The aim of this article is to show that the use of Spanish grammatical aspect is biased by inherent aspect depending on the learner's first language (L1). It considers both the Lexical Aspect Hypothesis (LAH; Andersen, 1986, and his followers) and the L1 Transfer Hypothesis (Izquierdo & Collins, 2008; McManus, 2015), and it compares the use of…

This study investigates whether native Hmong speakers' first language (L1) lexical tone experience facilitates or interferes with their perception of Mandarin tones and whether training is effective for perceptual learning of second (L2) tones. In Experiment 1, 3 groups of beginning level learners of Mandarin with different L1 prosodic background…

The present study was designed to investigate the ways in which notions of semantics and phonology are acquired by adult naive learners of American Sign Language (ASL) when they are first exposed to a set of simple signs. First, a set of ASL signs was tested for nontransparency and a set of signs was selected for subsequent use. Next, a set of…

Discusses problems in second language acquisition caused by linguistic interference and emphasizes the importance of positive attitudes. (RL)

This study focused on developmental word recognition strategies used by first language (L1) English readers of second language (L2) Japanese. There were two proficiency groups of Japanese learners. The study considered whether or not word recognition strategies are developmental and whether or not L1 orthographic interference (i.e., involvement of…

Spanish-speaking learners of Portuguese often transfer features of Spanish language to Portuguese. Learner errors, including those caused by Spanish interference, are analyzed by contrasting Portuguese and Spanish grammar. (SW)

Describes a study undertaken to assess interference from two languages for learners of French. Suggests that susceptibility to interference is related to a number of factors, such as level of proficiency in the target language, and the degree and type of similarity between the target and the base language. (MES)

Contrastive analysis of Spanish and English reveals the importance of giving as much attention to suprasegmentals as to segmentals in the teaching of pronunciation. (CFM)