Carroll, SusanneLee, JeongEun2014-09-242014-11-172014-09-242014Lee, J. (2014). Acquiring English complex compound nouns: An L2 study of Korean learners (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/24685http://hdl.handle.net/11023/1808My thesis is designed to see how adult second language learners (L2) process compounds containing plurals in non-head constituent (e.g., rats eater). These compounds have been well-studied in first language (L1) acquisition but not in L2 acquisition. They are interesting for several reasons: there is an interesting constraint such that the plural-marked noun can be irregular but not regular (mice eater vs. *rats eater); they are infrequent; Korean lacks plurals inside compounds like the English ones. They thus lend themselves to the study of three claims: 1) the ability of learners to process novel information is limited by how L1 grammatical knowledge is represented and processed; 2) L2 learners are nonetheless able to represent new linguistic distinctions; 3) the frequency of constructions in the input also constrains L2 learning. A goal is therefore to determine what Koreans learn of this construction and which acquisition mechanisms explain what they know.engUniversity of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.Linguisticssecond language acquisitionKorean learnersAITcompound nounsmaster thesishttp://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/24685