@conference {4724, title = {Salience-based vs. exposure-based strategies in L2 pronoun resolution in French}, year = {2016}, month = {09/2016}, abstract = {

We investigated pronoun resolution strategies in French native speakers and in German L2-learners of French. French and German differ in antecedent preferences in ambiguous constructions such as ?The postman hit the pirate before he went home?: while French shows a N2-preference, which is explained by the availability of a construction that unambiguously refers to N1, German, which does not have this alternative, shows a N1-preference.\ 
In questionnaires, we tested French active and passive sentences to investigate (a) whether the L2-learners would apply the same strategy as natives in the active condition (i.e. N2-preference), and (b) whether the explicit topicalization of a referent as a consequence of passivization influences interpretation preferences in both groups (resulting in more N1 choices).\ 
The results show that German learners continue to apply the L1 strategy in the L2, preferring the N1 significantly more often than the French natives in the active condition (57\% vs. 23\%). Crucially, the number of N1 choices increased significantly in both groups in the passive condition (74\% vs. 62\%). These results support salience-based strategies in L1 and L2 pronoun resolution and suggest that L2-learners might have difficulty acquiring strategies based on the frequency and availability of alternative constructions in the L2.

}, author = {Israel de la Fuente and Schimke, Sarah and Sascha Kuck and Barbara Hemforth and Colonna, Saveria} } @conference {4725, title = {Topicality-based vs. exposure-based preferences in pronoun resolution in French: Evidence from questionnaires and eye-movements}, year = {2016}, month = {09/2016}, abstract = {

It has been observed that in French sentences such as \&$\#$39;The facteur a appel\é le pirate avant qu\&$\#$39;il rentre \à la maison\&$\#$39; (\&$\#$39;The postman called the pirate before he went home\&$\#$39;), the N2 (the pirate) is strongly preferred as the antecedent of the ambiguous pronoun. This N2-preference in French has been explained by the fact that speakers take into account an alternative non-finite construction that is available in the language (\&$\#$39;avant de rentrer \à la maison\&$\#$39;, \&$\#$39;before going home\&$\#$39;) and that unambiguously refers to the N1.\ 
In a questionnaire and a Visual World eye-tracking experiment, we tested whether the explicit topicalization of the object by means of a passive construction (\&$\#$39;Le pirate a \ét\é appel\é par le facteur...\&$\#$39;) can change the N2-preference in favor of an N1-preference. Despite the fact that the non-finite construction is an unambiguous alternative for the active as well as the passive sentences, we observed a significant increase of N1-preferences in passive compared to active constructions in both the questionnaire (p\<.0001) and the Visual World experiment (p\<.01). These results suggest that pronoun interpretation preferences based on the frequency and availability of alternative constructions can be overridden when a referent is explicitly marked as the topic.

}, author = {Israel de la Fuente and Schimke, Sarah and Coralie Vincent and Barbara Hemforth and Colonna, Saveria} } @conference {4548, title = {L2 ambiguous pronoun resolution: the impact of L1-based preferences, L2-proficiency and working memory capacity}, year = {2015}, month = {05/2015}, address = {Rutgers}, author = {Schimke, Sarah and Colonna, Saveria and Israel de la Fuente and Barbara Hemforth} } @conference {4453, title = {Clause structure matters: The role of left-dislocation \& clefts in pronoun resolution}, year = {2013}, month = {03/2013}, address = {University of South Carolina}, doi = {10.13140/RG.2.1.1245.9682}, author = {Barbara Hemforth and Israel de la Fuente and Colonna, Saveria and Schimke, Sarah} } @conference {4460, title = { Pronoun resolution is fast and automatic: Evidence from a German visual world experiment}, year = {2013}, month = {09/2013}, address = {Marseille}, doi = {10.13140/RG.2.1.2974.4803}, author = {Schimke, Sarah and Colonna, Saveria and Barbara Hemforth} } @conference {4458, title = {The role of focus in within- and between-sentence pronoun resolution}, year = {2013}, month = {09/2013}, address = {Marseille}, doi = {10.13140/RG.2.1.1663.7608}, author = {Colonna, Saveria and Schimke, Sarah and Barbara Hemforth} } @conference {1087, title = {Different effects of focus in intra- and inter-sentential pronoun resolution in German and French}, volume = {25}, year = {2012}, month = {03/2012}, pages = {113}, address = {NewYork}, url = {http://cuny2012.commons.gc.cuny.edu/files/2012/03/cuny2012_113.pdf}, author = {Colonna, Saveria and Schimke, Sarah and Medam, Tiphaine and Barbara Hemforth}, editor = {Bradley, Dianne and Fernandez, Eva and Fodor, Janet} }