Language Learning 54:2, June 2004, pp.311-394

Effects of Recasts on the Acquisition of theAspectual Form -te i-(ru) by Learners of

Japanese as a Foreign Language

Midori IshidaUniversity of Hawai'i at Manoa

The present study investigated the effects of intensiverecasting on second language learners' use of the Japa-nese aspectual form -te i-(ru) using a time-series design.Four college classroom learners participated in 8 conver-sational sessions, with the researcher providing recastsduring the middle 4 sessions, and 2 of the learners alsoparticipated in a delayed-posttest session after 7 weeks.Overall accuracy increased significantly in correlationwith the number of recasts provided during the treat-ment period, and the accuracy rate was retained. How-ever, in contrast to the prediction based on the aspecthypothesis, the progressive use of -te i-(ru) was less

This article is a revised version of my scholarly paper (Ishida, 2002)submitted to University of Hawai'i in 2002, in partial fulfillment of therequirements for the Advanced Graduate Certificate in Second LanguageStudies. An earlier version of this article was presented at the FourthPacific Second Language Research Forum (PacSLRF), October 4-7, 2001,in Honolulu, Hawai'i.

I would like to give special thanks to Catherine Doughty, YasuhiroShirai, Kazue Kanno, J. D. Brown, and Kazutoh Ishida for theirinvaluable comments and support in writing up the present article. I amalso grateful for the insightful and constructive comments of theanonymous reviewers of Language Learning.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to MidoriIshida, Department of Second Language Studies, University of Hawai'i atManoa, 1890 East-West Road, Honolulu, HI 96822-2318. Internet:mfurukaw@hawaii.edu

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accurate than the resultative use, which showed constantincrease in every learner's performance. Possibleaccounts for the results include the role of input in class-room instruction, learners' developmental readiness, andcomplexity of form-function mapping.

The acquisition of aspect morphology in second languages(L2s) has been investigated extensively in Indo-Europeanlanguages such as English, Spanish, Italian, and French sincethe mid-1980s (reviewed in Andersen & Shirai, 1996; Bardovi-Harlig, 1999, 2000; Salaberry & Shirai, 2002). However, suchempirical studies are scarce in typologically dissimilar lan-guages such as Japanese (Li & Shirai, 2000). Moreover, althoughstudies on natural acquisition orders of various aspectual mean-ings in Japanese denoted by one form are abundant, there are nostudies that have investigated the effects of instruction on L2learners' development of their various uses of an aspectual form.The present study aimed at filling the gap in this area ofresearch by investigating the effect of recasts as an instructionaltechnique on the acquisition of various uses of the Japaneseaspectual form -te i-(ru).

The Japanese Aspectual Form -te i-(ru)

Aspect is generally categorized into perfective and imperfec-tive, according to "different ways of viewing the internal tem-poral constituency of a situation" (Comrie, 1976, p. 3). TheEnglish aspectual form consisting of an auxiliary and -ingis an example of an imperfective aspect marker that denotesmeanings such as progressive, habitual, and futurate aspect.The Japanese aspectual form composed of a verb in the -teform and a verb of animate existence i-(ru) is also sometimesreferred to as an imperfective aspect marker for the sake ofcrosslinguistic comparison (Shibata, 1999; Shirai, 1998b, 2000).

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Because -te i-(ru) denotes "a state of affairs as existing in ahomogeneous, unchanging fashion over a given interval of time"(Jacobsen, 1992, p. 200), it is also called a durative aspect marker(e.g., Li & Shirai, 2000, p. 137; Shibata, 2000; Shirai, 1998a) or acontinuative aspect marker (e.g., Rispoli, 1990; Shirai, 1993). Themeaning durative or continuative can be further categorized intofour distinct meanings: the progressive, the resultative, thehabitual, and the perfect. Examples of the respective aspectualmeanings denoted by -te i-(ru) are presented below. WhereasExamples (1) through (3) are taken from the speech productionof participants in the present study, the actual utterance has beenmodified in Example (4) for the sake of simplicity. (The examplesuse the following abbreviations: TOP: topic; ASP: aspect; NPAST:nonpast; and ACC: accusative.)

(1) Progressive the instance when the photo was

Minna wa tabe-te i-ru. taken

All TOP eat-ASP-NPAST

'All (of them) are eating.' - x xx x x -

<to eat>

(2) Resultative the instance when the photo was

Kajuaru-na fuku o ki-te i-masu. taken

Casual clothes ACC put on-ASP-NPAST(polite)

'(I am) in casual clothes.' -x _

t<to put the clothes on>

(3) Habitual

Ima dorama o benkyooshi-te i-masu.

Now drama ACC study-ASP-NPAST(polite)

'(We are) studying dramas these days.'

(4) Perfect

Senmon wa sudeni kime-te i-ru.

Major TOP already decide-ASP-NPAST

'(I) have already decided on my major.'

before I -nowadays I later

Iw w - x x x - y y y

<to study dramas>

now

- -- > 1

_ x

<to decide the major>

In Example (1), the speaker is describing a photograph thatwas taken at a dinner table. He uses -te i-(ru) to denote the

Language Learning

action of eating (tabe-(ru)) that was in progress at the timewhen the photo was taken. The aspectual meaning denoted by-te i-(ru) in this example is termed progressive. The aspectualform -te i-(ru) in Example (2) is used to describe the outfit ofa person in a photo. The state of a person who is in casualclothes is a continuative state that resulted from the actionof putting on the clothes some time earlier than when thephoto was taken. This is an example of the resultative use of-te i-(ru). In Example (3), the speaker is explaining the currenttopic of a class with the use of -te i-(ru), which indicates thatthe action of studying dramas in the class is repeated on dif-ferent occasions continuatively during a certain period oftime. In this way, the temporariness of the repeated actionsis also indicated by the marker of the habitual aspect. Thecontinuative meaning in terms of the relevant consequence ofa past situation is also denoted by -te i-(ru), as is shown inExample (4). The decision on a major that the speaker made atan earlier point in time has some relevance to the courses thathe or she has been taking since then. Whereas perfect andhabitual meanings are obtained with basically any of the inher-ent lexical class of the verbs or predicates to which -te i-(ru) isattached, progressive and resultative interpretations areobtained only with certain classes of verbs. To briefly describethe widely used four-way classification of verbs proposed byVendler (1957), the semantic features of inherent lexical aspectclasses are presented in Table 1.

The properties of inherent aspect classes are distinguishedfrom each other in terms of dynamicity, telicity, and punctuality.State verbs are [-dynamic] as well as [-telic] and [-punctual].Other classes of verbs are all [+dynamic], that is, they have someactions involved. Whereas activity verbs are [-telic], accom-plishment and achievement verbs are [+telic], which meansthat the action denoted by the verb has an inherent end point.The two types of verbs that are [+telic] are distinguished interms of punctuality: Whereas accomplishment verbs are[-punctual], achievement verbs are [+punctual], which means

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Table 1

Semantic features of inherent lexical aspect classes

Activity Accomplishment AchievementState (e.g., to eat; (e.g., to eat (e.g., to put on;

(e.g., to think) to study) an apple) to die)

Dynamic - + + +Telic - - + +Punctual - - - +

Note. From "Developmental Sequences: The Emergence of Aspect Marking in SecondLanguage Acquisition," by R. W. Andersen, in T. Huebner & C. A. Ferguson (Eds.),Crosscurrents in Language Acquisition Research and Linguistic Theories (p. 311),1991, Amsterdam/Philadelphia. Copyright 1991 by John Benjamins PublishingCompany. Adapted with permission.

that the entire action is conceived of as having happened at agiven time without any duration.

Progressive meanings are obtained with [+dynamic] and[-punctual] verbs, which include activity verbs such as tabe-(ru)(to eat) and benkyoo-su-(ru) (to study), and accomplishment pred-icates such as ringo o tabe-(ru) (to eat an apple). Resultativemeanings are obtained when -te i-(ru) is attached to [+telic] and[+punctual] verbs, which include achievement verbs such aski-(ru) (to put on) and ochi-(ru) (to fall). In English, the imperfec-tive marker -ing that is attached to an achievement verb denotesthe durative process leading up to the point of achieving the endstate, as in John is dying. In contrast, the Japanese imperfectivemarker -te i-(ru) that is attached to an achievement verb denotesthe durative state that came into being as the result of a pastaction: For example, when -te i-(ru) is attached to an achievementverb, shin-(u) (to die), as in John wa shin-de i-ru, John is inter-preted to be in the state of being dead as a result of dying. Sincethe Japanese aspectual form -te i-(ru) figures differently fromextensively studied Indo-European languages, especially interms of the resultative interpretation of -te i-(ru) in its interac-tion with achievement verbs, research on acquisition of Japaneseaspect has had a slightly different focus from research on the

Language Learning

acquisition of aspect in other languages, as will be discussed inthe next two sections.

The Aspect Hypothesis

Although a variety of approaches have been taken in theinvestigation of L2 learners' acquisition of aspect, including dis-course approaches that focus on the background-foregrounddistinction in narratives (e.g., Bardovi-Harlig, 1995a, 1998;reviewed in Bardovi-Harlig, 1999, 2000), a large number of stu-

dies on aspect acquisition in L2 are interested in the universalityof the early uneven distribution of tense and aspect markersover lexical aspect classes of the verb to which the markers areattached. Through investigation of L2 tense-aspect markingsince the mid-1980s, researchers have observed that L2 learnersas well as children, "in the early stages of acquiring verbalmorphology, use tense-aspect markers selectively according tothe inherent lexical aspect" (Andersen & Shirai, 1994). Thehypothesis that second language acquisition (SLA) researchershave formulated based on this observed phenomenon has cometo be known as the aspect hypothesis (Andersen & Shirai, 1994).

The descriptive generalizations of the hypothesis thatAndersen and Shirai (1996) summarized with regard to firstlanguage (L1) acquisition have been applied to L2 acquisitionof tense and aspect morphology. With regard to the progressiveaspect, the aspect hypothesis predicts that "in languages thathave progressive aspect, progressive marking begins with activ-ity verbs, and then extends to accomplishment/achievementverbs" (Li & Shirai, 2000, p. 50). In other words, in early stagesof L2 acquisition, "progressive marking was associated with[-telic] and [+dynamic] .... This initial restriction to particularsets of verbs gradually weakened" (Li & Shirai, 2000, p. 61).Such tendencies have been observed in many Ll and L2 studieson Indo-European languages, providing some crosslinguisticevidence in support of this prediction. One of the accounts forthe cumulative findings is the prototype account that has been

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provided by researchers such as Andersen and Shirai (1996).According to Shirai (1994), "activity verbs, if combined witha progressive marker, yield an action-in-progress meaning,which forms the prototype meaning for progressive" (p. 80). Itis considered that both Li and L2 learners begin to use a givenform for expressing the most prototypical meaning and gradu-ally extend its use to less prototypical meanings expressed withthe form.

Although there are robust findings that provide crosslin-guistic evidence of such a generalization, other typologicallydifferent languages need to be studied before universals areproposed. As for Japanese aspect, because the aspectual form-te i-(ru) does not allow for progressive interpretations when it isattached to achievement verbs, the prediction for the progressivemarking formulated in the aspect hypothesis should be modifiedinto a prediction as to how -te i-(ru) is used to mark variousaspectual meanings (Li & Shirai, 2000). The modified predictioncould be stated as follows: In the earlier stages of L2 acquisitionof the Japanese aspectual form -te i-(ru), learners begin to use -tei-(ru) with verbs that are both [+dynamic] and [-punctual], suchas activity and accomplishment verbs, thereby often obtainingprogressive meanings, and later extend the use to verbs that areboth [+telic] and [+punctual], such as achievement verbs,thereby obtaining resultative meanings.

L2 Acquisition of -te i-(ru)

Since the mid-1990s, research on L2 acquisition of -te i-(ru)has received increasing attention (reviewed in Li & Shirai,2000; Shirai, 2002; Sugaya, 2002a), and more L2 studies onthe acquisition of -te i-(ru) have been conducted, as summarizedin Table 2. An issue that has to be addressed before any conclu-sion can be reached about the order of acquisition of -te i-(ru)is the learners' proficiency level or developmental stage at thetime of data collection, especially in one-shot studies withoutlongitudinal or cross-sectional designs. For example, in Shibata's

317

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Language Learning

(1999) study, which involved 2 learners in a 4th-year collegecourse who had lived in Japan for 3 years, it is not clear whetherthe researcher considered the learners to be at the initial stageor at the stage where the association between -te i-(ru) andactivity verbs had already been weakened. Nevertheless,although the studies listed above differ in their approach, mostof them, except for Shibata (1999) and Sugaya (2001, 2003),showed results that support the prediction associated with theaspect hypothesis. The different approaches can be categorizedinto two trends. Whereas one group of researchers (e.g., Shibata,1999, 2000; Shirai, 1995), motivated by predictions associatedwith the aspect hypothesis, focus on the association between -tei-(ru) and the lexical aspect classes, the other group of research-ers (e.g., Kurono, 1994, 1995; Sheu, 1997, 2000a, 2000b), moti-vated by findings through earlier studies of contrastive analysisand error analysis, focus on the association between -te i-(ru) andthe aspectual meanings denoted by the form.

