A Study on Korean English Learners' Acquisition of English Verb Classes

Abstract

This study is based on verb classes and their semantic features of meaning which were proposed by Vendler (1967), Dowty (1979), Van Valin & LaPolla (1997), and Van Valin (2005). Especially, this empirical study attempted to investigate how the verb classes are acquired by 65 EFL college learners. The subjects responded to a 20-item instrument by indicating whether sentences in which verbs occur in the progressive aspect or co-occur with some phrases were acceptable or not. Their responses were submitted to a Winsteps program that is based on the Rasch analysis. The item fit indices showed that each test item followed Rasch analysis expectations. Further Rasch analysis showed that the combined semantic features of both punctual and telic were more difficult than a single semantic feature of static or telic, and that the verb class which is unmarked for all the three semantic features was the easiest. This result indicated that semantic meanings may be hierarchically organized so that verbs with semantically more difficult features are likely to be more difficult than others. In particular, it was found that the hierarchical difficulty order was from the easiest class of activity verbs, which are unmarked for all the three semantic features, to state verbs, to accomplishment verbs, and to the most difficult class of achievement verbs, which are marked for both punctuality and telicity. A practical approach for teaching verb meanings was suggested, based on a consciousness-raising task.