Eye-tracking approach allows us to collect and analyze data for a wide range of measures of eye-movements, to relate these to language processing, and to have insight of language processing (Conklin, Pellicer-Sánchez, and Carrol, 2018). The current study aims to investigate how ESL university students process the sentences with complex noun phrases modified by relative clauses. Two types of sentences with complex noun phrases were examined: complex noun phrases modified by relative clauses located in a sentence subject (syntactic-based processing) and those located in a sentence object (semantic-based processing). In total, 32 EFL university students participated in this study. Fixation count, regression rate, first reading time, and total reading time of areas of interest were examined. The eye-tracking results showed that the participants showed significantly higher regression rates on noun 2 than noun 1 in both types of complex noun phrases. In terms of verb selection, however, the results showed contrasting aspects : noun 1(verb 1 selection) preference in syntactic-based processing whereas noun 2(verb 2 selection) preference in semantic-based processing,

Syntactic priming effect is a tendency in which the syntactic structure used in the previous utterance tends to be carried over in the following utterance. The effects have been considered to help envisage the abstract process in mind into a more concrete idea and offered prospects for understanding the speakers' grammatical structure. The purpose of the present study is to investigate whether this effect appears in Korean learners of Chinese, and whether the implicit learning effect emerges regardless of their proficiency(length of learning). Participants consist of two groups: less proficient learners with shorter length of learning (N=31) and more proficient learners with longer length of learning( (N=31). For the implicit learning effects, each participant took part in the experiment three times with an interval of fifteen days. The results showed that the syntactic priming effects have been observed. Also, the more salient implicit learning effects were observed in the group with longer length of learning(longer LOL) while the shorter LOL group has shown weaker effects. The results shed light on the universal tendency of syntactic persistence and gave implications that less-proficient learners who lack the cognitive prerequisite on L2 syntactic structures have some limitations on both the priming and implicit learning effects. The findings were complementary with the results of Park (2011).

Syntactic priming effect is defined as a tendency that speakers are more likely to use the syntactic structure in the case that the same structure was used in a preceding sentence compared to the case in which a different syntactic structure was used in a preceding sentence. The purpose of the study is to investigate the difference of the syntactic persistence between young and adult EFL learners. Also, the present study investigated the implicit learning effect. Participants consist of three groups: elementary school students, middle school students, and university students. For the implicit learning effects, each participant took part in the experiment three times with an interval with ten days. As a result, the salient priming effects and implicit learning effects were observed in university students. Weak effects were shown for middle school students and the weakest effects for the elementary school students. Especially, the priming effects on passive and double object dative structure were not observed for the elementary school students, weak for the middle school students, and strong for the university students. The results imply that young EFL learners who are in lack of cognitive prerequisite on L2 linguistic forms are limited to both the priming effects and implicit learning effects. Pedagogically, the young learners who are in lack of cognitive prerequisite knowledge require more explicit instruction for L2 grammar.