To elaborate on the two approaches, I will briefly describethe two earliest studies on L2 acquisition of -te i-(ru) that arereported in Shirai and Kurono (1998). Experiment 1, which is areport of an earlier study conducted by Shirai (1995), is one ofthe studies that analyzed the distribution of -te i-(ru) over verbsof different lexical aspect classes by counting the frequency of itsappearance in free-production data. The 3 L2 learners, whohad stayed in Japan for 8 months, used -te i-(ru) more withactivities (55% on average), which is greater than the percent-age in 2 native Japanese speakers' speech samples (37%).Experiment 2, which is a report of a study conducted by Kurono(1994, 1995), on the other hand, focused on the aspectual mean-ings denoted by -te i-(ru). Through the analysis of an acceptabil-ity judgment task administered three times with 14 L2 learnersstaying in Japan, the researchers found that the learners hadmore difficulty correctly judging the acceptability of the resulta-tive use of -te i-(ru) (about 30% on average) than the progressiveuse (about 40% on average) in the first task administration.Moreover, while the average accuracy of acceptability judgments

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of the -te i-(ru) construction with progressive meaningsincreased from about 40% to 60% after 6 months, theaverage accuracy for the resultative use remained around 30%.Regardless of the differences in their approaches to investigatingthe acquisition of -te i-(ru), the researchers involved in the twoexperiments concluded that their results support the predictionbased on the aspect hyothesis.

As an explanation for the consistent findings from earlierstudies on L2 acquisition of -te i-(ru), a prototype account isprovided by Shirai (1993, 2002, and elsewhere) and Sheu(2000b). As Andersen and Shirai (1996) explained in their proto-type account for the aspect hypothesis, learners of Indo-Europeanlanguages start marking the progressive with the most proto-typical member of the meanings, that is, the unitary action-in-progress, and then later extend the use of the progressive markerto express other meanings. By hypothesizing that there is anaccuracy order also among aspectual meanings denoted by -te i-(ru) in the same way as is found in Indo-European languages,Shirai (1993) considers it possible to "regard the action-in-progress sense as the prototype of the semantics of -te i-, and theresultative meaning as the extension from it" (p. 204), as well asother meanings such as the habitual and the perfect (Sheu,2000b). It has to be noted here that the category action-in-progressis one of the subcategories of the progressive aspect, as will beexplained later (see Table 5). Explanations for the status of theprogressive as the prototypical meaning of -te i-(ru) are furtherprovided in Li and Shirai (2000, pp. 146-147): The prototypicalassociation may be attributed to the combination of (a) a universaldisposition, (b) native speakers' distribution of the -te i-(ru) formin the child's and/or the learner's input (see Shirai, 1998a), and(c) the simplified one-to-one mapping between form and functionthe learner makes in the initial stage of learnin a form.

Specifically with regard to L2 learners, Li and Shirai (2000)also discuss the influence of the learner's Li and the effect ofinstruction. In their review of studies on the aspect hypothesis,Andersen and Shirai (1996) discussed Li influence as a plausible

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explanation for L2 learners' aspect marking, but without muchemphasizing its role. However, recent studies on L2 acquisitionof -te i-(ru) in Japanese have shown the important role thatlearners' Li plays in the association that learners make betweenthe aspectual form and the different aspectual meanings itdenotes (Koyama, 1998; Sheu, 1997; Sugaya, 2001, 2003). InSugaya (2001, 2003), speakers of Li Russian, which does nothave progressive aspect markers, showed no preference for theprogressive use of -te i-(ru). As for speakers of Li Korean, whichdoes have an aspect marker, -o iss-(ta), that is parallel to theresultative use of -te i-(ru), 25 Korean Li speakers in Koyama's(1998) study judged the grammaticality of the resultative useof -te i-(ru) correctly more often than 25 Chinese Li speakers.Although the Chinese durative aspect marker zhe marks theresultative aspect as -te i-(ru) does, it does not cover theentire range of verbs equivalent to the Japanese achievementverbs that can be marked with -te i-(ru). Therefore, if ChineseLi speakers make a one-to-one association between theresultative use of -te i-(ru) and zhe, their use of -te i-(ru) will berestricted to a limited number of verbs. This tendency wasobserved in Sheu's (1997) oral picture descripion task: Theachievement verbs that were marked with -te i-(ru) by many ofthe Chinese Li speaker participants were the ones whoseequivalents in Chinese allow for the resultative construction withzhe. Meanwhile the ones that were marked less with -te i-(ru) andmore with the past-tense marker -ta were the verbs to which theperfective marker le should be attached in Chinese to denoteresultative states.

The influence of the form-function mapping in the learner'sLi system on the distribution of -te i-(ru) is also reportedby Shibata (1999) in her analysis of oral narration of a picturestory. Shibata's research participants, 4 Li speakers ofEnglish who were enrolled in a 4th-year course in Japaneseat a university in the United States, did not use -te i-(ru)more with activity verbs compared to the native speakers' usein the same oral narration task. Furthermore, when Shibata

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analyzed the distribution of -te i-(ru) in a type count, she foundthat her participants used -te i-(ru) more with achievementverbs for resultative meanings than with activity verbs forprogressive meanings. These results do not support the aspecthypothesis, which predicts more use of -te i-(ru) with activityverbs than with achievement verbs. Nevertheless, the resultsdo not mean that -te i-(ru) was associated more with achieve-ment verbs to denote resultative state in the early stages ofacquisition. Shibata indicated that there were instances inwhich her participants used -te i-(ru) with achievement verbsto denote progressive meanings in non-target-like ways. Forinstance, 2 learners attached -te i-(ru) to an achievementverb, de-(ru) (to exit), when describing a picture in which afrog is trying to climb out of a jar. This finding adds supportto the previously mentioned claim of Li influence, becauseEnglish allows progressive interpretation of -ing with achieve-ment verbs. Shibata concluded that "non-native speakersmight have transferred the function of -ing to -te i-(ru)"(p. 80).'

L2 learners' distribution of -te i-(ru)-generally usedmore as the progressive marker than as the resultative marker,but with some exceptional cases-can be thus explained asreflecting the influence of the learners' Li system as well aswith the prototype account. As Li and Shirai (2000) and Shirai(2002) briefly indicate, the effect of instruction may be anotherimportant factor for instructed learners. When contact withthe target language (TL) is restricted to the classroom, as isoften the case in foreign language environments, instructionalcircumstances, such as classroom language use and samplesprovided in teaching materials, are considered to have greatinfluence on the distribution of the input to which the learnersare exposed and the process of developing form-function map-ping (Li & Shirai, 2000, pp. 147-148). Although many of thereviewed studies on L2 acquisition of -te i-(ru) involvedinstructed learners, the issue of instructional effect has notbeen empirically investigated to my knowledge. Therefore, I

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decided to undertake this empirical study on the effect of a

particular type of instructional intervention on L2 learners'development in the use of -te i-(ru).

Recasting as Instructional Intervention

Assuming that -te i-(ru) is acquired differently depending

on the lexical aspect classes to which the aspectual form isattached and on the aspectual meanings the form denotes, thequestion that now needs to be addressed is what type of instruc-tion might be effective in helping L2 learners develop controlover the various uses of -te i-(ru), including the resultative useof -te i-(ru) with achievement verbs, which has been observed tobe more difficult than the progressive use. With the aim of provid-ing the rationale for the choice of recasting as the instructionalintervention employed in the present study, I will first discuss(a) focus on form in communicative activities and (b) recasting as

focus-on-form intervention, and then review (c) experimentallaboratory studies on the effect of recasts and (d) observationalstudies focusing on the frequency of recasting and uptake. Theremainder of the section will address the issues that were raised

through the review of recast studies, such as (e) attentionalfocuses directed to recasts, (f) learners' readiness and attentionto target forms, and (g) durability of instructional effect. Afterpointing out the way these issues are taken into consideration in

the present study, the research questions will be presented.Focus on form in communicative activities. Although commu-

nicative approaches to L2 teaching that put the primary emphasison meaning-oriented communicative activities flourished in NorthAmerica in the 1980s, studies have shown the limitation of suchnoninterventionist approaches to language teaching in the devel-

opment of accuracy. One of the most influential findings is thatstudents in immersion classrooms are unable to achieve ultimateattainment in grammatical competence even after years ofcontent-based instruction with abundant meaningful input(e.g., Harley & Swain, 1984). In search of optimal instructional

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orientation, focus on form (Long, 1991) emerged as an alternativeto purely meaning-oriented approaches in L2 instruction.

A focus on form "overtly draws students' attention to lin-guistic elements when they arise incidentally in lessons whoseoverriding focus is on meaning, or communication" (Long, 1991,p. 46). The facilitative role of focus-on-form interventionshas theoretical premises. According to Schmidt's (1990, 1992)noticing hypothesis, detecting linguistic material in input isnecessary for input to become intake. The important role ofselective attention to a particular form in input in L2 acquisitionalso figures as the indispensable element in the interactionhypothesis (Long, 1981, 1996). In this hypothesis about therole of interaction as an important linguistic environment forL2 acquisition, selective attention to a particular linguisticform that is drawn during negotiation for meaning betweeninterlocutors in a communicative activity is considered tofacilitate L2 learning. Based on these premises, a wide range offocus-on-form techniques, including input processing, inputenhancement, and input flood, have been employed in L2classrooms, and their effectiveness has been investigated(Doughty & Williams, 1998). Recasting is another one of thosefocus-on-form techniques.

Recasting as focus-on-form intervention. The utility ofrecasts, among the various focus-on-form techniques, as a wayof providing feedback to learner errors has been investigatedsince the mid-1990s (Nicholas, Lightbown, & Spada, 2001).According to Long and Robinson (1998), recasts that are pro-vided during communicative activities are "corrective reformula-tions of a child's or adult learner's (Li or L2) utterances thatpreserve the learner's intended meaning" (p. 23). Long andRobinson noted that "such feedback draws learners' attentionto mismatches between input and output, that is, causes them tofocus on form, and can induce noticing of the kinds of forms forwhich a pure diet of comprehensible input will not suffice" (p. 23).Along with the potential roles of output (Swain, 1985; Swain &Lapkin, 1995) for stimulating noticing of one's interlanguage

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(IL) deficiencies or "holes" (Doughty & Williams, 1998, p. 228),recasts given in response to the learner's erroneous output areconsidered to provide opportunities for the learner to notice thegap, or the difference between the TL and one's IL.

Experimental laboratory studies on effects of recasts. Inexperimental studies that compared the conditions with andwithout recasting, recasting as an incidental focus-on-formintervention was found to be effective in the development oflearners' use of various target forms (e.g., Han, 2002; Mackey& Philp, 1998). Learners improved, in terms of accuracy or con-sistency, in the use of the target forms, which they had alreadybegun to use, as an effect of several treatment sessions. Mean-while, studies that compare the utility of recasts (which providenegative evidence) to the utility of models (which provide posi-tive evidence; Ayoun, 2001; Inagaki & Long, 1999; Mito, 1993;Ortega & Long, 1997) have had mixed results. In these studies,learners in the recast groups received recasts immediately afterevery instance of their production, whereas learners in themodel groups received the same number of models as recasts.The changes in accuracy scores for the recast and model groupswere compared, as were the changes in the accuracy scores of thelearners in control groups who did not receive treatment on thetarget forms. The recast groups showed higher scores compared tothe model groups in the locative construction and an adjectiveorder rule in L2 Japanese (Mito, 1993) and adverb placementrules in L2 Spanish (Ortega & Long, 1997), but not in otherfocal rules. Although these studies share the same basic experi-mental design, their results are dissimilar. I will scrutinize themethodological choices made in each study with the aim of iden-tifying some conditions necessary for recasts to be effective.

First, the difference in methodology between Mito's (1993)and Inagaki and Long's (1999; also reported in Long, Inagaki, &Ortega, 1998) studies has to be examined. Whereas Mito foundhigher score gains in the recast group, Inagaki and Long foundno significant difference in score gains between the recast andthe model groups. In both studies, during a communicative game

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on adjective construction rules, learners in the recast groupdescribed the size and color of a piece of paper that theypicked so that their partners could choose a matching piece.Then, their partners provided what the researchers called recasts,regardless of the correctness of the learner's utterance. Therewere six exemplars in both the recast and the model conditions.In the model conditions, the leamers in Mito's study had noopportunity for output after listening to the description of apiece of paper, whereas Inagaki and Long required the learnersto repeat the model utterances. The discrepancy of the results ofthese two studies could be accounted for by the addition of outputopportunity in the model condition in Inagaki and Long's study.As Leeman (2003) pointed out, based on her experimental study,recasts may be effective not because of their property as negativeevidence per se but at least partially because of the "enhancedsalience" of positive evidence. By its juxtaposition with the ILform, a recasting intervention is considered to enhance thesalience of the corresponding TL form in the feedback. The outputopportunity in the model group in Inagaki and Long's experimentmight also have contributed to the enhanced salience of positiveevidence. By way of requiring the leamers to repeat the models,the model condition could have motivated the learners to payattention to the target form contained in the models and thushad a positive effect on the use of the target form. A similar resultis reported in Ayoun's (2001) study, in which leamers in themodel condition had output opportunity immediately afterreceiving models. Ayoun did not find any significant differenceon tense marking between the recast and the model groups.

