CHAPTER ONE INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 Significance of the Study of Temporality 1
1.2 Significance of the Present Study 3
1.3 Outline of the Book 7
CHAPTER TWO THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 9
2.1 Temporal Semantics and the Tense-aspect System 9
2.1.1 Time Specification and Expressions of Temporal Relations 10
2.1.2 The Tense-Aspect Morphology of Past in English 18
2.2 Lexical Aspect:The Inherent Temporal Properties 21
2.2.1 Lexical Aspect versus Grammatical Aspect 22
2.2.2 Inherent Aspectual Classification of Verbs on Time Schemata 23
2.2.3 Inherent Semantic Aspectual Properties of Verbs 27
2.2.4 Distinctions of Lexical Aspects by Semantic Properties 29
2.2.5 Diagnostic Tests of Lexical Aspectual Categories 31
2.3 Chapter Summary 40
CHAPTER THREE PREVIOUS STUDIES ON ACQUIS-ITION OF TEMPORALITY 42
3.1 Studies on Acquisition Stages of Temporality 43
3.1.1 Developmental Stages of Temporal System in L1 43
3.1.2 Developmental Stages of Temporal Acquisition in L2 45
3.2 Studies on Acquisition Order of Past Morphology:A Formal Perspective 52
3.2.1 Acquisition of Irregular and Regular Past Morphology 52
3.2.2 The Principle of Saliency 55
3.3 Studies on Lexical Aspect:A Semantic Perspective 59
3.3.1 The Defective Tense Hypothesis 60
3.3.2 The Primacy of Aspect Hypothesis 62
3.3.3 The Aspect Hypothesis 63
3.3.4 Principles Underlying Tense-Aspect Acquisition 67
3.4 Review of Research Methodologyin Temporal Studies 73
3.4.1 Longitudinal versus Cross-sectional Studies 73
3.4.2 Individual versus Group Data 75
3.4.3 Data Elicitation Tasks 76
3.5 Chapter Summary 78
CHAPTER FOUR METHODOLOGY 81
4.1 Research Hypotheses 81
4.2 Participants 84
4.3 Data Elicitation 86
4.3.1 The Task 86
4.3.2 Elicitation Procedure 87
4.4 Data Coding 87
4.4.1 Identification of Obligatory Simple Past Contexts 88
4.4.2 Coding for Features of Phonetic Saliency 90
4.4.3 Coding for Lexical Aspectual Categories 92
4.4.4 Coding for Verb Type 96
4.5 Data Analysis 97
4.5.1 Selection of Data for Analysis 98
4.5.2 Tests for Bias of the Selected Data 104
4.5.3 Division of Participants for the Cross-sectional Study 108
4.5.4 Data Processing 110
4.6 Chapter Summary 111
CHAPTER FIVE RESULTS AND FINDINGS 112
5.1 Results from Analyses of Phonetic Saliency 112
5.1.1 Results from the Overall Descriptive Study:Evidence for Hypothesis 1 112
5.1.2 Results from the Cross-sectional Study Across the Five Proficiency Groups:Evidence for Hypothesis 2 123
5.2 Results from Analyses of Lexical Aspect 137
5.2.1 Results from the Overall Descriptive Study:Evidence for Hypothesis 3 138
5.2.2 Results from the Cross-sectional Study:Evidence for Hypothesis 4 142
5.3 Chapter Summary 149
CHAPTER SIX DISCUSSION 151
6.1 The Effect of Phonetic Saliency 151
6.1.1 The Irregular versus Regular Constraint 152
6.1.2 The Constraint of Saliency on Irregular Variants 155
6.1.3 The Constraint of Saliency on Regular Variants 157
6.2 The Effect of Lexical Aspect 159
6.3 A General Discussion 163
6.4 Chapter Summary 165
CHAPTER SEVEN CONCLUSION 166
7.1 Major Findings 166
7.2 Pedagogical Implications 169
7.3 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Studies 171
BIBLIOGRAPHY 174
APPENDIX Data Collection Task 189
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 191
Table 2.1 Tense and Adverbial Relations 12
Table 2.2 Possible Combinations of Tense and Aspect in English 18
Table 2.3 The Relationship Between the Semantic Properties and the Aspectual Categories 31
Table 3.1 The Spread of Past Morphology from 0-inflection to Target-like Acquisition 65
Table 3.2 Distribution of Past and Present Inflections by Aspectual Class for Both L1 and L2 Learners Following the Aspect Hypothesis 67
Table 4.1 The Saliency Hierarchy of Phonetic Features of the Simple Past Morphology 92
Table 4.2 Inter-rater Reliability Test for Classification of Lexical Aspect 96
Table 4.3 Distribution of Samples by Length of Composition Before Selection 98
Table 4.4 Distribution of Accuracy Rates by Classification of Phonetic Saliency Before Selection 101
Table 4.5 Distribution of Appropriacy Rates by Classification of Lexical Aspect Before Selection 102
Table 4.6 The Use of Past Morphology by Male and Female Participants(by classification of phonetic saliency) 104
Table 4.7 The Use of Past Morphology by Male and Female Participants(by classification of lexical aspect) 105
Table 4.8 The Use of Past Morphology by Different Length of English Study(by classification of phonetic saliency) 106
Table 4.9 The Use of Past Morphology by Different Length of English Study(by classification of lexical aspect) 107
Table 4.10 Distribution of Participants by Rate of Past Tense Use Based on Classification of Phonetic Saliency 108
Table 4.11 Distribution of Participants by Rate of Past Tense Use Based on Classification of Lexical Aspect 109
Table 5.1 Distribution of Irregular and Regular Past Morphology(overall study;token analysis) 113
Table 5.2 Distribution of Irregular and Regular Past Morphology(overall study;type analysis) 114
Table 5.3 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology of Irregular Variants(overall study;token analysis) 115
