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Linguistic distance effect on cross-linguistic transfer of

morphological awareness

Article  in  Applied Psycholinguistics · September 2013

DOI: 10.1017/S0142716412000070

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Applied Psycholinguistics, page 1 of 26, 2012
doi:10.1017/S0142716412000070

Linguistic distance effect on

cross-linguistic transfer of
morphological awareness
DONGBO ZHANG
Nanyang Technological University

Received: October 18, 2010 Accepted for publication: October 14, 2011

ADDRESS FOR CORRESPONDENCE

Dongbo Zhang, Center for Research in Pedagogy and Practice, National Institute of Education,
Nanyang Technological University, 1 Nanyang Walk, Singapore 637616.
E-mail: dongbo.zhang@nie.edu.sg

ABSTRACT
This study examined transfer facilitation effect of first language morphological awareness on second
language lexical inference ability among Grade 6 Chinese-speaking English as a foreign language
learners in China. A set of paper and pencil tests was administered to measure children’s morpho-
logical awareness and lexical inference ability in both Chinese and English. Results showed that the
contribution of Chinese morphological awareness to English morphological awareness was larger for
compound words than for derived words. In addition, the indirect effect of Chinese compound aware-
ness on English compound word meaning inference was significant, but that of Chinese derivational
awareness on English derived word meaning inference did not achieve significance. These findings
confirmed that cross-linguistic transfer of Chinese morphological awareness was responsive to the
linguistic distance between Chinese and English.

Monolingual reading research has shown that morphological awareness is a signifi-

cant independent contributor to development of literacy skills in morphophonemic
English (e.g., Carlisle, 2000; Deacon & Kirby, 2004; Nagy, Berninger, & Abbott,
2006) as well as logographic Chinese (e.g., Chen, Hao, Geva, Zhu, & Shu, 2009;
Ku & Anderson, 2003). Recently, studies of bilingual children’s literacy acquisi-
tion have also revealed that morphological awareness can be transferred from one
language to facilitate the development of reading ability in another language (e.g.,
Deacon, Wade-Woolley, & Kirby, 2008; Pasqurella, Chen, Lam, Luo, & Ramirez,
2011; Ramirez, Chen, Geva, & Kiefer, 2010; Wang, Yang, & Cheng, 2009).
Because there are cross-linguistic similarities as well as variations in morpho-
logical structure across languages, presumably, transfer of morphological aware-
ness in biliteracy acquisition should be governed by the typological distance
between the two languages of children, as suggested in Koda’s (2005, 2008)
transfer facilitation model. However, previous studies on transfer of morpholog-
ical awareness have not adequately addressed this issue, largely because their
© Cambridge University Press 2012 0142-7164/12 $15.00
Applied Psycholinguistics 2
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

morphological awareness measures in most cases only dealt with one structure
shared by first language (L1) and second language (L2), such as inflectional
morphology in French and English (Deacon et al., 2007) and compounding in
Chinese and English (Wang et al., 2009). A better understanding of a linguistic
distance effect on transfer of morphological awareness necessitates a concurrent
investigation of more than one morphological structure in both L1 and L2, which
was the objective of this study. Specifically, we aimed to examine how L1–L2
distance influences the facilitation effect of L1 morphological awareness transfer
on L2 word learning, or lexical inference ability, by focusing on young Chinese-
speaking readers of English as a foreign language (EFL).

MORPHOLOGICAL AWARENESS AND VOCABULARY ACQUISITION

Morphological awareness pertains to “the ability to reflect upon and manipu-
late morphemes and employ word formation rules in one’s language” (Kuo &
Anderson, 2006, p. 161). Carlisle (2000) argued that morphological awareness
“must have as its basis the ability to parse words and analyze constituent mor-
phemes for the purpose of constructing meaning” (p. 170). As such, morphological
awareness contributes to word reading by facilitating segmentation of morpho-
logically complex words and the retrieval and retention of these words; more
importantly, it is also a basic competence for word learning in that meanings of
unfamiliar words can be inferred by use of morphological analysis. Many studies
have revealed that morphological awareness is a significant contributor to word
learning and vocabulary growth (e.g., Carlisle, 2000; McBride-Chang et al., 2008;
McBride-Chang, Wagner, Muse, Chow, & Shu, 2005).
The conducive role of morphological awareness in vocabulary acquisition is
no surprise given that the majority of words monolingual children encounter in
print school materials are complex words that are morphologically transparent and
children can use their morphological knowledge to derive the meanings of these
words (Nagy & Anderson, 1984). The competence of “morphological problem
solving” (Anglin, 1993, p. 5) is thus essential to children’s word acquisition in
school.
Experimental studies have shown that skilled use of morphological information
often leads to better inference and memory of word meanings. Wysocki and
Jenkins (1987) reported that children performed better on transfer words that were
derivationally related to the infrequent words they were previously taught than on
control words for which they had not received any prior training. In Bowers and
Kirby (2010), children who received “structured word inquiry” program, which
highlighted morphological analysis as one core component, were more successful
than those who had not participated in the program with regard to their use of
base word knowledge to infer meanings of unknown derivational words, or their
“morphological vocabulary.” Bauman, Edwards, Boland, Olejnik, and Kame’enui
(2003) reported that children who were explicitly taught derivational affixes and
were encouraged to draw upon the various morphological clues (affixes and roots)
better unlocked meanings of unfamiliar complex words than did counterparts who
received instruction on content-central vocabulary from the textbooks with such
Applied Psycholinguistics 3
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