Secondly, contrastive results on two target structures inOrtega and Long's (1997; also reported in Long et al., 1998)experiments should be discussed in relation to the methodo-logical decision the researchers made. The recast group inOrtega and Long's study demonstrated significantly higher post-test scores compared to the model group on adverb placementrules, whereas the scores of learners in neither group showedany gain on object topicalization. No learner in the control group

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increased his score on either structure. Because no learner in thethree groups had demonstrated prior knowledge of the struc-tures, any gains in score in the recast and the model conditionscan be attributed to the treatment in this particular study.In Inagaki and Long's (1999) experiments, which employed thesame design as Ortega and Long's, learners who demonstratedthe ability to use the target structure in the pretests were noteliminated. Ortega and Long, on the other hand, removed learn-ers with prior knowledge in order to "distinguish the genuineacquisition of new forms from the deployment of grammaticalknowledge that is latent at the onset of a study" (Long et al.,1998, p. 364). By eliminating the intervening variable of priorknowledge, the researchers were able to examine the learnabil-ity of the structures.

Although effects of recasts may be constrained by thedegree of readiness of the learners with respect to the targetforms, the experimental studies reviewed here have shown somesupport for the effectiveness of recasts in improving accurateuse of target structures. In sum, recasting is found to be morebeneficial than provision of models without enhanced salience,as well as in comparison to control conditions.

Observational studies focusing on frequency of recastingand uptake. In contrast to the effectiveness of recasts found inexperimental studies, classroom observational studies on cor-rected feedback provided during interaction in dyads and com-municative or content-based L2 classrooms have squarelyreported the ineffectiveness of recasts in drawing learners'attention to various linguistic elements, especially to morpho-syntactic features. There seems to be agreement that recasts areprovided abundantly as a corrective feedback device by teachersin classrooms (e.g., Doughty, 1994; Lyster & Ranta, 1997), andin learner-learner dyads in the classroom (e.g., Morris, 2002),with some exceptional cases in native speaker (NS)-nonnativespeaker (NNS) dyads (Braidi, 2002; Izumi, 1998) and in childNS-NNS dyads (Oliver, 1995). Despite its frequent use, recastingwas found to be ineffective in eliciting learners' uptake, which

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Lyster and Ranta (1997) defined as "a student's utterance thatimmediately follows the teacher's feedback... that constitutesa reaction in some way to the teacher's intention to draw atten-tion to some aspect of the student's initial utterance" (p. 49).Furthermore, recasting was found to be ineffective in elicitingrepair, which Lyster and Ranta (1997) defined as "the correctreformulation of an error as uttered in a single student turnand not to the sequence of turns resulting in the correctreformulation" (p. 49), or incorporation of the forms in therecasts in the uptake turn (e.g., Braidi, 2002; Izumi, 1998;Lyster & Ranta, 1997; Oliver, 1995), especially on grammaticalerrors (Lyster, 2001; Morris, 2002).

Lyster (2001) interpreted infrequent appearance of uptakeor repair after recasts to be an indication that "recasts may beless successful at drawing learners' attention to their nontargetoutput" in the communicative or content-based L2 classroom(p. 290). However, the limited opportunity for uptake as aresult of discourse features such as the interlocutor's topiccontinuation and the appropriateness of responding with ayes/no answer instead of repairing (Braidi, 2002; Lyster, 1998;Oliver, 1995) suggests that the frequency of uptake movesand repairs may not be a good indicator of learners' attention.Mackey, Gass, and McDonough (2000) examined learners'attention to corrective feedback in relation to learner responseto the feedback through stimulated recall (Gass & Mackey,2000). They found that a large proportion of morphosyntacticerrors, to which recasts were provided in the majority of cases,were not followed by learner repair. The learners' reportsindicate that the learners were likely to fail to perceive theinteractants' feedback to morphosyntactic errors, which theyrarely repaired, as corrective feedback. This result echoesPica's (1994) observation that "negotiation seems to work mostreadily on lexical items and larger syntactic units: Negotiationover grammatical morphology is rare" (p. 518) in interactions inwhich interlocutors do not have instructional focus on particularlinguistic items. Mackey et al.'s (2000) finding may lend support

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to Lyster's (1998) argument that learners may be unlikely toperceive recasts as corrective feedback but may perceive itsimply as confirmation of meaning, especially with respect tomorphosyntactic errors.

Attentional focuses directed to recasts. It is difficult to com-

pare the two different strands of findings from experimental andobservational studies, as they seem to result from differences in

the researchers' analytical focuses and the conditions in whichrecasts are provided. Researchers who conduct experimentalstudies focus on the effect of recasts on the development ofparticular linguistic features and set up problem-solving tasksin which learners' attentional focuses are naturally directed tothe recasts. Meanwhile, the focus of observational studies is ondocumenting the natural occurrence of recasts in communicativeclassrooms or dyads, and therefore such studies do not involveintentional emphasis on recasting as focus-on-form intervention.Although it is hoped that some experimental studies areconducted in the classroom and that some classroom studiesinvolve focus on particular forms as the instructional target,there has been only one study, Doughty and Varela (1998),that addresses the relationship between the two strands ofresearch on recasting.

Doughty and Varela's (1998) study demonstrated that itwas possible for the teacher in a content-based L2 classroom toadd emphasis on incidental recasting to draw learners' attentionand that recasting intervention had positive effects in the class-room settings as well as in laboratory settings. Since recastswere provided in response to the learners' uses of the targetitems that were naturally required to complete a specific class-room task, they were not artificial but "task-natural" (Doughty &Varela, 1998, p. 115). The difference between Doughty andVarela's study and observational studies is that the teacher intheir study purposefully provided recasts to draw the learners'attention to the simple past and conditional forms. The teacherused a "focused recasting" technique, which includes repetitionof the learner's incorrect form before the recast proper, and the

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technique was shown to have immediate and long-term effectson promoting accuracy of the target forms. The elimination ofambiguity of recasting on the part of the instructor may havedrawn the learners' attention to recasts as corrective feedbackand thus succeeded in inducing noticing of the gap between theirIL form and the target form in the recasts.

The question for further research is, therefore, whetherrecasting effectively improves the learners' correct use of a tar-get form if recasts are provided incidentally and task-naturallyduring meaning-focused interactions without adding extra sali-ence. In the current study on the acquisition of Japanese aspec-tual form -te i-(ru), this question will be pursued by providingrecasts as confirmation of meaning, without their beingrestricted to the use of the target form, as was done in previousexperimental studies, but extending them as well to other lin-guistic features that need corrective feedback. It is hypothesizedthat when a particular form is responded to with recasts inten-sely and consistently, the learner can increase in his accuracy ofits use even when the recasting is not focused in Doughty andVarela's (1998) sense, that is, does not involve the repetition ofthe learner's incorrect utterance.

Learners' readiness and attention to target forms. Lyster(1998, 2001) discussed the importance of opportunities for modi-fied output in developing the L2 learner's IL based on Swain's(1985) proposal about the role of output in leading to modifiedoutput through attention to one's own IL system. On the groundsthat recasts are less likely to elicit learners' modified output,Lyster (1998, 2001) suggested the importance of explicit feed-back, which is more likely to be followed by repairs. Neverthe-less, the question of whether recasts are ineffective in terms ofsubsequent L2 development as a result of their ineffectiveness ineliciting repairs awaits further research. As Mackey and Philp(1998) suggested, "the immediate response of the learner torecasts may not be a predictor of whether the learner will sub-sequently make use of the recast" (p. 352). In Mackey and Philp'sstudy, learners who were developmentally ready could advance

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in question formation regardless of their immediate responses torecasts. The ready learners, irrespective of their immediateresponse to recasts, were likely to have noticed the gap betweentheir IL question form and the target form in the recasts. Thispoint is supported in Philp's (2003) study of constraints on noti-cing, in which she used a cued immediate recall to examinewhether the learners noticed the correct form in the recastsprovided during NNS-NS interactions and whether the formwas taken into short-term memory. Philp found that accuracyof recall was affected by the developmental level of the learnerswith respect to question formation, along with the length ofrecasts and the degree of difference between the TL and the ILforms.

Experimental studies that explored the effects of recasts onsubsequent L2 development of the target form and its relation-ship with learners' immediate response to recasting suggest thatthe learners' readiness affects the effectiveness of recasting onlearners' noticing and subsequent development of a particularform. As mentioned earlier, recasts on morphosyntactic featuresincluding tense-aspect marking, in comparison to those on pho-nology and lexis, are less likely to be noticed, especially bylearners who are not ready, and thus are unlikely to have apositive effect on subsequent use. Nevertheless, as Mitchelland Myles (1998) pointed out, "we still know very little aboutwhat might constitute 'readiness' to acquire any given item,either in terms of the necessary prerequisite state of the learn-er's interlanguage, or in terms of the degree of automaticity ofprocessing, which might 'free up' the attentional space which isneeded for 'noticing' something new" (p. 142). As demonstratedin Mackey and Philp's (1998) and Philp's (2003) studies, instruc-tion may help a learner acquire a new structure if he or she is atthe right stage in terms of processability (Pienemann, 1984,1989). In line with the developmental stages that Pienemannand Johnston (1987, pp. 82-83) presented, Bardovi-Harlig(1995b) also found that the use of the pluperfect in Englishrequires the ability to stably use the simple past in narrating.

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Furthermore, recasts may draw more learner attention to partic-ular morphosyntactic features if the learner has prior knowl-edge through earlier instruction or has metalinguistic awareness(Schmidt & Frota, 1986). As Nicholas et al. (2001) summarizedin their review of experimental studies, "recasts can be effectiveif the learner has already begun to use a particular linguisticfeature" (p. 752) based on some prior knowledge.

Even if learners are considered to be ready to benefit frominstructional interventions such as recasting, however, othervariables, such as the degree of difference between the TL andthe IL forms, may constrain the effect of instruction (cf. Philp,2003). With respect to the acquisition of aspect morphology, theeffect of instruction may differ according to such variables as thelexical aspect class with which the aspectual form is used andthe aspectual meanings denoted by the form. As previous studieson acquisition of aspect have suggested, a more prototypicalsubcategory may be acquired earlier both by instructed anduninstructed learners. However, there has been no study, tomy knowledge, that investigated how this acquisition order isrelated to the effect of any instructional intervention. Therefore,the present study aims to investigate differential effects ofrecasting as a focus-on-form intervention on learners' develop-ment in the use of -te i-(ru) in relation to the acquisition orderfound in earlier studies. More specifically, it investigateswhether L2 learners show development of the target form inless prototypical subcategories only after having acquired themore prototypical subcategory, or even without having acquiredsuch subcategory.

Durability of instructional effect. Among the experimentalstudies that investigated effects of recasts, only three havereported on both the durability of any effects of recasting andthe immediate effects on improvement in accuracy (Doughty &Varela, 1998; Han, 2002; Mackey & Philp, 1998). In Doughtyand Varela's (1998) classroom experiment, recasting treatmentwas provided on tense marking in three pedagogical labs duringa 5-week interval between a pretest and a posttest. The scores on

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a delayed posttest, which was administered 2 months after theposttest, showed that the participants maintained the increasedability to mark past in the oral tasks but not in the writtentask. Mackey and Philp (1998) employed two delayed posttestsin their study of the acquisition of question formation: Posttest 2was conducted 1 week after the immediate posttest (Posttest 1),and Posttest 3 was conducted 4 weeks after Posttest 1. There werethree consecutive instruction sessions between a pretest and theimmediate posttest. Learners' production of some question formsincreased in terms of frequency across the three posttest sessionsafter the recasting treatment, although the researchers do notprovide a clear interpretation of their results. Han (2002) reportedthat increased rates of tense consistency in both oral and writtentasks demonstrated on an immediate posttest were maintained ina delayed posttest that was carried out 4 weeks later. A recastingtreatment was provided eight times during the 5-week intervalbetween a pretest and the immediate posttest. Although theresults of these studies are mixed, the effects of the recastingtreatment were generally found to be retained.

According to Norris and Ortega's (2000) research synthesis,although the effect of instruction tends to gradually deteriorate,it was nevertheless generally found to last beyond the immediateobserved effects. This is a promising observation and consistentwith the results of the three studies just discussed. The effects ofrecasting were shown to be maintained in studies that providedlonger treatments, that is, three treatment sessions on threeseparate days (Mackey & Philp, 1998) or over 4 weeks (Doughty &Varela, 1998), or eight treatment sessions over 4 weeks (Han,2002). Nevertheless, as Norris and Ortega demonstrated, acloser look at the interaction between durability of effect andthe length of treatment periods revealed that effects in studieswith shorter treatments tend to deteriorate more than in thosewith longer treatments. Although we do not know whether theeffect of recasting was durable in studies by Mito (1993), Inagakiand Long (1999), and Ortega and Long (1997), which providedonly six tokens of recasts in one session, it is likely that the

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immediate effect would not have lasted because of the limitednumber of recasts provided as instructional treatment.

