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This study aimed to validate the Simple View of Reading (SVR) in L2 English readers with alphabetic and morphosyllabic L1 writing system backgrounds. Forty-five L2 English learners enrolled in American university bridge programs completed a set of tasks that measured real word decoding efficiency, pseudoword decoding efficiency, linguistic (listening) comprehension, passage reading comprehension, and word meaning inferencing. There were two major findings: (1) only pseudoword decoding efficiency predicted passage reading comprehension in learners with a morphosyllabic L1, whereas both pseudoword decoding efficiency and linguistic comprehension were significant predictors in learners with an alphabetic L1; (2) pseudoword decoding efficiency was a significant predictor of word meaning inferencing in learners with a morphosyllabic L1, and moderated the effect of real word decoding efficiency on word meaning inference in learners with an alphabetic L1. The findings indicate the complex relationships among word decoding, linguistic comprehension, and passage reading comprehension in adult L2 English learners., (© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)

This article presents the first meta-analysis on correlations of morphological awareness (MA) with reading-related abilities in deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) students (k = 14, N = 556). The results showed high mean correlations of MA with all three reading-related abilities: rs = 0.610, 0.712, and 0.669 (all ps < 0.001), respectively, for word reading, vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension. A set of moderator analysis was conducted of language, DHH students' age/reading stage and degree of hearing loss, and task type. The correlation of MA with word reading was significantly stronger in alphabetic than in non-alphabetic languages, and for fluency than accuracy; for vocabulary knowledge, the correlation was significantly stronger for production MA tasks than for judgment tasks; for reading comprehension, derivational MA tasks showed a stronger correlation than those having a mixed focus on inflection and derivation. While no other moderator effects were significant, the correlations for subsets of effect sizes were largely high for a moderator. These findings reaffirmed the importance of morphology in DHH students' reading development. The present synthesis, while evidencing major development of research on the metalinguistic underpinnings of reading in DHH students, also showed that the literature on MA is still very limited., (© The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press.)

According to the Interface Hypothesis in the field of bilingualism, the interface connecting a linguistic module with a language-external domain (e.g., syntax-discourse) will present prolonged difficulties for adult bilingual learners, as compared with the interface connecting language-internal modules (e.g., syntax-semantics). This study tested whether the Interface Hypothesis is applicable to the acquisition of Mandarin Chinese as a heritage language. An internet-based acceptability judgment task (AJT) was administered to 58 advanced and intermediate adult Chinese heritage speakers to collect data in accuracy and reaction time to investigate the adult heritage speakers' mastery of referential nominal expressions regulated at the syntax-semantics and syntax-discourse interfaces, respectively, in Mandarin Chinese. The target linguistic phenomena involved three nominal expressions (i.e., the bare N(oun), the [Cl(assifier)-N], and the [Num(eral)-Cl-N]) under four interface-regulated referential readings (i.e., type-denoting, quantity-denoting, indefinite individual-denoting, and definite individual-denoting). In terms of accuracy, the results showed that (i) for the N and the [Num-Cl-N], regardless of the interface type, the advanced group acquired the target phenomena to a nativelike level, who significantly outperformed the intermediate group; (ii) for the [Cl-N], the advanced group exhibited nativelike attainment at the syntax-discourse interface but not at the syntax-semantics interface, and performed significantly better than the intermediate group at both interfaces. Regarding reaction time, no significant differences were reported between the advanced group and the native group for the target structures at either the syntax-semantics or the syntax-discourse interface, while the advanced group performed significantly better than the intermediate group, regardless of the interface type and the structure type. The findings suggest that the nature of the language interface, i.e., whether it pertains to language-external domains (i.e., the external interface) or not (i.e., the internal interface), should not be a reliable factor for predicting the (im)possibility of nativelike attainment of bilingual grammar knowledge, contra the predictions of the Interface Hypothesis. The present study provides new empirical evidence to show that language-external interface properties are not necessarily destined for prolonged difficulties in heritage language acquisition, and that it is possible for adult heritage speakers to make developmental progress in both accuracy and processing efficiency at different types of interfaces., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Jin, Ke and Lee.)

Reading comprehension entails a set of distinct, yet interdependent cognitive, linguistic, and nonlinguistic processes. Previous second language (L2) Chinese studies have identified significant and positive impacts of grapho-morphological knowledge at the character and subcharacter (radical) levels on passage reading comprehension; however, little is known regarding how early L2 grapho-morphological knowledge at the character and radical levels jointly predict later L2 reading comprehension. This study aimed to fill this gap. One hundred and five beginning-level L2 Chinese collegiate learners were recruited, and completed two character-related and two radical-related tasks in Week 8, as well as one reading comprehension tasks in Week 18. The main findings, based on correlational and path analyses, suggested that L2 Chinese learners' early character-level and radical-level grapho-morphological knowledge significantly predicted later reading comprehension, yet the interrelations among grapho-morphological knowledge at the character and radical levels were complex. Path analyses identified direct and indirect paths from early character-level grapho-morphological knowledge to later reading comprehension, as well as indirect paths from early radical-level grapho-morphological knowledge to later reading comprehension. Methodological and pedagogical implications for L2 Chinese reading research and practices are discussed., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Chen, Ke and Koda.)

This study is aimed to re-examine the Interface Hypothesis via investigating the adult L2 acquisition of the word order variation of numeral classifier indefinites at the syntax-semantics and syntax-discourse interfaces in L2 Chinese. A computerized acceptability judgment task was administered to 41 advanced and intermediate adult Korean learners of Chinese to collect data in accuracy and reaction times. For accuracy, it was found that the advanced L2 learners have not acquired the target phenomenon to a native-like level and did not score significantly higher than the intermediate L2 learners at both the syntax-semantics and syntax-discourse interfaces. For reaction times, while no significant differences were reported between the syntax-semantics and syntax-discourse interface items for the advanced L2 learners, developmental progress was observed on the syntax-semantics but not the syntax-discourse interface phenomenon. The findings suggest that the internal versus external interface dichotomy should not suffice to account for the acquisition difficulty and processing costs of different linguistic properties in L2 acquisition.