strategies as textbook and dictionary definitions, predict/verify strategy, and so

forth.
Because of the importance of morphological analysis to lexical inference, stud-
ies across diverse languages have found that a significant amount of variance
in children’s vocabulary knowledge can be accounted for by individual differ-
ence in their morphological awareness. McBride-Chang et al. (2005) observed
that morphological identification ability and morphological structure knowledge
significantly predicted expressive vocabulary of English-speaking kindergarten-
ers and second graders. Similarly, Chen et al. (2009) revealed that Chinese first
and second graders’ compound awareness uniquely predicted their expressive
vocabulary knowledge, after adjusting for phonological skills. In Carlisle (2000),
English-speaking children’s derivational awareness accounted for a large amount
of variance in their vocabulary knowledge. In a longitudinal study, McBride-
Chang et al. (2008) tracked the development of compound awareness and vocabu-
lary knowledge in Chinese- and Korean-speaking preschoolers. Across language
groups, Time 1 compound awareness significantly predicted Time 2 vocabulary
knowledge, even after Time 1 vocabulary knowledge, phonological processing
skills and other related skills were controlled for.

CROSS-LINGUISTIC TRANSFER OF MORPHOLOGICAL AWARENESS

Research on L2 reading and biliteracy acquisition has generally concurred that
reading subskills, such as metalinguistic awareness, can be transferred across
languages (Durgunoglu, 1997; Koda, 2005, 2008). Koda’s (2005, 2008) transfer
facilitation model, for instance, specifically predicts that transferred competence
of one language can provide top-down assistance for the development of reading
and its related skills in another language. Previous research has generally endorsed
transfer of phonological awareness (e.g., Durgunoglu, Nagy, & Hancin, 1993) with
relatively limited attention to transfer of morphological awareness. However, there
is growing evidence that morphological awareness can also be transferred across
languages and facilitate biliteracy development.
Deacon et al. (2007) tracked the development of the ability to deal with past tense
morphology and word reading from Grade 1 to 3 among English children enrolled
in a French immersion program. The study revealed that early measures of English
morphological awareness significantly predicted French reading, after controlling
for French morphological awareness and other related skills; in addition, later
measures of French morphological awareness also predicted English reading after
accounting for the effects of English morphological awareness, English vocabu-
lary, and other skills. These findings suggested bidirectional transfer of morpho-
logical awareness, albeit different in pattern at different times, in French–English
biliteracy acquisition. Ramirez et al. (2010) showed that Spanish-speaking ESL
learners’ knowledge of derivational affixes and morphological production ability
in Spanish uniquely predicted English word reading, after all related English
variables were controlled for. It suggested a transfer facilitation effect of Spanish
derivational awareness in the acquisition of English reading ability.
Transfer of morphological awareness was also observed in literacy acquisition
of Chinese and English, two typologically diverse languages and also the focal
Applied Psycholinguistics 4
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

languages of the present study. Wang et al. (2009) documented transfer of com-
pound awareness in that Chinese immigrant children’s English compound aware-
ness accounted for a unique proportion of variance in Chinese character reading,
over and above Chinese compound awareness and a few other related variables.
A similar finding was also reported in a study of Chinese learners of English in
a foreign language context. Zhang et al. (2010) trained fifth graders’ Chinese and
English compound awareness. Four comparable classes were assigned to three
experimental conditions: one received training on Chinese compound morphol-
ogy, and one on English compound morphology; the other two served as controls.
Children were posttested on a compound analogy task in both Chinese and English.
The study showed that the Chinese intervention group significantly outperformed
the control groups on the English task, which indicated an effect of cross-linguistic
transfer from Chinese to English because the children who had received training
in Chinese compounding applied their insights to English compound analysis.
Interestingly, reverse transfer from English to Chinese also surfaced in the study,
but this transfer only happened to those children with a high level of English
proficiency.