In order to pursue the question of durativity of instruc-tional effect, the present study provided four treatment sessionsover 2 weeks and employed a delayed posttest 7 weeks after theposttest sessions.

Research Questions

The present study was designed to examine the effectof intensive recasting on the acquisition of aspect in Japaneseas a foreign language (JFL). Specifically, this study pursued thefollowing questions:

1. Change in overall accuracy:

a. How does the overall accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru)change over time?

b. Are the changes in accuracy related to the totalnumber of recasts for each learner?

2. Variable use of -te i-(ru):

a. How does the accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) withverbs of different lexical aspect classes change over time?

b. How does the accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) fordifferent aspectual meanings change over time?

c. Are the changes in accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) fordifferent aspectual meanings related to the totalnumber of recasts provided for each category?

3. Durability of instructional effect: Are effects of recastingtreatment durable?

Method

This study employed a time-series design (Mellow, Reeder, &Forster, 1996) involving four case studies in concurrent replication.

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A time-series design has the advantage of documenting a learner'sprogress at every instructional session, even between pretest andposttest sessions. The use of a time-series design allows me toinvestigate the direct relationship between instruction and thelearners' development. Rather than comparing two or moregroups of learners, this study compares an individual learner'sperformance during the preintervention period and subsequentperiods, including the treatment and the posttest periods. Datafrom the first two out of a total of eight sessions served as abaseline, and they were then compared to those taken from fourtreatment sessions and two posttest sessions.

Research Participants

There were 4 participants, 1 female and 3 males, and theywere all undergraduate students taking either a 4th- or 5th-semester Japanese language course (JPN 202 or JPN 301, respec-tively) at a university in the United States. They volunteered toparticipate in this study when I visited their classes to recruitparticipants. Edward and Greg were taking the 4th-semesterclass, and Larry and Tina were taking the 5th-semester class.Three participants (Greg, Larry, and Tina) have English as theirLi, and 1 participant (Edward), who came to the United States atthe age of 12, has Chinese as his Li but is a competent bilingualin Chinese and English.2

The Japanese courses in which the students were enrolleduse a series of textbooks titled Situational Functional Japanese(Tsukuba Language Group, 1994, 1995). The textbooks explicitlyintroduce the -te i-(ru) form in a "Grammar Notes" section, firstas a resultative aspect marker in Lesson 8 (the third lesson to becovered in the 2nd semester), and later as a progressive aspectmarker in Lesson 13 (the second lesson to be covered in the 3rdsemester). If a semester is considered to be 4 months, the timelag between the introductions of the two meanings will be about4 months. The use of -te i-(ru) for denoting the perfect in thenegative form is also introduced in Lesson 8. However, the

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habitual use of -te i-(ru) is not introduced in a "Grammar Notes"until the end of the 4th-semester course. All 4 learners demon-strated their knowledge of the -te i-(ru) form by using it morethan one time in the first session, with a mean of only about 37%target-like use, although the frequency and the distribution ofthe target form differed among them.

Procedure

Each learner participated twice a week in 30-min, one-on-one conversation sessions with an Li Japanese-speakinginterlocutor, for a total of eight sessions. As the interlocutor,I provided intensive recasts during the treatment period, whichlasted from the third through the sixth sessions. The first twosessions served as comparable pretests, and the last two sessionsserved as comparable posttests. Additionally, 7 weeks after theeighth session, 2 participants (Edward and Greg) participated inanother 30-min session that served as a delayed posttest. Theother 2 participants, Larry and Tina, were not available for thedelayed-posttest session because they had left the university tostudy in Japan. During the 7 weeks between the eighth sessionand the delayed posttest, Edward continued learning Japanesein a summer intensive course, whereas Greg did not continuetaking Japanese. Each session was audio-recorded with the con-sent of the participants.

Each conversation session covered the following topics:daily activities, weekly schedules, picture description, weekendtalk, and reflection on the session. Index cards, on which eachtopic and its subtopics were written in English, were used by theinterlocutor to maintain the flow of conversation without resort-ing to framing questions, which could serve as models. Althoughsubtopics on the cards were prepared to stimulate ideas of whatto talk about, I usually probed for more details by asking ques-tions (in Japanese) such as "How about yesterday?" The detailsof the subtopics are presented in Appendix A. For the picture

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description task, the participants brought their own photos toeach session as I requested and carried on a conversation basedon those pictures.

I provided recasts, along with other types of feedback, dur-ing the treatment period whenever I felt the need to confirm themeaning of the message the learners were trying to convey, notonly on the use of -te i-(ru), but also on lexical and grammaticalitems. With the aim of making recasting as natural as possible, Ioften used sentence-final particles such as ne and ka. The par-ticle ne is an affective particle often used in ordinary mundaneconversation in Japanese that shows the speaker's acknowledg-ment of the previous speaker's message. By adding the questionmarker, ka, in a falling tone, I also confirmed my understanding.Learners' repetition of my recasts was neither encouraged norblocked for the sake of naturalness of conversations.

Coding

I transcribed recorded utterances and then two coders, anNS of Japanese who specializes in Japanese language pedagogyand myself, coded them as follows.3

Learner utterance. First, learners' utterances were codedusing the following categorization scheme, which is presented inTable 3: correct suppliance of the morphology in an obligatorycontext (SOC), nonsuppliance of the morphology in an obligatorycontext (NOC), incorrect suppliance of the morphology in a non-obligatory context (i.e., "overuse"; SNC), nonsuppliance of anytense or aspect marker after a verb stem (that is, the morpholo-gical conjugation of the verb is incomplete; NAM), nonsupplianceof Japanese verbs (except for existential verbs; NJV), or appro-priate nonsuppliance of the morphology in a nonobligatorycontext (N/A). After I had coded 831 utterances, 23% (187 utter-ances) were also coded by the other rater after a training session.The interrater reliability was .90 (kappa =.86).

Feedback. Second, the interlocutor's immediate, feedbackafter the learners' utterances was coded using the coding scheme

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presented in Table 3. A recast is a feedback move that highlightsthe differences between the target input and learners' use of anon-target-like form in need of correction in terms of the targetaspectual form. Among 13 categories of researcher feedback,only 5 were considered to be recast categories in the presentstudy. A feedback move was considered to be a recast when itreplaced the learner's incorrect form with a form that was cor-rect in terms of the -te i-(ru) construction. Other feedback typeswere considered either model, repetition, or no feedback relatedto -te i-(ru). Because this coding is rather mechanical, only I wasinvolved in the coding at this stage.

Lexical aspect. Additionally, all verbs and verb phraseswere coded for inherent lexical aspect categories using stepwisetests (see Appendix B). Although Vendler's four-way classifica-tion is widely used in categorizing lexical aspect, it causes someproblems in categorizing some verbs with the [+punctual] fea-ture. Therefore, I employed Robison's (1995) six-fold classificationsystem, which is also based on three semantic features: dura-tivity, dynamicity, and telicity. Table 4 presents the classificationof lexical aspect based on Robison's framework and its interactionwith the aspectual meanings denoted by -te i-(ru).

The present classification of durative verbs, which are[-punctual], roughly corresponds to that of Vendler. States,activities, and accomplishments in Vendler's categorization arecalled durative states (DR-STs), durative activities (DR-ACs),and durative events (DR-EVs), respectively, in the present sys-tem. Meanwhile, verbs that have the [+punctual] feature, orachievements in Vendler's categorization, needed further classi-fication into three types of punctual verbs according to dyna-micity and telicity. One type of [+punctual] verb that has the[+dynamic] and [-telic] features, such as to knock and to jump,is called a punctual activity (PC-AC; Lee, 1991) or semelfactive(Smith, 1991). It has to be noted that a verb with the [-telic]feature has no inherent end point that leads to a state differentfrom the initial state prior to the action. As Nishi and Shirai(2000) found in a corpus of conversations among NSs of

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Table 4

Classification of Japanese lexical aspect and its interaction withaspectual meanings of -te i-(ru)

nondynamic - I dynamicatelic I - telic

State (ST) Activity (AC) Event (EV)

Durative Durative State Durative Activity Durative Event(DR) <V: State> <V: Activity> <V: Accomplishment>

e.g., omo-(u) e.g., benkyoo-su-(ru) e.g., ringo o tabe-(ru)(to think) (to study) (to eat an apple)[-te i-(ru): [-te i-(ru): [-te i-(ru): progressive]progressive, progressive]temporarinessof the state]

Punctual Punctual State Punctual Activity Punctual Event(PC) <V: Achievement> <V: Achievement> <V: Achievement>

e.g., ni-(ru) e.g., doa o tatak-(u) e.g., shin-(u)(to take after (to knock on (to die)somebody) the door) [-te i-(ru):[always with [-te i-(ru): iterative resultative state]-te i-(ru): progressive]pseudoresultativestate]

Note. The first line of each cell refers to the term used in the present study. Thesecond line of each cell refers to Vendler's (1957) terminology.

Japanese, the aspectual form -te i-(ru), when attached tothese verbs, denotes iterative action-in-progress rather thanresultative states. When attached to punctual-activity verbs,the aspectual form -te i-(ru) puts the focus on the durativityof the repeated punctual activity, rather than on the durationafter the change of state denoted by the telic punctual event(PC-EV).

The last category to note in Table 4 is the punctual state(PC-ST; Robison, 1995). Although verbs in this category, such as

344 Vol. 54, No. 2

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ni-(ru) (to take after somebody) or Type 4 verbs in Kindaichi's(1976a, 1976b) terms, are considered to be part of achievementsby Shirai (2000 and elsewhere) and Jacobsen (1992), they do notentail perceivable actions that are completed at a particularmoment and thus have the [-dynamic] quality. Because of thisquality, this class of verbs in the past-tense form never indicatesa past event in which some kind of action took place, as thesection in the test for the inherent aspect presented in AppendixB indicates.4 On the other hand, they are also "outside thestative prototype, which is conceived as permanent state ofaffairs" (Robison, 1995, p. 350). Robison (1995) added a sixthcategory, the punctual state, to solve the dilemma. His classi-fication of English verbs applies to Japanese verbs to a consider-able degree, although the aspectual meanings denoted byimperfective markers, -ing and -te i-(ru) in the two languages,respectively, in interaction with the verbs within a categorydiffer across languages, and the formulation of operationaltests for lexical aspect needs to be adjusted. A detailed discus-sion of aspectual meanings will be presented in the next section.

The tests for determining inherent aspect in Japanese arepresented in Appendix B. A stepwise procedure was followed inidentifying inherent aspect. A preparatory phase distinguisheddurative from punctual verbs. Among durative verbs, durativestates were first identified, and then durative activities anddurative events were distinguished. The same procedure wasfollowed for the class of punctual verbs. Finally, additional testswere applied to confirm the resulting classification. Because theoriginal interrater reliability of the coding was .83 (kappa = .78),which indicates low reliability, raters coded the lexical aspectualclasses again after a discussion of the coding criteria, whichresulted in a simple agreement of .99 (kappa =.98).

Aspectual meanings. Lastly, obligatory contexts for -te i-(ru)were coded according to the aspectual meanings that the -te i-(ru)construction expresses. As reviewed at the outset, the Japaneseaspectual form -te i-(ru) encodes four basic aspectual meanings:the progressive (PRG), the resultative (RSL), the habitual

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(HBT), and the perfect (PRF). However, a more detailed coding of

aspectual meanings was necessary to specify the kinds ofmeanings expressed within the progressive aspect and withinthe resultative aspect. Although various ways of categorizingaspectual meanings denoted by -te i-(ru) have been employed in

earlier studies on L2 acquisition of -te i-(ru), the relationshipsamong different meanings are often unclear. Therefore, the sub-categories of the progressive and resultative in the present codingsystem, based on a detailed categorization of -te i-(ru) semantics,in relation to the time reference and the lexical aspect of the verbsto which -te i-(ru) is attached, are presented in Table 5. Interraterreliability was .90 (kappa .89).

According to Shirai (2000), habitual and perfect meaningsare obtained generally with all the lexical aspect classes,whereas different progressive and resultative meanings are

obtained with verbs of particular lexical aspect classes. Theaspectual form -te i-(ru) as a progressive marker can denoteunitary action-in-progress (PRG-UAP) with DR-ACs andDR-EVs, as Example (1) shows, or iterative action-in-progress(PRG-IAP) when attached to PC-ACs, as in John ga to o tatai-tei-ru (John is knocking on the door). With some DR-STs, it candenote temporariness (PRG-TMP) of the state, as in Sukoshibenkyoo-shi-yoo to omot-te i-masu (I am thinking of studying alittle). With regard to -te i-(ru) as the resultative aspect marker,it denotes a resultative state (RSL-RSL) with PC-EVs, as shownin Example (2), and a pseudoresultative state (RSL-PSD) withPC-STs, as in Mary wa hahaoya ni ni-te i-ru (Mary resemblesher mother). Whereas Shirai (2000) does not distinguishbetween these two aspectual categories (the RSL-PSD and theRSL-RSL) or between the corresponding lexical aspect classes(the PC-EV and the PC-ST), the present coding system employsthese distinctions.

