Native Language Transfer in Vocabulary Acquisition: An Empirical Study From Connectionist Perspective

Since the 1940s, the behaviorist paradigm, contrast analysis hypothesis and mentalist model have focused much attention on explaining the L1 - L2 relationship and how it works in second language acquisition. These studies support that different linguistic features of L1 and L2 would lead to language transfer. Nevertheless, there are still some questions being asked: How does native language transfer occur? What are the effective teaching methods to help L2 learners overcome the challenges of native language transfer? This study investigates native language transfer among Chinese university students in second language vocabulary acquisition. The results show that the connectionist model can explain the cognitive process of native language transfer through a dynamic approach, and adequate language input with timely grammar correction can enhance learning efficiency. The connectionist teaching method is effective in second language vocabulary acquisition.