Korean EFL Learners’ Acquisition of English Prenominal Adjectival Participles

Korean EFL Learners’ Acquisition of English Prenominal Adjectival Participles

  In this study I investigated Korean EFL learners’ knowledge of English conflation classes of verbs, focusing on the formation of prenominal adjectival participles. Three groups of 30 learners and 1 group of 10 native speakers of English participated in the study. They rated the acceptability of prenominal adjectival participles contained in two different linguistic contexts. The results showed that the Korean EFL learners were generally sensitive to conflation classes related to the formation of prenominal adjectival participles, even though a clear-cut separation of the state-change from the non-state-change verb classes started from the intermediate learners. It suggests that Korean EFL learners’ knowledge of English conflation classes of verbs in the formation of prenominal adjectival participles improved gradually, as they increase exposure to English. In addition, the finding that the low-proficiency learners have not yet learned the state-change items as a conflation class from the non-state change items may be explained partially by L1 effect. Finally, an asymmetry between manner verbs and state-change verbs associated with prenominal adjectival participles was discussed.