Additional subcategories were determined with respect tothe time reference, which is often indicated by the use of timeadverbs. The -te i-(ru) constructions that denote aspectualmeanings, such as the PRG-UAP shown in Example (1) and the

Vol. 54, No. 2346

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Ishida

RSL-RSL shown in Example (2), are captured at one particularpoint in time, that is, the moment when the photo the learnerbrought to the session was taken. Meanwhile, the same con-structions can denote the same aspectual meanings with respectto more than one point of reference by adding the time adverbitsumo (always). An example of expressing the progressivemeaning at repeated points in time is presented in Example (5):

(5) Progressive-habitual at repeated points of reference[when asked about an item on a topic card, "the activityyou are involved in at" 9 o'clock]

9pm 9pm 9pmKu-ji goro itsumo benkyoo-shi-te i-masu. I I I9 o'clock around always study-ASP- - x x x x x x -x x x-

NPAST(polite) <to study> <to study> <to study>

'I am usually studying around 9 o'clock.'

In talking about daily activities, the learners were asked aboutthe activity they are usually involved in at a certain time. The -tei-(ru) in Example (5) indicates that the speaker is always in themiddle of studying at 9 o'clock and that the progressive action isrepeated daily. Because such use of -te i-(ru) expresses the pro-gressive aspect at repeated points of reference, it was termedprogressive-habitual (PRG-HBT) in the present analysis. Thevisual schema in Example (5) should be contrasted withthe schema of the habitual aspect presented in Example (3).Rather than expressing the internal view of the act of studying,habitual-temporariness (HBT-TMP) indicates that the activity ofstudying is repeated at certain intervals over an extended periodof time (ima [nowadays]).

The final category for the progressive aspect that wasincluded in this study is the progressive-continuous (PRG-CNT).The -te i-(ru) construction can indicate that an activity has been inprogress for an extended period of time, as illustrated in Example

349

Language Learning

(6). The time expression zutto (all the time) in the example pointsto the fact that the action of studying is viewed as being in progressfor an extended period of time up to the point of reference:

(6) Progressive-continuous up to the point of reference

Ni-jikan mae kara zutto benkyoo-shi-te i-masu. two hours ago now

Two hours ago since all the time study-ASP(polite) l 1

'I have been studying continuously for two hours.' - x x x x x x x (x)-

The same is true for the resultative aspect. In contexts in whichthe continuity of the resultative state is indicated, the subcategoryresultative-continuous (RSL-CNT) was used. This subcategory isdifferent from the use of -te i-(ru) as the marker of perfect of result(PRF-POR), as presented in Example (4), in which the continua-tive meaning is denoted only in terms of the relevant effectresulting from the act that occurred at an earlier point in time.

Counting

In measuring the learners' development in the use of -te i-(ru)in this study, two accuracy measures in a type count were used.Accuracy measures were employed instead of frequency distributionmeasures because the latter are highly sensitive to the tasks or tothe segment of discourse, in which certain aspect markers andcertain lexical aspectual classes tend to be used more frequently.

With respect to the choice between a type and a token countin measuring accuracy, given that accuracy may be affectedconsiderably by one lexical item that is used many times, count-ing the same lexical item with the same meaning in use as onlyone type avoids this imbalance.5 Therefore, this study employeda type count in measuring the accuracy of -te i-(ru) use. Forinstance, when a learner correctly used -te i-(ru) in the presenttense, as in Ima benkyoo-shi-te i-ru (I am studying now), it wascounted as one SOC. If the same learner correctly used -te i-(ru)in the past-tense form on a different occasion, as in Sono tokibenkyoo-shi-te i-ta (I was studying then), the two tokens of SOC

Vol. 54, No. 2350

Ishida

were counted as one type of SOC. The contracted forms, such asshi-te ru and shi-te ta, were also treated as one type.

Overall accuracy and accuracy within each lexical aspec-tual class in the learners' production of -te i-(ru) were measuredthrough target-like use (TLU) analysis (Pica, 1983). When -te i-(ru)was not used in obligatory context, the coding NOC was assigned.When -te i-(ru) was overused, the incorrect use was counted asSNC. TLU of -te i-(ru) is formulated as follows:

TLU = n of obligatory n of correct use (SOC) x 100n of obligatory contexts (SOC + NOC) + n of overuse (SNC)

Although this formula is appropriate for measuring overallaccuracy and accuracy within each lexical aspectual class, itneeds to be altered when measuring the accuracy of -te i-(ru)use within aspectual categories (the progressive, resultative,habitual, or perfect). Since the aspectual meaning expressed bythe oversupplied -te i-(ru) construction is not ascertainable, thedenominator of the above formula is consequently changed to "nof obligatory contexts (SOC + NOC)," omitting "n of overuse(SNC)." Thus, the correct-use ratio was used in measuringaccuracy within aspectual categories:

Correct-use ratio~n of n of correct use (SOC) x 100n of obligatory contexts (SOC + NOC)

In addition to the learners' utterances, the interlocutor'sfeedback utterances were also counted. A token count wasemployed for the feedback, because it was assumed that learnersgain an opportunity to compare their output and TL input fromthe interlocutor each time the learner receives corrective feedback.

Statistical Analysis

Several statistical analyses were employed to interpret thefindings of this study. For all statistical analyses, the alpha levelwas set at .05. According to Kazdin (1984), "if the single-casedesign is applied to a group of subjects, correlated t-test or

351

Language Learning

repeated-measures analysis of variance can be performed"(p. 294). Therefore, a repeated-measures analysis of variance(ANOVR) was utilized to compare the mean TLU in the pretest,treatment, and posttest periods. The within-participantscontrasts among the three periods were calculated via Helmertanalysis, which is a statistical device used to compare the meanat each period (except the last) to the mean at subsequentperiods. The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficientwas also used to investigate the degree of relationship betweenthe total number of recasts and any increases in accuracy. Aseries of implicational scale analyses were conducted to deter-mine the relative accuracy order among the uses of -te i-(ru) fordifferent aspectual categories. Lastly, the relationship betweenany increase in correct-use ratio for each aspectual category andthe number of recasts provided was examined using the Pearsonproduct-moment correlation coefficient.

Results

This section will present the results addressing the threeresearch questions.

The Effect of Intensive Recasting on the Overall Use of -te i-(ru)

This section addresses the question of whether the recast-ing treatment triggered greater accuracy in the learners' overalluse of -te i-(ru).

Change in overall accuracy. First, individual learners' TLUof -te i-(ru) and the number of recasts provided in response to theuse and nonuse of the target form in each session are presented.Table 6 displays the individual learners' TLU in each session(a type count), and Table 7 shows the number of correctiverecasts in each session (a token count).6

Figure 1 shows the mean TLU and the total number ofrecasts in each session as group data. As the figure shows, themean TLU for the pretest period was low, and there was no

Vol. 54, No. 2352

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Ishida 355

16.00 100.00 Reat14.00 Reat12.00 80.00 -- TLU

0 10.00 -60.00 e0c 8.00

(OD 6.00 40.00 -J4.002.00 20.000.00 0.00

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8Session

Figure 1. TLU and total number of recasts (mean of the four learners).

increase in accuracy from Session 1 to Session 2. In contrast,TLU increased to above 50% during the treatment period (Ses-sions 3 through 6). The figure also shows that when the treat-ment period ended and recasts were not provided intensively, inSessions 7 and 8, learners' high TLU was maintained and, more-over, slightly increased in Session 7.

In addition to visual inspection of the group data, statisticalanalyses were conducted using ANOVR. The assumption of equalvariance (required to conduct ANOVR) was checked through theFmax test (Fm. = 2.44, k =3, df= 2). Means of TLU for eachperiod-the pretest, the treatment, and the posttest periods-are summarized in Table 8. The results of the ANOVR aresummarized in Table 9. Since the overall F value for this analysis

Table 8

Mean TLU for each period

Pretest Treatment PosttestSessions 1 and 2 Sessions 3-6 Sessions 7 and 8

Edward 23.64 47.68 . 68.75Greg 34.71 62.32 61.96Larry 40.91 45.42 54.76Tina 44.95 62.16 65.00

Language Learning

Table 9

One-way ANOVR: Source table for F-ratio

Source of variation SS df MS F Eta-squared Power

Session type (A) 1479.68 2 739.84 11.80* .80 .92Participants (P) 236.70 3Types x Participants 376.14 6 62.69(A x P)

Total 2092.51 11

* p <.05 (FC,dt = 5.79).

was 11.80 (df = 2, 6), the main effects were found to be significantat the p < .05 level. Eta-squared was .80, and the power was .92.

The tests of within-participant contrasts also showed a sig-nificant difference between TLU in the pretest and treatmentperiods (F = 16.69; df = 1, 3; p < .05), but no significant differencebetween TLU in the treatment and posttest periods was found(F= 3.04; df = 1, 3; Fcrit= 10.13). The eta-squared for the differ-ence between the pretest and treatment periods was .85, and theobserved power was .77. The results of ANOVR suggest that theaccuracy in the learners' use of the -te i-(ru) form increasedduring the treatment period and the higher accuracy rate wasmaintained in the posttest period. Although there was a slightincrease in accuracy from the treatment period to the posttestperiod, this difference was not significant.

The relationship between the change in accuracy and thenumber of recasts. To analyze the relationship between increasein TLU and the number of recasts the learners received, acorrelation analysis using the Pearson product-moment correla-tion coefficient was conducted. Table 10 shows the degree ofincrease in TLU, which was obtained by subtracting the learner'spretest mean from his or her posttest mean, and the numberof recasts that the learner received during the treatmentperiod.

Vol. 54, No. 2356

Ishida 357

Table 10

Increase in TLU and number of recasts per learner

Posttest Pretest TLU Recasts in themean - mean = increase treatment

Edward 68.75 - 23.64 45.11 41Greg 61.96 - 34.71 = 27.25 30Larry 54.76 - 40.91 13.85 18Tina 65.00 - 44.95 20.05 19

The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient wasr = .98, which is significant at the p < .05 level. The visual repre-sentation of the relationship between the number of recasts andTLU increase is shown in Figure 2. As the figure depicts clearly,the more recasts in response to the use of the target form thelearners received, the more target-like their use of the formbecame.

In sum, the learners' use of -te i-(ru), measured by the TLUanalysis, increased significantly after the recasting treatmentbegan, and a high accuracy rate was maintained even after thetreatment sessions were over. Moreover, the analysis revealedthat the number of recasts the learners received was signifi-cantly correlated with the degree of increase in TLU.

50 C TLU increase (%)

4 Recasts (n)40

30

20

10

0ER GV LK TR

Figure 2. Increase in TLU and number of recasts per learner.

358 Language Learning Vol. 54, No. 2

Variable Use of -te i-(ru) and Its Change During the Eight Sessions

Once the overall development of accuracy in the use of-te i-(ru) and its relationship with the recasting treatmenthad been analyzed, the next step of the analysis was to addressthe second set of research questions by examining the variableuse of the target form and its change over time. This section willfocus on the group tendency of the change in accuracy in eachsession.

The use of -te i-(ru) with verbs of different lexical aspectclasses. To examine the accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) withverbs of different lexical aspect classes, the mean TLU of the -tei-(ru) with two groups of lexical aspect categories was calculatedfor each session using a type count, with the data from all 4learners being collapsed.7 The two groups are (a) the lexicalaspect (LA) types that can yield progressive interpretationswhen -te i-(ru) is attached to the verb (LA for PRG) and (b) thelexical aspect types that can yield resultative interpretationswhen -te i-(ru) is attached to the verb (LA for RSL). LA forPRG includes all the durative verbs (durative states, durative

100

80

D 60 ----LAffor PR'40 ^ / | -LA for RSL

20

0-1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

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LA for (6/23) (7/25) (21/39) (12/34) (10/26) (12/25) (11/20) (9/23)PRG

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52.63 40.00 71.43 58.82 70.59 71.43 90.00 77.27

Figure 3. Change in TLU of -te i-(ru) with different lexical aspect classes(type). The data from all 4 learners are collapsed.

Ishida

activities, and durative events) and punctual activities. LA forRSL includes punctual states and punctual events.

Figure 3 displays how the TLU of -te i-(ru) with differentclasses of lexical aspect changed over the eight sessions. Thefigure clearly shows that the accuracy rate (TLU) of -te i-(ru)with LA for RSL was higher than that with LA for PRG, not onlyin the first two sessions, but throughout the eight sessions.

