Awareness of verb subcategorization probabilities with polysemous verbs: The second language situation

Different meanings of a verb are associated with different argument structures (subcategorization), which in this study are sentential complements (SC) and direct object (DO) arguments. Interaction between verbal meaning and argument structure is investigated at the production level using polysemous verbs in the absence (Norming Experiment) and presence of sense-promoting context (Main Experiment) with participants that are university students and teachers of English. Next, the main experiment is replicated in the participants' native language to look for L1 effects on results. Speakers of English as L2, whether students or teachers, were found to be capable of making sense-contingent verb subcategorization distinctions between DO and SC arguments following priming context, with DO context making the stronger contribution to DO-biased verb meanings. Unlike native speakers of English, non-native participants showed a greater tendency to use SC arguments irrespective of verb bias requirement and priming context. When the study was replicated in the participants' own language, native-like preferences for SC and DO subcategorization frames were observed, which led the researcher to conclude that the dominance of SC arguments and the underuse of DO arguments in participants' L2 productions were not governed by influences from their L1. Discussion of the implications of these results is extended to language learning classroom contexts.