Overpassivization in the use of unaccusatives by Korean EFL learners = 한국 EFL 학습자들의 비대격 동사 과수동화 현상 연구

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study aims to investigate why Korean EFL learners overpassivize English unaccusatives. To identify learners' overpassivization patterns, a corpus analysis of their writing samples was conducted first. The first study attempts to find out whether two types (Alternating and Non-alternating) of unaccusatives and the subject animacy of the verbs influences the overpassivization error pattern. Non-native students (NNS) corpus data were analyzed by WordSmith Tools to see the frequency of the overpassivization error. It shows that the error rates of non-alternating unaccusatives are higher than those of alternating unaccusatives but that it has no significant difference in error rates between the two types of unaccusatives. It was also found that the overpassivization error rate can differ according to the animacy of subject only in the case of alternating unaccusatives. The results of the first study demonstrate that the animacy can partially play a significant role in the overpassivization error pattern.
The second study also attempts to find out whether the external and internal causation, alternation of verb, and English proficiency affect the overpassivization error pattern. Grammaticality Judgement test with 30 items was conducted on 183 Korean EFL learners not majoring in English from G University. The participants are divided into three groups (High, Middle, and Low) by their English grades on the Korean Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). The experiment shows that there is no significant difference found in the overpassivization errors between the external and internal causation and between alternating and non-alternating unaccusatives. However, it demonstrates that there is significant difference found in the errors among the three groups. The middle group made the most errors among three groups, thereby demonstrates the U-shaped learning development. It is likely that their errors were most affected by natural features of the verb, agentivity, and L1 transfer.
Taking into account above-mentioned study and survey results, it can be concluded that non-linguistic factors, as well as linguistic factors, may affect Korean EFL learners to make overpassivization errors. In future studies, more non-linguistic factors will be considered for analysis to investigate how they pose difficulties to the learners when deciding which voice form to use.

목차 (Table of Contents)

• 1. Introduction 1
• 1.1 Background of the Study 1
• 1.2 Research Questions 7
• 1.3 Purpose and Organization of the Dissertation 8
• 2. Literature review 10
• 2.1 Types and Properties of English Unaccusatives 10
• 2.2 Overpassivization of English Unaccusatives 14
• 2.2.1 Data of English Overpassivization by L2 Learners 14
• 2.2.2 Syntactic Approach 15
• 2.2.3 Various Overpassivization Error Rates among Unaccusatives 18
• 2.3 Factors Affecting Overpassivization 20
• 2.3.1 Linguistic Factors 20
• 2.3.1.1 Alternation of Verb 20
• 2.3.1.2 Animacy of Subject 24
• 2.3.1.3 External/Internal Causation 25
• 2.3.1.4 L1 Transfer 29
• 2.3.2 Non-Linguistic Factors 30
• 2.3.2.1 English Proficiency 30
• 2.3.2.2 Emotional effects 32
• 2.3.3 Multiple Effects and Interaction Effects 34
• 3. Research Methods 37
• 3.1 Corpus Analysis 37
• 3.1.1 Research Questions 37
• 3.1.2 Data 37
• 3.1.3 Procedure and Analysis 37
• 3.2 Grammaticality Judgement Task 41
• 3.2.1 Research Questions 41
• 3.2.2 Participants 41
• 3.2.3 Materials and Procedure 43
• 4. Results and Discussion 50
• 4.1. Corpus Analysis Results 50
• 4.1.1 Research Question 1 50
• 4.1.2 Research Question 2 54
• 4.1.3 Discussion 57
• 4.2. Grammaticality Judgement Task Results 60
• 4.2.1 Research Question 1 60
• 4.2.2 Research Question 2 64
• 4.2.3 Research Question 3 66
• 4.2.4 Discussion 79
• 4.2.4.1 External/Internal Causation 79
• 4.2.4.2 Alternation of Verbs 80
• 4.2.4.3 Proficiency 83
• 5. Summary 89
• References 93
• Korean Abstract 101
• Appendices 103