A statistical test of the relation between wh-dependency resolution and working memory in Korean learners of English

Abstract

Kim, Euhee and Park, Myung-Kwan. 2016. A statistical test of the relation between wh-dependency resolution and working memory in Korean learners of English. Korean Journal of English Language and Linguistics 16-4, 851-877. Employing a self-paced reading experiment which focuses on wh-dependency resolution, we investigated two questions, examining how Korean learners of English (KLEs) engage in processing wh-dependencies in non-island and island contexts of English and whether there is a relationship between processing of wh-dependencies in such contexts and working memory (WM) capacity, as measured by both reading span and n-back in our study. The experiments with the KLEs found that both non-island long-distance wh-question and whether-island sentences showed filler integration effects (recorded by a reading time slowdown), but complex NP and adjunct islands did not display such effects. The results point to the fact that KLEs are partially sensitive to syntactic wh-constraints in English as their L2, though further careful examinations are in need for the definite conclusion on this issue. In addition, the present study found that for KLEs there was no relationship between wh-dependency relation and individual WM capacity in both grammatically licit non-island and illicit island environments, suggesting that, even for L2ers (unlike L1ers, as shown by Hofmeister and Sag (2010)), processing resources do not play any significant role in the process of integrating the wh-filler into its gap position.