earticle

영어

The present study investigates Chinese and Japanese learners' acquisition of some combinations of Korean prefinal endings: -si-, -ass/ess-, and -kess-. Forty-nine Chinese speakers and forty-two Japanese speakers participated in the experiment that asked the participants to judge the grammaticality of the combination of the prefinal endings. They were presented through a computer monitor a verb form which included the combination of two or three prefinal endings and asked to judge the grammaticality of the verb form. The findings of the study revealed a strong influence of the learners' native language. The Japanese participants showed a substantial improvement as their Korean proficiency increased, while the Chinese learners of Korean showed a small increase, which was not statistically significant. A new approach that considers both positive and negative effects of the learners' native language should be developed in the teaching of Korean in the classroom and in the development of Korean teaching materials.