Contrary to what would be predicted from earlier studies,for the learners who participated in the current study, the use ofthe form with the verbs that can yield progressive interpreta-tions was not the highest in terms of accuracy. Nevertheless,this result does not directly indicate that the use of -te i-(ru) asthe resultative aspect marker shows a higher accuracy rate thanits use as the progressive aspect marker, because some of theverbs that belong to the two groups were also used with -te i-(ru)to mark the habitual and the perfect. The use of some verbs formarking these aspectual meanings is considered to have affectedthe accuracy rates of the respective groups differently.

The use of -te i-(ru) for different aspectual categories. Toexamine the use of -te i-(ru) for expressing different aspectualmeanings, the correct-use ratio of -te i-(ru) in each sessionwas calculated for each aspectual category, with the data fromall 4 learners being collapsed. The results are displayed inTable 11.

Because the numbers of obligatory contexts for the PRG-IAP, the PRG-TMP, the resultative-habitual (RSL-HBT) and theRSL-CNT are too small, the accuracy rates for these subcate-gories are not reliable. The means for these categories are placedwithin parentheses in the table. As the values for the standarddeviation indicate, the means for the PRG-IAP, the PRG-TMP,and the RSL-CNT range widely across sessions. High values forthe standard deviation, including the PRG-CNT and thePRF-POR, are underlined in Table 11. Categories that have arelatively high number of obligatory contexts whose standarddeviation is relatively low, in order of descending means ofcorrect-use ratio, are the RSL-PSD, the RSL-RSL, the

359

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Language Learning Vol. 54, No. 2

PRG-UAP, the PRG-HBT, and the HBT-TMP. The order basedon the mean correct-use ratios suggests that the resultative useof -te i-(ru) may be higher in accuracy than the progressive use,which is higher in accuracy than the habitual use. However,because of the low number of obligatory contexts in each sessionin general, it is difficult to analyze changes in accuracy fordifferent aspectual categories.

To examine the change in the use of -te i-(ru) for expressingdifferent aspectual meanings, the correct-use ratio for -te i-(ru)in each session was calculated for the major aspectual cate-gories. In cases of the progressive and the resultative, the num-bers from the subcategories were combined and the means werecalculated. These results are displayed in Figure 4. Since thenumber of types with obligatory contexts for the perfect -te i-(ru)in each pair of sessions was only about two, and only one type ofTLU of -te i-(ru) as the marker of the perfect was employed by all

0

0

0

+-- PRG-- -RSL

-* BT

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

Session

PRG (2/14) (5/16) (16/25) (7/18) (6/15) (10/15) (8/14) (6114)

(progressive) 14.29 31.25 64.00 38.89 40.00 66.67 57.14 42.86

RSL (6/15) (5/10) (9/13) (10/15) (11/14) (9/12) (10/10) (17/19)

(resultative) 40.00 50.00 69.23 66.67 78.57 75.00 100.00 89.47

HBT (4/10) (2/10) (7/14) (7/11) (5/16) (2/7) (4/9) (3/6)

(habitual) 40.00 20.00 50.00 63.64 31.25 28.57 4.44 50.00

Figure 4. Change in correct-use ratio for different -te i-(ru) semantics(type). The data from all 4 learners are collapsed.

362

Ishida

4 learners, the correct-use ratio for the perfect varied from 0% to100%. Therefore, the data for the category are not presented inthe figure.

Figure 4 shows that in contrast to the findings from earlierstudies, -te i-(ru) was used more accurately as the resultativeaspect marker than as the progressive aspect marker through-out the eight sessions. Whereas the resultative use of -te i-(ru)shows a constant increase in accuracy, the progressive and thehabitual uses of -te i-(ru) show much fluctuation. Although thefluctuation makes it difficult to see the relative accuracy rates ofthe progressive and the habitual uses, there are more sessions inwhich the progressive use is higher in accuracy than in whichthe habitual use is higher in accuracy.

The accuracy order of -te i-(ru) through implicational scal-ing analyses. To capture the individual variability of the changein accuracy in addition to the group tendency, a series of impli-cational scaling analyses were employed following Andersen's(1978) scaling procedures. In these analyses, two sessions werecollapsed into one unit to increase the number of obligatorycontexts and to avoid situations in which there were only oneor two contexts, such that the correct-use ratio was not inter-pretable. For the same reason as for the above analysis, theperfect use was eliminated from this analysis. The implicationalscales created at the 66.67% criterion are presented in Table 12.8The coefficient of reproducibility (CR)9 and the coefficient ofscalability (CS) were 1.00 for each scale, except for the scalefor Sessions 3 and 4, in which the CR was .83 and the CSwas .50. Because a CR greater than .90 and a CS greater than.60 are considered to be indications of a valid scale (Dunn-Rankin,1983, p. 107), all the scales in Table 12, except for those forSessions 3 and 4, are valid.10 By and large, for every pair ofsessions, the -te i-(ru) construction was used most correctly forthe resultative aspect, followed by the progressive aspect, andthen the habitual.

In sum, throughout the eight sessions, the learners in thisstudy used -te i-(ru) more correctly as a resultative aspect

363

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Language Learning

marker with punctual verbs, with an increasing rate of accuracy,than as a progressive aspect marker with durative verbs or as ahabitual aspect marker.

The relationship between the change in accuracy and thenumber of recasts. It was found, both through the analysis of thegroup data (Figure 3) and the analysis of the individualdata (Table 12), that the correct-use ratio for the resultativeuse of -te i-(ru) was higher than that for the progressive usethroughout the eight sessions. Moreover, the increase in accuracy,as measured by the increase in the correct-use ratio (obtained bysubtracting the pretest mean from the posttest mean for all thelearners), for the resultative -te i-(ru) from the pretest period tothe posttest period was larger than that for the progressive, aspresented in Table 13.

Was this difference in accuracy increase due to a highfrequency of recasts on the resultative relative to other aspectualcategories? With the aim of pursuing this question, the Pearsonproduct-moment correlation coefficient of the correlationbetween the accuracy increase and the number of recasts pro-vided for each aspect category during the treatment period wascalculated based on the data presented in Table 13 (r = -. 77).Thus, although the overall accuracy increase for individuallearners highly correlated with the total number of recaststhey received, such a correlation was not observed for theaspectual categories. The increase in accuracy in the use of -te

Table 13

Increase in correct-use ratio and number of recasts per aspectualcategory

Posttest - Pretest = Increase in Recasts in themean mean correct-use ratio treatment

Resultative 94.74 - 45.00 = 49.74 24Progressive 50.00 - 22.77 = 27.23 37Habitual 47.22 - 30.00 = 17.22 32

366 Vol. 54, No. 2

Ishida 367

i-(ru) for different aspectual categories was negatively correlatedwith the number of recasts.

Durability of Instructional Effect

Finally, the durability of the effects of the recasting treat-ment was examined by analyzing both the overall TLU and thedistribution of -te i-(ru) found in the ninth session with 2 of thelearners (Edward and Greg).

With regard to overall accuracy, Figure 5 displays the tra-jectory of the TLU, and Table 14 displays the mean TLU in eachperiod. Although both Edward and Greg showed a 5% decreasein accuracy compared to the average scores exhibited in theimmediate posttests (Sessions 7 and 8), their TLUs in thedelayed-posttest session (Session 9) fell within the range of

100.00

80.00

, 60.004J40.00

20.00

0.00

[ * Edward[ ̂ Greg I

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

| Sessions

Figure 5. Trajectory of TLU for Edward and Greg.

Table 14

Mean TLU in each period (based on a type count)

Pretest Treatment Posttest Delayed posttest

Edward 23.64 47.68 68.75 62.50Greg 34.71 62.32 61.96 56.25

: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Language Learning

the two immediate posttest TLUs and still were much higherthan the average scores of the pretests.

Association among -te i-(ru), lexical aspect, and aspectualmeanings was also analyzed. Durative verbs and punctual-activity verbs (LA for PRG) were used correctly in 44.44% ofthe contexts (8 out of 18 types), when data from the 2 learnerswere collapsed. This percentage is much smaller than the 75% (9out of 12 types) for punctual states and punctual events (LA forRSL). This is consistent with the observation presented inFigure 3, in which LA for RSL showed a higher accuracy ratethan LA for PRG in all eight sessions when data from all 4learners were collapsed.

Similarly, -te i-(ru) constructions that have the progressiveaspect were correctly supplied in 58.33% of the contexts (7 out of12 types), and those with resultative meanings were correctlysupplied in 72.73% of the contexts (8 out of 11 types) whendata from the 2 learners were collapsed. This result is againconsistent with the analysis presented in Figure 4, in that theaccuracy of the resultative use of -te i-(ru) was higher than theaccuracy of the progressive use.

Implicational scaling analyses were also conducted with thedata from the delayed-posttest session. Since the use of -te i-(ru)as the marker of the perfect was restricted to one instance inSession 9, the data for the perfect were eliminated from thisanalysis. The implicational table with a 66.67% criterion is pre-sented in Table 15. Since there was no deviation, CR and CSwere both 1.00.

The implicational scale in Table 15 shows that the resulta-tive is the most accurate category, followed by the progressive,then the habitual. This relative order of accuracy is consistentwith the order found through the analysis of the scales presentedin Table 12. Thus, it can be concluded that whatever the overallcorrect-use ratio, the accuracy order among the three aspectualmeanings realized with the -te i-(ru) construction was stablefrom the pretest period through the delayed-posttest session.

368 Vol. 54, No. 2

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Language Learning

Discussion

The results presented in the previous section have shownthat reactive recasting as an implicit focus-on-form interventionin meaning-oriented activities had a positive effect on thesignificant increase in accuracy in the learners' overall use of-te i-(ru) during the treatment period. The effect was observedeven without focused recasts (Doughty & Varela, 1998), in whichlearners' erroneous utterances are repeated for added emphasis.The higher accuracy rate was retained both in the immediate-and in the delayed-posttest periods. However, recasting waseffective only under certain conditions. The following subsec-tions will discuss constraints that limit the effectiveness ofrecasting treatment in relation to various uses of -te i-(ru) andaddress some methodological concerns.

Constraints on the Effectiveness of Recasting Treatment

Some constraints on the effectiveness of the recasting treat-ment should be discussed first based on the results from thepresent study. One of the constraints was found in relation tothe limited number of recasts provided during the treatmentperiod. The positive effect was smaller when the interlocutorprovided a smaller number of recasts involving the target form,as evidenced by the significant correlation between the numberof recasts and the overall accuracy increase (see Table 10).Further analysis of Tables 10 and 12 also suggests that intensiverecasts were less likely to be provided when the learnerdemonstrated higher accuracy by producing fewer non-target-like forms in the initial sessions.

On a positive note, it is possible to consider that the learn-ers' prior knowledge of the target form contributed to the posi-tive effects of recasting. As reviewed above, the recastingtreatment was shown to have positive effects on improving L2learners' past marking in studies such as Doughty and Varela(1998) and Han (2002), in which the learners had already begun

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to use past marking. Meanwhile, recasts provided in Ortega andLong's (1997) study had variable effects on structures that werenovel to the learners: No learner in either the recast or the modelgroup gained in scores on the topicalization rules. These resultsfrom earlier studies suggest that recasts may more readilytrigger the learners' attention to the information contained inthe recasts when learners have prior knowledge of the targetstructure.

The variability of effects of the recasting treatment was alsoobserved through the detailed analysis of accuracy rates in theuse of -te i-(ru) for different aspectual meanings as well as its usewith verbs of different lexical aspect classes. Although it ispossible to interpret the similarity among the 4 learners'posttest accuracy scores on overall -te i-(ru) use presented inTable 10 to be an indication of a ceiling effect of recasting, theaccuracy rates for the progressive and the resultative categories,respectively, as shown in Table 13 suggest that there was vari-ability in the effects of recasting on different aspectualcategories expressed with the target form. The high increase inaccuracy in the resultative use of -te i-(ru) was engendered byfewer recasts, particularly when compared to the large numberof recasts provided for the progressive and the habitual uses of-te i-(ru). This result is discussed in relation to the learners'initial use of -te i-(ru) for different aspectual categories in thefollowing subsection.

