}, series = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, journal = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam : Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, number = {529}, issn = {1866-8364}, doi = {10.25932/publishup-41549}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-415491}, pages = {1305 -- 1333}, year = {2014}, abstract = {Regular and irregular inflection in children's production has been examined in many previous studies. Yet, little is known about the processes involved in children's recognition of inflected words. To gain insight into how children process inflected words, the current study examines regular -t and irregular -n participles of German using the cross-modal priming technique testing 108 monolingual German-speaking children in two age groups (group I, mean age: 8;4, group II, mean age: 9;9) and a control group of.. adults. Although both age groups of children had the same full priming effect as adults for -t forms, only children of age group II showed an adult-like (partial) priming effect for -n participles. We argue that children (within the age range tested) employ the same mechanisms for regular inflection as adults but that the lexical retrieval processes required for irregular forms become more efficient when children get older.}, language = {en} } @misc{FelserCunningsBatterhametal.2012, author = {Felser, Claudia and Cunnings, Ian and Batterham, Claire and Clahsen, Harald}, title = {The timing of island effects in nonnative sentence processing}, series = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, journal = {Postprints der Universit{\"a}t Potsdam Humanwissenschaftliche Reihe}, issn = {1866-8364}, doi = {10.25932/publishup-41517}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-415179}, pages = {32}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Using the eye-movement monitoring technique in two reading comprehension experiments, this study investigated the timing of constraints on wh-dependencies (so-called island constraints) in first- and second-language (L1 and L2) sentence processing. The results show that both L1 and L2 speakers of English are sensitive to extraction islands during processing, suggesting that memory storage limitations affect L1 and L2 comprehenders in essentially the same way. Furthermore, these results show that the timing of island effects in L1 compared to L2 sentence comprehension is affected differently by the type of cue (semantic fit versus filled gaps) signaling whether dependency formation is possible at a potential gap site. Even though L1 English speakers showed immediate sensitivity to filled gaps but not to lack of semantic fit, proficient German-speaking learners of English as a L2 showed the opposite sensitivity pattern. This indicates that initial wh-dependency formation in L2 processing is based on semantic feature matching rather than being structurally mediated as in L1 comprehension.}, language = {en} } @article{FelserCunningsBatterhametal.2012, author = {Felser, Claudia and Cunnings, Ian and Batterham, Claire and Clahsen, Harald}, title = {The timing of Island effects in nonnative sentence processing}, series = {Studies in second language acquisition}, volume = {34}, journal = {Studies in second language acquisition}, number = {1}, publisher = {Cambridge University Press}, address = {Cambridge}, issn = {0272-2631}, doi = {10.1017/S0272263111000507}, pages = {67 -- 98}, year = {2012}, abstract = {Using the eye-movement monitoring technique in two reading comprehension experiments, this study investigated the timing of constraints on wh-dependencies (so-called island constraints) in first- and second-language (L1 and L2) sentence processing. The results show that both L1 and L2 speakers of English are sensitive to extraction islands during processing, suggesting that memory storage limitations affect L1 and L2 comprehenders in essentially the same way. Furthermore, these results show that the timing of island effects in L1 compared to L2 sentence comprehension is affected differently by the type of cue (semantic fit versus filled gaps) signaling whether dependency formation is possible at a potential gap site. Even though L1 English speakers showed immediate sensitivity to filled gaps but not to lack of semantic fit, proficient German-speaking learners of English as a L2 showed the opposite sensitivity pattern. This indicates that initial wh-dependency formation in L2 processing is based on semantic feature matching rather than being structurally mediated as in L1 comprehension.}, language = {en} }