Real Language Users

[N. Chipere]

Apologies to members of Linguists List for the multiple posting.

I have just written up an experiment carried out to investigate the
conventional notion of linguistic competence (the abstract is appended to
this message). I am planning further experiments based on  what I found. It
would be very useful for me to get some feedback on the first experiment
during this planning stage. If you are interested in reading the
experimental report and offering comments on any aspect of it, no
matter how brief, please let me know and I will send you a copy. Please
also specify the format in which you prefer to view the document and
whether or not you would like me to summarise the responses.

Thanks in advance,

Ngoni Chipere

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Abstract : Real Language Users


The idea of a perfectly competent but resource limited language user is the
basis of many psychological models of sentence comprehension. It is widely
assumed that linguistic competence is a) uniform; b) generative; c)
autonomous; d) automatic and e) constant. It is  also believed that  the
free expression of these properties is frustrated by limits in the
availability of computational resources. However, no firm experimental
evidence for the classical language user appears to exist. Negative evidence
for each assumption is reviewed here and the notion of resource limitations
is shown to be suspect. An experiment is reported which tested each of the
five assumptions underlying the conventional idea of linguistic competence.
It was found that native speakers of English a) differed in  grammatical
competence; b) often failed to display syntactic productivity; c) grossly
violated syntax in favour of plausibility; d) expended conscious effort to
comprehend some sentences and e) appeared to adapt to novel structures as
the experiment progressed. In line with previous studies, a relationship was
found between comprehension skill and formal education. A new finding is
that highly educated non-native speakers of English can outperform less
educated native speakers of English in comprehending grammatically
challenging English sentences. The results indicate that the classical
language user is an inaccurate model of real language users, who appear to
vary widely in grammatical skill. A number of specific questions for further
research are raised.