Accuracy Order in the Pretest Period

In the present study, the learners' initial use of -te i-(ru) asthe resultative aspect marker was found to be more accuratethan its use as the progressive, the habitual, and the perfectmarkers, although the acquisition of -te i-(ru) was predicted tostart from its progressive use. There are some possible ways toaccount for this finding, including the role of classroom instruc-tion. The textbook used at the university where the learners weretaking Japanese classes explicitly introduces the resultative use

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of -te i-(ru) as a grammar point about 4 months earlier than theprogressive use of -te i-(ru). The resultative use of -te i-(ru) isdescribed as the form for "expressing a state of affairs" or "astate resulting from the action of the verb" (Tsukuba LanguageGroup, 1995, p. 183). The initial introduction of -te i-(ru) asa marker of the resultative aspect could have preventedthe learners from making a one-to-one mapping between the-te i-(ru) form and progressive aspect marking and could alsohave provided the learners with more exposure to the resultativeuse of -te i-(ru) (cf. Shirai, 2002). Just as children's variable useof -te i-(ru) is highly affected by caregivers' input (Shirai, 1998a),the initial input in foreign language classroom settings, which ishighly constrained, could have affected the learners' acquisitionof -te i-(ru) for different aspectual meanings. 11

The present finding with regard to the learners' initialcorrect use of -te i-(ru) as a resultative aspect marker can alsobe accounted for by the role of formulas and chunk learning, asSugaya (2002a) has discussed. The learners in the present studyused some resultative constructions such as sun-de i-(ru) (tolive), mot-te i-(ru) (to have), and shit-te i-(ru) (to know), withhigh correct-use ratios. The textbook introduces these construc-tions as "normally used in their [V-te] i-ru ... form" (TsukubaLanguage Group, 1995, p. 184). While the category of the resul-tative aspect in the present study included the learners' use ofthese formulaic constructions and resulted in the highest accu-racy among the four aspectual categories, the accuracy rate onthe resultative use of -te i-(ru) was found to be lower than thaton the progressive use in studies that separated the formulaicuse of these constructions or their use as adjectives from thecategory of resultative uses (e.g., Sheu, 1997; Uozumi, 1998).

The question to be addressed here is whether the initialpreponderance of the progressive use of -te i-(ru) in comparisonto its resultative use, predicted and found in earlier studies, canbe considered to be a universal disposition (Shirai, 1998a) ordevelopmentally sequenced (Andersen, 1991). If the acquisitionorder between the progressive and the resultative -te i-(ru) forms

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a developmental sequence, even though classroom instructioncould help learners move from one stage to the next faster, itcould not have changed the order of acquisition, according to theteachability hypothesis (Pienemann, 1984, 1989). Therefore, itmight have to be considered that the order predicted andobserved in earlier studies may be affected by the input foundin NSs' speech, the input provided through classroom instruc-tion, or the L2 learner's knowledge of other language(s), asShirai (2002) suggested, rather than being a universal disposi-tion or developmentally sequenced.

Despite the contradictory results with regard to the acqui-sition order between the progressive and the resultative usesof -te i-(ru), however, the findings from the present study donot provide any counterevidence to the prototype account forthe acquisition of progressive marking provided in the aspecthypothesis. As Andersen and Shirai (1996) explain, the use of aprogressive marker begins with the most prototypical memberof the progressive meanings, that is, the unitary action-in-progress. A similar trend was observed in the current study(see Table 11). The learners exhibited their ability to correctlyuse -te i-(ru) more to mark unitary action-in-progress than tomark other, less prototypical progressive meanings. Additionalinvestigation that is focused on the order of acquisition within theprogressive use of -te i-(ru) is called for in order to examine to theapplicability of the prototype account for the order found in earlierstudies on different languages (cf. Andersen & Shirai, 1996).

Development in the Use of -te i-(ru) for Denoting Various AspectualMeanings

Although input may play an important role in determiningthe relative order of acquisition, detailed analysis of the effects ofrecasting on the changes in the learners' use of -te i-(ru) overtime, as shown in Table 13, has revealed that a greater amountof input provided through recasting did not ensure moreimprovement in the progressive as well as the habitual uses of

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-te i-(ru). For example, Larry, who received more tokens ofrecasts involving the progressive use of -te i-(ru) (nine tokens)than involving the resultative use (five tokens), did not show anyimprovement in the progressive use of -te i-(ru), whereas heshowed a constant increase in the resultative use of -te i-(ru).Such constraint of instruction could be accounted for byPienemann's teachability hypothesis (1984, 1989). According tothat hypothesis, instruction will not help a learner acquire a newstructure unless he or she is already at one stage prior to thestage at which the new structure can be acquired (Pienemann,1984, 1989). The sequencing of stages for acquiring structures istheorized in the processability theory. For instance, a structurethat requires the "phrasal procedure," which involves exchangeof information only within phrases for the formation of thestructure, is placed at Level 3, whereas a structure thatrequires the "subordinate clause procedure," which involvesexchange of information between the main and the sub-ordinate clauses, is placed at Level 6. As I reported in a posthoc examination of verbal morphology and word order in speechsamples from the pretest period in the same study (Ishida, 2002),Larry did not produce any structures that were consideredto belong to Level 6, whereas Greg, who showed the highestdevelopment in the progressive use of -te i-(ru) (see Table 12),produced many of those structures. Although this point has tobe investigated further, an explanation could be that Larrywas not ready, in terms of the level of processing that hecould handle, to benefit from the recasting treatment hereceived in developing the use of -te i-(ru) for expressing variousprogressive meanings.

Difficulty in developing the progressive use of -te i-(ru)despite a relatively large number of recasts could be attributedto the difficulty in applying the -te i-(ru) form of a verb to variousmeanings of the progressive aspect. Even if a learner can sayo-hanashi shi-te i-ru (I am talking) in describing a unitary actionof talking that is in progress at a reference time (PRG-UAP),the -te i-(ru) does not straightforwardly apply to other contexts.

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The learner needs to know when to use and when not to use the-te i-(ru) form.

(7) Nagai aida o-hanashi shi-mashita kara, benkyoo shi-nakatta desu.(Because I talked for a long time, I didn't study.)

(8) Nagai aida o-hanashi shi-te i-ta kara desu ka?(Because (you were) talking for a long time?)

(9) Nagai aida o-hanashi shi-ta ato de, benkyoo shi-ta.(After I talked for a long time, I studied.)

Example (7) is Greg's utterance, produced in Session 7,which lacks -te i-(ru) as the marker of PRG-CNT. The interlocu-tor provided a recast by adding -te i-(ru), as in Example (8). Evenif Greg noticed the difference between shi-mashita without -tei-(ru) in his utterance and the interlocutor's use of -te i-(ru) inshi-te i-ta, the utility of this recast is not guaranteed. The PRG-CNT use of -te i-(ru) is expected in Example (7) not because ofthe time expression nagai aida (for a long time), but because thesubordinate clause describes the background reason for thesituation described in the main clause. This is consistent withthe use of a progressive marker for describing the backgroundin narrative structure in English (Bardovi-Harlig, 1998). InExample (9), in which both clauses foreground the main line ofa narrative, o-hanashi shi-ta should not be in the -te i-(ru) form.If Greg applies to this situation the PRG-CNT use of o-hanashishi-te i-ta found in the recast without understanding the narra-tive structure, it will be an inappropriate use of -te i-(ru). Thelow correct-use ratios for the PRG-CNT displayed in Table 11can be interpreted in this way.

As this explanation suggests, L2 learners' task is not only tonotice the difference in forms, but to understand the context inwhich the particular form in input is used. As a possible expla-nation for the ineffectiveness of recasts on increasing accuracy inthe progressive use of -te i-(ru) found in the present study, it canbe suggested that the learners may have had more difficulty in

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figuring out the rules for progressive uses based on the input inthe recasts than the rules for resultative uses, because therecasts were more varied in terms of the contexts in which theaspectual form was used. The existence of a relatively largenumber of obligatory contexts for the PRG-HBT and thePRG-CNT in addition to the PRG-UAP, in comparison with theresultative counterpart, as presented in Table 11, supports thisexplanation. 12

Methodological Concerns

The above discussion indicates that the result from a studyand its interpretations may be affected by the choice of elicita-tion method and the method of analysis. As shown in Table 11,the accuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) differs considerably acrosssubcategories of the progressive. It is likely that the overallaccuracy in the progressive use of -te i-(ru) will be higher in anelicitation task that requires more contexts for unitary action-in-progress than in a task that requires more contexts for otherprogressive meanings. Moreover, if a study on effects of recastsfocuses only on -te i-(ru) as the marker of the unitary action-in-progress, the complexity of form-function mapping will bereduced, and thus the effectiveness of recasts will be increased.Furthermore, the difference between a type count and a tokencount (Shibata, 1999; Shirai & Kurono, 1998) and the differencein the analysis of distribution and accuracy (Bardovi-Harlig,2000, 2002) are other factors that may contribute to the differentresults among studies. Therefore, interpretations of earlier find-ings in comparison with those of the present study should takeinto consideration the differences in methodology, including thechoice of elicitation method.

Conclusion

This article has reported the results of a study that investi-gated the effectiveness of recasting on JFL learners' use of the

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Japanese aspectual form -te i-(ru) in a series of conversationsessions. Several important points that could contribute to thefield of SLA research were also discussed. First, the resultsfrom this study provided additional evidence that recasting inmeaning-oriented communicative activities can be an effectiveinstructional technique that helps learners increase the accu-racy in their use of certain grammatical constructions. The over-all accuracy rate increased significantly after the recastingtreatment began, and the high accuracy rate was retained bothin the immediate- and delayed-posttest sessions. Moreover, theaccuracy increase significantly correlated with the number ofrecasts provided to the learners during the treatment sessions.Although comparing recasting treatment with other instruc-tional interventions is an important area for investigation, thisstudy has shown that concurrent and successive observations ofindividual participants through the use of a time-series design isa fruitful way to investigate instructed IL development. General-izing these findings to other populations is difficult because ofthe small scale of the study, but accumulation of such studieswill contribute further to our understanding of instructed ILdevelopment.

Second, the results from this study raise questions aboutthe aspect hypothesis's prediction concerning the early use ofimperfective marking (Andersen & Shirai, 1996). Contrary to theprediction, the learners in the present study exhibited loweraccuracy in the use of -te i-(ru) for expressing progressive mean-ings than in its use for expressing resultative meanings. Thisfinding suggests that the initial strong association between -te

i-(ru) and activities to mark the progressive aspect that wasobserved in earlier studies may not be a universal disposition.Rather, the preponderance of the resultative use of -te i-(ru) overits progressive use found in this study could have been stronglyinfluenced by early introduction of its resultative use in the JFLclassroom, which is considered to affect the length and frequencyof input exposure. Moreover, inclusion of some -te i-(ru) construc-tions that were taught as formulaic expressions as part of the

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resultative category could have contributed to the higheraccuracy in the resultative use of -te i-(ru). The influence ofthese variables on the order of acquisition needs to be furtherexplored to account for contradictions between the findings fromthe present study and those from the earlier studies.

With regard to the constraints that limit the effect ofrecasting on improving the use of -te i-(ru) for expressing differ-ent aspectual meanings, it was suggested in this article thatthe learners' readiness is a possible factor that affected theeffectiveness of instructional treatment. Although the learners'prior knowledge of -te i-(ru) appears to have helped them improvein using it as a whole, intensive recasting did not engendergreater increases in accuracy in using -te i-(ru) to express variousprogressive meanings than in marking the resultative aspect. It ispossible that the effect of recasting on the acquisition of varioussubcategories of the progressive aspect interacts with the lear-ners' developmental readiness in terms of either prototypicality(Andersen & Shirai, 1996) or processability (Pienemann, 1998).Further investigation of the relationship between individual lear-ners' developmental stage and the effect of instruction on theacquisition of -te i-(ru) for expressing various aspectual meaningsis awaited.

Although the present study provided intriguing results,generalizability of the results has to be tested by replicatingthe study with a larger number of learners who use the sametextbook as the learners in the present study. The effect ofinstructional order on the accuracy order between the progres-sive and the resultative use of -te i-(ru) should be also tested bycomparing those learners with learners who were taught theprogressive -te i-(ru) first through classroom instruction. Pos-sible influence of the learners' Li could also be investigatedin the future. In the current study, Edward, who is an NS ofChinese, showed the greatest increase in overall accuracy. Thiscould be explained by the fact that Chinese has the progressiveaspect morpheme zai, as well as the durative aspect morphemezhe, which is similar to the resultative use of-te i-(ru) (Sheu, 1997;

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Shirai, 1998b). The durative effect of recasting should also beinvestigated more systematically, with a larger number of partic-ipants, and by either controlling the language contact or collectingdata on how the research participants have spent the periodbetween the immediate and delayed posttests.

In sum, detailed analyses of the effect, reported in thepresent article, of recasting as an implicit focus-on-form inter-vention on an aspectual form have indicated both the utility ofrecasting in conversational activities and some constraints on itseffectiveness. The findings suggest implications for the utility ofrecasting in communicative activities when a learner's conversa-tion partner can provide an ample amount of recasts on partic-ular forms of which the learner has latent knowledge. However,practitioners are advised to be aware of the factors, such as thedifferent degrees of difficulty in acquiring a form for denotingvarious meanings and the learner's readiness to appropriatelyuse the form, that may constrain the effectiveness of recasting.

