Previous studies of semantic implicit learning in language have only examined learning grammatical form-meaning connections in which learning could have been supported by prior linguistic knowledge. In this study we target the domain of verb meaning, specifically semantic preferences regarding novel verbs (e.g., the preference for a novel verb to…

Despite many years of investigation into implicit learning in nonlinguistic domains, the potential for implicit learning to deliver the kinds of generalizations that underlie natural language competence remains unclear. In a series of experiments, we investigated implicit learning of the semantic preferences of novel verbs, specifically, whether…

We report three experiments that explore the effect of prior linguistic knowledge on implicit language learning. Native speakers of English from the United Kingdom and native speakers of Cantonese from Hong Kong participated in experiments that involved different learning materials. In Experiment 1, both participant groups showed evidence of…

Although there is good evidence for implicit learning of associations between forms, little work has investigated implicit learning of form-meaning connections, and the findings are somewhat contradictory. Two experiments were carried out using a novel reaction time methodology to investigate implicit learning of grammatical form-meaning…

The present study investigates the influence of first language (L1) lexicalization patterns on the processing of second language (L2) words in sentential contexts by advanced German learners of English. The focus was on cases where a polysemous word in the L1 is realized by independent words in the L2, e.g. German "Blase" realized by English…

This paper investigates the shared or independent nature of grammatical gender representations in the bilingual mental lexicon and the role word form similarity (as in the case of cognates) plays in these representations. In a translation task from Greek (L1) to German (L2), nouns that had the same gender in both languages were translated faster…

Cross-language (L1-to-L2) syntactic priming is the repetition of utterance structure from one language to another independently of meaning and has motivated models of language-shared representations of L1-L2 equivalent structures (Salamoura and Williams, submitted; Schoonbaert, Hartsuiker and Pickering, submitted). These models assume that the…

Two experiments examined the learning of form-meaning connections under conditions where the relevant forms were noticed but the critical aspects of meaning were not. Miniature noun class systems were employed, and the participants were told that the choice of determiner in noun phrases depended on whether the object was "near" or "far" from the…

Our research reflects the current trend to relate individual differences in second language learning to underlying cognitive processes e.g., Robinson, 2002. We believe that such investigations, apart from being of practical importance, can also shed light on the cognitive mechanisms underlying the language learning process. Here we focus on the…