Earticle

The present study tested whether adult Korean learners of English are able to immediately integrate verb-specific structural information (i.e. subcategorization restrictions imposed by individual verbs) as they read sentences in English. Seventeen native speakers of English and 22 Korean learners of English participated in an eye-tracking experiment, in which they read English sentences that contained a wh-dependency between the head NP and the verb of a relative clause. The relative clause verbs consisted of three types that varied in terms of subcategorization properties: transitive verbs that take an NP complement more often than a PP complement, transitive verbs that take a PP complement more often than an NP complement, and unaccusative verbs that are strictly intransitive. The results suggest that whereas native speakers use verb subcategorization information in making initial parsing decisions regarding wh-dependency formation, Korean learners are only able to integrate the information in later stages of sentence processing. Possible accounts of this discrepancy in the time course of verb information integration are discussed.

This study investigates Koreans' overt and covert language attitudes towards the Jeju dialect. In order to analyze both overt and covert attitudes, direct (survey questionnaire) and indirect (matched-guise test) methods were used together. There were a total of 90 subjects, 30 of whom were speakers of Jeju dialect and 60 of whom were speakers of other Korean regional dialects: central dialect, Gyoungsang dialect, and Jeolla dialect. After all the questionnaires were completed, the results were compiled and subjected to statistical testing (paired t-test or Wilcoxon's signed-ranks test). The study revealed that Jeju dialect users regard their own dialect as a language with high solidarity and low status when their overt and covert attitudes were investigated. Also, it was confirmed that other dialect users label Jeju dialect as a language with low solidarity and low status when their overt attitude was analyzed. However, when their covert attitudes were analyzed, it turned out that they feel Jeju dialect is a language with low status and neutral level of solidarity. There was a subtle difference between Jeju dialect users’ overt and covert language attitudes in regard to status. This might have been caused by Jeju dialect users’ radical perception change towards Jeju dialect. As for the other dialects users, there was a difference between their overt and covert language attitudes in respect to solidarity. Their prejudice against Jeju dialect is likely to be a reason for this discrepancy.

This paper analyzes the trends of the studies on particle errors for Chinese Korean learners and examines the results of the research so far. Based on this, this paper aims to present the future research task of particle errors analysis. The papers subject to analysis are 90 theses and dissertations of the degree and 43 articles of the academic journal, which are total 133 articles of the study, and in this paper, the research trends were analyzed in detail by study timing, study data (size and type), study target (proficiency, learning environment), study content (by particle, by error type). As a result, among the field of error research for Chinese learners, research on particles has been ongoing steadily, and the target data has mostly been centered on written materials. Specifically, error studies on case markers accounted for the largest portion and most studies were found to be error types based on the determination of the results. Future studies on particle errors require studies to observe changes in error patterns according to proficiency and to identify the cause of particle errors.

This study investigates correlations between gender and strategy use and, more specifically, the prioritization for metacognitive strategy use in Korean EFL learners using the Strategy Inventory for Language Learning (SILL, Oxford, 1990). An entry SILL survey was given at the beginning of a semester for an EFL discussion class in Korea and an exit SILL survey was given at the end of the semester to determine if there were any significant changes in strategy use in either gender group. The study found that significant shifts in the use of metacognitive and affective strategies were demonstrated by females, while only minor metacognitive strategy shifts were found in the male groups. Implications are made towards the development of language learning classrooms which are designed for specific types of language learners based on their preferences in strategy usage.