Revised version accepted 25 November 2003

Notes

'The progressive use of -te i-(ru) with the achievement verb de-(ru) (to exit)could be the result of substituting an accomplishment verb such as hat-tede-(ru) (to climb out of something) and thus be attributed to wordsubstitution regardless of the difference in lexical aspect. Another possibleaccount would be the substitution of the progressive expression - yoo toshi-te i-(ru) (to be trying to -), which can be attached to achievement verbs,with -te i-(ru). The Li influence account is another possible explanation.2Background information such as the languages the learners speak otherthan English, the length of study of Japanese, and language learningexperience in high school was not collected separately. However, somerelevant information, such as information on Edward's Li and Greg'shistory of learning Japanese, was obtained during the sessions. Greg, whowas taking the 4th-semester Japanese course (JPN 202) in his 2ndsemester of college, was assigned to take the 3rd-semester course (JPN201) in his 1st semester based on the result of the placement test. He hadstudied Japanese since his 1st year of junior high school. Additionally,Larry and Tina were found to be planning to go to Japan in a year-abroadstudy program after the semester was over.

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3 Although comparison data were also collected in a session with anadvanced L2 speaker of Japanese and in a session with an NS ofJapanese, the analysis of these data is not reported in this article.However, calculation of interrater reliability reported here included thecodings of these data.4An anonymous reviewer pointed out that one verb, tsukare-(ru) (to gettired), that I categorized as a punctual-state verb is probably one of degreeachievements, such as to get fat and to become thin. Although I agree thattsukare-(ru) entails a change of degree, verbs of degree change are allclassified as punctual-state verbs according to the operational test ofinherent aspect presented in Appendix B. The distinction between thetwo categories, namely, between the punctual event and the punctualstate, depends on whether the change is perceivable by seeing, hearing,or touching at a particular moment. If the change is not perceivable any ofthese ways, the verb is classified as a punctual state that involved aconceptual change. Therefore, both Type 4 verbs in Kindaichi's (1976a,1976b) classification and subjective-motion verbs in Matsumoto's (1996)framework are considered to be part of punctual-state verbs.5Distribution measures with a token count are often used in studies on theacquisition of aspect using naturally occurring conversations (e.g., Cziko &Koda, 1987; Shirai, 1994, in child Li acquisition studies; Robison, 1995;Shirai, 1995; and Shirai & Kurono, 1998, in L2 acquisition studies). Whenaccuracy is measured, on the other hand, researchers often employ clozetests or multiple-choice tests in which a verb token with a certain aspectualmeaning appears only once (e.g., Bardovi-Harlig, 1995b; Bardovi-Harlig &Reynolds, 1995; Kurono, 1995; Sheu, 1997). Therefore, type counts, ratherthan counting repeated appearance of the same type as in token counts,seem to be preferred in accuracy measures.6As the interlocutor, I sometimes could not refrain from providingrecasts during the pre- and posttest sessions, although the number ofthose recasts was very small (see Table 7). Therefore, by documenting theinterlocutor's provision of recasts this way, I tried to make the dataaccountable. Provision of recasts in the posttest sessions may haveinfluenced the accuracy rate of the individual learners in the posttestsessions, especially Greg's and Larry's TLU of -te i-(ru) in the eighthsession (see Table 6).7When the data from all the learners were collapsed for each session, thedata were first sorted on a spreadsheet according to the session, thenfurther sorting within each session was carried out according to thelexical aspect class, the individual lexical item, and the correctness ofsuppliance/nonsuppliance of -te i-(ru) in obligatory/nonobligatory contexts.In Session 8, for example, -te i-(ru) was attached to the durative-activityverb benkyoo-su-(ru) (to study) in an obligatory context twice; one tokenwas by Greg and the other by Tina. Although these tokens of correctsuppliance were produced by different learners, they were counted only

Ishida 381

once. With regard to the number of obligatory contexts, because Tina failedto supply -te i-(ru) for the same verb in the same session, another count wasadded to the obligatory context.8One of the rationales for employing a 66.67% (two out of three contexts)criterion instead of a 75% (three out of four contexts) or 80% (four out offive contexts) criterion was to permit analysis with the minimum numberof obligatory contexts. Moreover, because only several instances exceeded80% correct use, such a high criterion has a problem with scalability.Therefore, the lower criterion that requires only three obligatory contextswas chosen for the current analysis. Since 66.67% correct use is far belowthe accuracy rate that can indicate acquisition, the criterion was usedto examine the relative order of accuracy among different aspectualmeanings, rather than as an indication of acquisition. For a detailedreport on implicational scaling, please refer to Ishida (2002).9 Andersen's (1978) formula for the coefficient of reproducibility isCR= 1- [n of errors/(n of rows) (n of columns)]. In this analysis, thedenominator was changed to "(n of rows) (n of columns) - n of data thatdo not have enough obligatory contexts." For example, when there wereonly two obligatory contexts, one correct use of the target form could havebeen only a chance performance. Therefore, when the number of obligatorycontexts was fewer than three, the correct-use ratio was excluded from thecalculation, which is indicated with parentheses in Table 12.l'Sessions 3 and 4 did not follow the pattern as a result of Tina's highcorrect-use ratio for -te i-(ru) for the progressive and the habitualmeanings. However, it is beyond the scope of this article to examine thereasons why she could use -te i-(ru) with high accuracy with these meanings.1"The effect of instructional order needs further research. The use of -tei-(ru) as the marker of the perfect of result is introduced in the samelesson as its use as the resultative marker, as mentioned in the ResearchParticipants section. However, the learners could produce only two fixedexpressions: mada kime-te i-nai (I haven't decided yet) and mada kimat-tei-nai (It hasn't been decided yet). On the other hand, although the habitualuse of -te i-(ru) is not introduced in the "Grammar Notes" in the textbookuntil the end of the 4th semester, the learners used -te i-(ru) as the habitualmarker more accurately and with more verb types than as the perfectmarker. The role of various uses of -te i-(ru) modeled in the textbook andin the classroom without explicit explanation should be also taken intoconsideration.1 2 The lexical aspect classes of the verbs with which -te i-(ru) forms arecreated for the other subcategories of the progressive and the resultativeare different from those for the PRG-UAP and the RSL-RSL. Therefore, thecomparison was made only within the subcategories that differ in terms oftime reference.

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Appendix A

Five Topics on the Cards

Daily Activities

Please tell your partner what you usually do.

* How do you commute?* Where do you eat, and with whom?* What classes do you have, and when?* What do you usually do between classes?* The activity you are involved in at certain times (e.g., 12:00 pm)?* How often do you usually do the following things?

* laundry* talk on the phone* clean your room* eat out for dinner

Today's Schedule

Please tell your partner about what you did and will do today.

a Are you busy, or not?* Why?* What do you need to do, by what time?

* classes?* homework?* part-time job?

* By what time do you want those to be done?

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Picture Description

Please talk about the event in your picture by describing the followingin as much detail as possible.

* When?* Who?* Where?* What occasion? Why?* Special clothing? Why?* Particular facial expressions? Why?* Feeling and talking?* Other information-What's in the background?

Weekend Talk

Please talk freely about your last weekend and about your plans forthis coming weekend.

About Learning Japanese

Please tell your partner anything about learning Japanese.

* Did you enjoy this talking session?* Did you have difficulty expressing yourself? When?* Do you have any comments or questions concerning what you are

learning in your class?

Appendix B

Tests for Inherent Aspect in Japanese (modified from Shirai& Kurono, 1998)

Preparatory Step: Durative Verbs Versus Punctual Verbs

When modified by an "at" time phrase, the entire event thatthe verb in -ta form entails is conceived as having happened at agiven time:

Ishida

No-* Durative (e.g., Hon wa hachi-ji ni tsukue no ue ni atta."The book was on the table at 8:00.")(e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni hataraita. "Tarooworked at 8:00.")(e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni tsukue o tukutta."Taroo made a desk at 8:00.")

Yes-- Punctual (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni booru o ketta."Taroo kicked the ball at 8:00.")(e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni okita. "Taroogot up at 8:00.")

Durative Verbs

After identifying nondynamic verbs (DR-ST) as opposed todynamic verbs (DR-AC and DR-EV) in Step 1, proceed to Step 2for further categorization of dynamic verbs.

Step 1: Identifying Durative States

A. The verb can refer to present state in simple presenttense without referring to a habitual situation or a futureaction:

Yes, DR-ST (e.g., Tsukue no ue ni hon ga aru. "There is abook on the table.")

No, Others (e.g., Taroo wa hataraku. "Taroo will work" or"Taroo [usually etc.] works.")

B. When the past-tense marker -ta is attached, the verbhas neutral interpretation regarding termination:

Yes-- DR-ST (e.g., Tsukue no ue ni hon ga atta. "There was abook on the table.")

No-- Others (e.g., Taroo wa hataraita. "Taroo worked [andthe action is terminated].")

Step 2: Durative Activities Versus Durative Events

A. Even if the subject stops in the middle of the action, theverb still entails that s/he did the action:

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Yes-- DR-AC (e.g., Taroo wa hataraita. "Taroo worked[although he stopped working after a while].")

No-* DR-EV (e.g., Taroo wa tsukue o tukutta. "Taroo made adesk [although he stopped making a desk].")

B. With the verb of simple past tense, the verb accepts aunitary, nonanticipatory meaning (that is, the entire situationoccurs throughout the duration of the time period) when it co-occurs with an adverbial of duration:

Yes [adverb of duration] -- DR-AC (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-jikanhataraita. "Taroo worked for eighthours.")

Yes [adverb of duration]-kakete -4 DR-EV(e.g., Taroo wa hachi-jikan kakete tsukue o tukutta."Taroo made a desk byspending eight hours.")

No-- Punctual verbs (e.g., Taro wa hachi-jikan (kakete) booruo ketta. "Taroo kicked the ball for/spend-ing eight hours.")(e.g., Taroo wa hachi-jikan (kakete) okita."Taroo got up for/spending eight hours.")

Punctual Verbs

After identifying nondynamic verbs (PC-ST) as opposed todynamic verbs (PC-AC and PC-EV) in Step 1, proceed to Step 2for further categorization of dynamic verbs.

Step 1: Identifying Punctual States

The verb needs to fulfill both of the following requirementsto be identified as PC-ST.

A. Since the verb does not entail action, the occurrenceof the change of state is hardly recognizable at a particularpoint:

Yes-- PC-ST (e.g., Hachi-ji ni hahaoya ni niru. "To come toresemble her mother at 8:00.")

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No-- PC-AC (e.g., Hachi-ji ni booru o keru. "To kick a ball at8:00.")

PC-EV (e.g., Hachi-ji ni okiru. "To get up at 8:00.")

B. With a past-tense form, the verb indicates a state and neverindicates a past event in which some kind of action took place:

Yes-- PC-ST (e.g., Hahaoya ni nita onna no ko. "A girl whoresembles her mother.")

No,* PC-AC (e.g., Booru o ketta otoko no ko. "A boy whokicked a ball.")

PC-EV (e.g., Hachi-ji ni okita hito. "A person whogot up at 8:00.")

Step 2: Punctual Activities Versus Punctual Events

A. The state of the subject of the action, which is entailedby the verb, goes through a change between before and after themoment of the action:

Yes-- PC-EV (e.g., Taroo wa okita. "Taroo got up [Taroo'sstate changed from lying down to being up].")

No-- PC-AC (e.g., Taroo wa booru o ketta. "Taroo kicked theball [Taroo's state did not change]." )

B. The action the verb entails can be performed iterativelyfor a certain duration of time by the same subject, since the stateof the subject has not gone through a change:

Yes-- PC-AC (e.g., Taro wa nan-kai mo tsuzukete booru o ketta."Taroo kicked the ball many times in succession.")

No-- PC-EV (e.g., Taroo wa nan-kai mo tsuzukete okita."Taroo got up many times in succession.")

Additional Tests for Confirming the Classification

Test 1: States-Durative States Versus Punctual States

The DR-ST verb can refer to a present state in the simplepresent tense, whereas the PC-ST verb can refer to a presentresultative state only with -te i-(ru):

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Simple present- DR-ST (e.g., Hon no ue ni pen ga aru."There is a pen on the book.")

With -te i-(ru)- (e.g., Hanako wa hahaoya ni nite iru."Hanako resembles her mother.")

Test 2: Activities-Durative Activities Versus Punctual Activities

Neither type of verb involves change of state at the naturalend point inherently entailed in the verb. However, it is possibleto say V-hajimeru ("start -ing") with the DR-AC verb withoutinvolving iterative meaning, whereas V-hajimeru ("start -ing")with the PC-AC verb will involve iteration:

Noniterative-* DR-AC (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni hatarakihajimeta. "Taroo began working at 8:00.")

Iterative-+ PC-AC (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-ji ni booru o kerihajimeta. "Taroo began kicking a ball.")

Test 3: Events-Durative Events Versus Punctual Events

Both types of verbs inherently have end points. However, inorder to refer to the end point of the DR-EV verb, only [time]-decan be used, and [time]-go ni will focus only on the beginningpoint of the event or action, whereas these two time adverbs canbe used interchangeably for the PC-EV verb:

DR-EV---* (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-jikan de/go ni tsukue o tukurudaroo. "Taroo will complete/begin making desksafter eight hours.")

PC-EV-- (e.g., Taroo wa hachi-jikan delgo ni okiru daroo."Taroo will get up after eight hours.")

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