Table 5.4 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology of Irregular Variants(overall study;type analysis) 116
Table 5.5 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology of Regular Variants(overall study;token analysis) 118
Table 5.6 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology of Regular Variants(overall study;type analysis) 119
Table 5.7 A Summary of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;token analysis) 120
Table 5.8 A Summary of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;type analysis) 121
Table 5.9 The Overall Developmental Tendency of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;token analysis) 121
Table 5.10 The Overall Developmental Tendency of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;type analysis) 122
Table 5.11 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Irregular and Regular Past Morphology(token analysis) 124
Table 5.12 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Irregular and Regular Past Morphology(type analysis) 125
Table 5.13 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Irregular Variants of the Simple Past Morphology(token analysis) 127
Table 5.14 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Irregular Variants of the Simple Past Morphology(type analysis) 130
Table 5.15 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Regular Variants of the Simple Past Morphology(token analysis) 133
Table 5.16 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of Regular Variants of the Simple Past Morphology(type analysis) 135
Table 5.17 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(overall study;token analysis) 138
Table 5.18 Comparison of the Past Tense Use of Statives and BE(token analysis) 139
Table 5.19 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(BE excluded from Statives)(overall study;token analysis) 140
Table 5.20 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(overall study;type analysis) 141
Table 5.21 A Comparison of the Past Tense Use of Statives and BE(type analysis) 141
Table 5.22 Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(BE excluded from Statives)(overall study;type analysis) 141
Table 5.23 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(token analysis) 144
Table 5.24 Results from the Cross-sectional Study of the Distribution of the Simple Past Morphology by Lexical Aspect(type analysis) 147
Figure 2.1 Classification of Aspectual Oppositions 17
Figure 3.1 Relationship Between the Development of Cognition and Temporal Expression 46
Figure 3.2 Extension from Prototype to Marginal Members for English Past Morphology 71
Figure 3.3 Extension from Prototype to Marginal Members for English Progressive Morphology 72
Figure 4.1 Distribution of Samples by Length of Composition Before Selection 99
Figure 4.2 Distribution of Samples by Length of Composition After Selection 100
Figure 4.3 Distribution of Accuracy Rates by Classification of Phonetic Saliency Before Selection 100
Figure 4.4 Distribution of Accuracy Rates by Classification of Phonetic Saliency After Selection 102
Figure 4.5 Distribution of Appropriacy Rates by Classification of Lexical Aspect Before Selection 103
Figure 4.6 Distribution of Appropriacy Rates by Classification of Lexical Aspect After Selection 103
Figure 5.1 A Summary of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;token and type analyses compared) 121
Figure 5.2 The Developmental Tendency of the Simple Past Marking Across All Variants by Phonetic Saliency(overall study;token and type analysis compared) 122
Figure 5.3 Distributional Pattern of Irregular Past Variants in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 129
Figure 5.4 Developmental Trend of Each of the Irregular Past Variants Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 129
Figure 5.5 Distributional Pattern of Irregular Past Variants in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 131
Figure 5.6 Developmental Trend of Each of the Irregular Past Variants Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 132
Figure 5.7 Distributional Pattern of Regular Past Variants in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 134
Figure 5.8 Developmental Trend of Each of the Regular Past Variants Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 134
Figure 5.9 Distributional Pattern of Regular Past Variants in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 136
Figure 5.10 Developmental Trend of Each of the Regular Past Variants Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 136
Figure 5.11 Distributional Pattern of the Simple Past Marking by Lexical Aspect in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 145
Figure 5.12 Developmental Trend of Each of the Lexical Categories Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;token analysis) 145
Figure 5.13 Distributional Pattern of the Simple Past Marking by Lexical Aspect in Each Proficiency Group(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 148
Figure 5.14 Developmental Trend of Each of the Lexical Categories Across Proficiency Groups(cross-sectional study;type analysis) 149