First language attrition and syntactic subjects: A study of Greek and Italian near-native speakers of English

TLDR

Syntactic attrition in Greek and Italian speakers who have near‑native proficiency in English but still use their L1 regularly is examined. The study tests whether L1 syntactic changes are confined to the interface with conceptual/intentional cognitive systems. Participants were assessed on production and interpretation of null and overt subjects, preverbal and postverbal positions, and grammaticality judgments, with results reported from one production task and two interpretation tasks. Greek speakers showed attrition in producing preverbal subjects, while Italian speakers exhibited attrition in interpreting overt pronominal subjects, suggesting that semantic features are vulnerable whereas syntactic options remain intact.

Abstract

In this paper we present some results from an experimental study that we have been conducting into the effects of syntactic attrition on the L1 of Greek and Italian speakers who have achieved near-native proficiency in their L2 (English) but still use their L1 on a regular basis. In particular, we test the hypothesis, developed on the basis of assumptions regarding syntactic modularity, that the changes in L1 syntax will be restricted to the interface with the conceptual /intentional cognitive systems. The area of investigation is the domain of grammatical subjects in Greek and Italian. More specifically, we tested the participants on the production and interpretation of null and overt subjects, and of preverbal and postverbal subjects. We also elicited grammaticality judgments on subject extraction and subject position in various syntactic contexts. In this paper we report on the results of one of the production tasks (of preverbal and postverbal subjects) and two interpretation tasks. Attrition effects are found in the production of preverbal subjects in the Greek group whereas Italian speakers show attrition effects in the interpretation of overt pronominal subjects. We argue that these results are in the right direction, that is, that semantic features are vulnerable in language attrition whereas syntactic options remain intact.