APPLYING PROCESSABILITY THEORY TO ITALIAN: RESULTS OF ANALYSIS

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APPLYING PROCESSABILITY THEORY TO ITALIAN
RESULTS OF ANALYSIS
A.Ghiaccio, F.Ledda, A.Peloso, A.Salis, A.Zedda
University of Sassari
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Subjects 8 Erasmus students 2 untutored
learnersDesign longitudinal, 5-7 interviews
over 2-5 months Interviews semi-guided, with
free conversation and communicative tasks
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Singular and plural forms for two inflectional
noun classes (-o/-i masculine -a/-e
feminine). Tavolo table Sedia chair.
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Noun phrases Questo this Libro book
Grande big Sedia chair Molte many
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 regular Verb conjugationConjugation of two
regular verbs mangiare (eat) and leggere
(read), present tense. 3 conjugations, 6
persons, different moods, tenses and aspects

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Data collection
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3 criteria

• Data density absence vs non-suppliance
• Data uniformity all structures should have equal
  opportunities to show that they are present and
  productive
• Data qualityfocus on communication vs focus on
  grammar

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Make sure that the learner produces

• morphological minimal pairs
• cane/cani
• complex noun phrases
• tavolo rosso/tavoli rossi
• full NP subjects
• Mario mangia

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Types of tasks

• Notice the difference
• Describe images
• Two-picture stories
• Retelling of scenes taken from movies
• Information-gap tasks

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Notice the difference
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Two picture story
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The happy farm
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Liann 3, noun phrasesfree conversation
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Notice the differencestreet with shops
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Liann 3, noun phrases describe image street
with shops
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II. Data organization
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Liann, interview 1, category procedure
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Liann, Int. 1, Cat.-proc TYPES AND TOKENS
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Exclusion of problematic items formulas

• Category procedure
• Pantaloni, forbici (trousers, scissors)
• Ph- procedure
• Ristorante cinese, lanno scorso
• (chinese restaurant, last year)
• S- procedure
• Come-si-chiama, non-lo-so
• (how-do-you-say, I-dont-know)

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Exclusion of problematic items null subjects

• Full subject
• Mario mangia (Mario eats) (almost certainly
  productive)
• Pronoun subject
• Io-mangio (I eat) (higher risk of
  formulaicity)
• Null subject
• Mangio (eat) (is this really
  agreement?)

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Factorisation

• looking at all phonological forms to see if
  there is any systematic association between any
  of them and any single diacritic feature

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One form can be associated with different
functions
Plural?
-i
Masculine?
Masculine plural?
With some other features?
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Data aggregation

• -i/-e
• As allomorphs for plural,
• Regardless of nouns gender

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emergence is applied to the following structures
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III. Data interpretation
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Demonstrate productivity
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Liann, int.1 Category-proc
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Demonstrate non randomness

• Binomial retrocumulated formula
• applied to category procedure

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Example
p probability of random agreement
2 alternatives right/wrong (more
conservative) 4 alternatives all possible
suffixes (more generous)
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IV. Results
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THREE INFORMANTS

• Liann
• Anita
• Swan

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LIANN

• L1 irish
• Type of learner semi-tutored

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ANITA

• L1 norwegian
• Type of learner tutored

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SWAN

• L1 french
• Type of learner tutored

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APPLYING PROCESSABILITY THEORY TO ITALIAN
RESULTS OF ANALYSIS
A.Ghiaccio, F.Ledda, A.Peloso, A.Salis, A.Zedda
University of Sassari
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Visit our web site atwww.uniss.it/facolta/ling
ue/docenti/pallotti

• Includes
• Elicitation materials
• Interviews transcriptions
• Distributional tables