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It is generally agreed that first language (L1) morphological awareness, the ability to reflect upon, analyze and manipulate morphemes and morphological structure of words, can transfer and facilitate second language (L2) reading subskill acquisition. However, the facilitative role of L1 morphological awareness is unclear in the literature investigating third language (L3) reading. This study explored if and how L1 morphological awareness and L2 reading subcomponent skills contribute jointly to L3 lexical inferencing in syllabic L1 Japanese-alphabetic L2 English-morphosyllabic L3 Chinese university learners. Sixty-seven students were recruited from novice-level, first-year Chinese classes from a Japanese university. Only 56 students completed 7 computerized or paper-and-pencil tasks, including L1 Japanese morphological awareness, L2 English morphological awareness, L2 English vocabulary knowledge, L2 English lexical inferencing, L3 Chinese morphological awareness, L3 Chinese vocabulary knowledge, and L3 Chinese lexical inferencing. They also completed a self-reported proficiency questionnaire survey. Correlational and regression analyses were conducted. The results suggested that there was only a significant association between L1 Japanese morphological awareness and L3 Chinese lexical inferencing, and there were no significant correlations between L2 English reading subcomponent skills and L3 Chinese lexical inferencing. Discussion is provided regarding the crosslinguistic influence of L1 morphological awareness in L3 reading development and the implications for L3 reading instruction.

This scoping review explores the causal relationship between morphological instruction and reading development in young L2 learners by synthesizing 12 primary studies published between 2004 and 2019 (N = 1,535). These studies focused on reading English as the target language and involved participants between kindergarten and Grade 12 from four countries (China, Egypt, Singapore, and the USA). Findings suggested that (a) morphological instruction led to consistent and positive gains in L2 children’s morphological awareness and vocabulary knowledge, and the effect sizes (Cohen’s ds) ranged from small to large; and (b) the relationship between morphological instruction and other outcomes such as phonological awareness, word reading accuracy, word reading fluency, spelling, and reading comprehension was inconclusive. Notably, transfer effects of L2 English morphological instruction on novel word learning in English or on reading development in an additional language were only examined and observed in four primary studies. Discussion was provided regarding future instructional and research design.

This research compared the contributions of lexical inferencing, decoding, and listening comprehension to reading comprehension in Chinese-speaking learners of English as a second language (ESL) enrolled in university bridging programs in the U.S. and Chinesespeaking university learners of English as a foreign language (EFL) in mainland China. The findings suggested that the contributions of these three reading component skills differed in ESL and EFL contexts: In the ESL context, both second language (L2) lexical inferencing and L2 decoding were significant predictors of L2 reading comprehension, but L2 listening comprehension did not correlate with L2 reading comprehension. In the EFL context, L2 lexical inferencing was the only significant predictor of L2 reading comprehension. Thus, it appears that the Simple View Reading (decoding + listening comprehension = reading comprehension) is not applicable to Chinese-speaking adult learners of L2 English because learners in both ESL and EFL contexts rely on word-level reading subskills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Home language and literacy input (HLLI) is critical for linguistic and literacy development in bilingual children. This exploratory study investigated home oral, and print input for Chinese heritage language learners between four and six years old in the United States and aimed to identify salient types of input associated with speaking and reading abilities in the heritage language (Chinese) and the societal language (English). Fifty-three parents completed a HLLI questionnaire and rated the speaking and reading competencies in Chinese and English of their children. The relationships between HLLI and bilingual abilities were examined via principal component analysis and regression. There were two major findings: first, Chinese speaking ability mainly depended on oral language exchange between parents and their children, as well as print exposure to Chinese; Chinese reading ability was associated with oral language exchange between parents and their children, as well as pinyin/bopomofo practice at home. Second, both speaking and reading abilities in English were significantly and positively related to children's interest in reading English only. Evidencebased recommendations are provided regarding home language and literacy practices for young Chinese heritage language learners in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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.