This study explores cross-linguistic differences in online sentence production, working on the theory that the grammatical characteristics of a language customize the speakers’ usual manner of sentence construction and utterance. It is reasoned that a contrast between English and Korean syntax has a direct bearing on that process: The sentential subject is licensed by a tensed verb in English, while it is by an overt morpheme in Korean. This gives rise to a substantial difference in the speakers’ speech patterns: English speakers’ message formation and linguistic encoding center on a verb, while Korean speakers elect or utter a subject first and then draw a predicate. An experiment is conducted on the hypotheses that (a) English L1 speakers are disposed to make sentences based on verbal information, so they would choose a subject that is conceptually more intimate with a given verb; (b) In contrast, Korean L1 speakers’ sentence construction is topic-oriented, so they would first consider the contextual properties of each referent such as shared familiarity and previous topicality; (c) Korean speakers’ L1 patterns would be persistent in their L2 English processing. The results and some implications for English teaching are discussed.

【벼리】문장은 완결된 내용으로 표현하는 최소의 언어형식이다. 이 문장의 확대를 통해 학습자들은 자신의 생각을 논리적으로 기술하여 하나의 글을 완성해 간다. 문장의 확대는 복문과 관계가 있다. 본고에서는 문장 연결 과제를 통해 외국인 학습자들의 복문 습득 양 상들을 살펴보고자 하였다. 실험은 3주 동안 초․중․고급 단계 외국 인 학습자 45명을 대상으로 하였다. 그 결과 접속문의 경우 대조와 이유가 모든 급에서, 나열은 초급과 고급에서 70%이상의 정답률로 습득을 하였으며 그 외 접속문은 완전 하게 습득을 못하였다. 내포문의 경우 관형절이 모든 급에서 80%이상 의 높은 정답률로 습득을 하였고 명사절은 초급이 47%로 습득이 아 직 진행 중이었으며 중급과 고급은 정답률에 차이가 있지만 습득이 이루어졌다. 혼합문의 경우 세 문장, 네 문장 연결하기 모두 정답률이 70%이하로 습득이 이루어지지 않았다. 이상에서 단순한 두 문장 연결의 접속문과 내포문에서 습득이 이루어졌더라도 문장 길이가 길어져 통사적으로 좀 더 복잡한 복문구조가 되면 문장 연결의 정확도가 떨어진다는 것을 알 수 있었다.

The current study investigates the syntactic priming effects on sentence processing in Korean(L1) and English(L2) production through a measure of production time. The purpose of this study lies in investigating whether the priming condition facilitates the production process both in processors’ L1 and L2 production. Participants are 32 Korean native speaking (L1) university students who speak English as a second language(L2). The target structures were dative alternate structures: prepositional vs. double object dative structures in English and canonical(DAT-ACC) vs. scrambled(ACC-DAT) dative structures in Korean. The experimental paradigm involved the repetition of an auditory stimulus, followed by picture descriptions. The production time was measured by E-prime. As a result, while syntactic priming effects were observed both in L1 and L2 production, the syntactic primed condition did not reduce the production time in L1 utterances. However, the time was reduced in L2 utterances with failing in reaching to the statistically significant effects.