TYPOLOGICAL DISTANCE EFFECT ON TRANSFER

OF READING SUBSKILLS
As languages differ in linguistic structure and the ways in which phonological and
morphological information are mapped onto orthography, cross-linguistic varia-
tions of metalinguistic awareness should be expected. Subsequently, according to
the transfer facilitation model (Koda, 2005, 2008), to what extent metalinguistic
insights can be transferred or are “transfer-ready” depends on the linguistic dis-
tance between L1 and L2. Presumably, facets related to a linguistic structure that
is typical of or productive in both languages are more likely to be transferred,
whereas facets that are more L1/L2-specific (e.g., related to a structure productive
in one language but not the other) would be less readily transferable.
In line with the prediction of the transfer facilitation model, Wang, Park, and
Lee (2006) reported that in Korean–English biliteracy acquisition, phonological
awareness in children’s L1 Korean transferred and assisted L2 English reading,
but no transfer of orthographic processing skills from L1 to L2 was observed.
This is because Korean and English are both alphabetic languages, but contrast
in how phonemic information is represented in orthography. Although phonemes
in English are represented orthographically in a linear string of letters, Korean
phonemes are packed in nonlinear, character-shape Hangul blocks. Similarly,
Wang et al. (2009) reported that Chinese–English bilingual children transferred
their Chinese phonological awareness in English word reading. However, no sig-
nificant transfer facilitation effect of orthographic processing ability was observed
from Chinese on English word reading and from English on Chinese character
recognition. This lack of orthographic transfer should not be a surprise, given the
two contrasting writing systems of English and Chinese.
Regarding morphological awareness, the findings of the preceding studies seem
to imply that the facilitation effect of L1 morphological awareness transfer on L2
reading and its related skills should also be a function of the linguistic distance
Applied Psycholinguistics 5
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

between L1 and L2. Presumably, a facet that represents a productive morpholog-

ical structure of both L1 and L2 would be more transferrable, whereas transfer
facilitation would be less readily available in L2 reading for a facet that is typical
of L1 but not L2 or vice versa.
Take as an example the morphological structure of Chinese and English, the
focal languages of the present study. Although compounding serves as a productive
way of word formation in both languages (Fabb, 1998; Packard, 2000), derivation
is productive only in English (Li & Thompson, 1981; Plag, 2003). In Chinese,
derivational process is very limited and derivational affixes are small in number
and low in functional salience. A morpheme that serves as an affix in Chinese often
has multiple meanings, and it can sometimes function as a root or a bound root
and be combined with other root morphemes to form compound words, too. For
example, is often regarded as a derivational suffix, meaning one with expertise
as in (painter or artist). However, it also means home or family and forms
compound words with other morphemes, such as (a married woman’s parents’
home). Despite the low productivity and salience of derivation in Chinese, Ku and
Anderson (2003) found that children do develop insights into such a structure in
their native language and the insights increase across grades. However, it remains
a question whether Chinese children can transfer their L1 derivational knowledge
to facilitate word learning and reading in L2 English.
Cheung et al. (2010) observed that Hong Kong children’s Chinese L1 com-
pound awareness was transferred to facilitate English L2 word reading, over and
above English derivational awareness and phonological awareness. The study,
however, does not seem to directly support a linguistic distance effect on transfer
of morphological awareness, because English compound awareness and Chinese
derivational awareness were not measured and analyzed in their regression anal-
yses. Wang, Cheng, and Chen’s (2006) study on biliteracy acquisition among
immigrant children in the United States covered both compound and derivational
morphology in Chinese as well as English. The study revealed that compound
awareness in English, children’s dominant language, explained a unique propor-
tion of variance in Chinese reading. Such a predictive relation, however, was not
found for English derivational awareness. Based on structural equation modeling
analysis, Pasquarella et al. (2011) observed that Canadian Chinese–English bilin-
guals’ English compound awareness significantly predicted Chinese vocabulary
knowledge as well as reading comprehension; however, such relationships were
not existent for English derivational awareness.
Taken together, the findings of the preceding studies suggest that transfer readily
happened to awareness of compounding, a structure productive in both Chinese
and English, but not awareness of derivational morphology, which is productive
in and typical of English only. They, thus, appear to support a linguistic distance
effect on transfer of morphological awareness as implied in the transfer facilitation
model. A conclusion like this, however, should be made with caution because of
the limitations of the studies.
To illustrate, in Wang, Cheng, et al. (2006), when Chinese reading comprehen-
sion was regressed on related Chinese and English variables, Chinese morpholog-
ical awareness was not in the regression equation. As a result, the unique contribu-
tion of English compound morphology to Chinese reading comprehension might
Applied Psycholinguistics 6
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

only reflect the relationship of English compound awareness to Chinese compound

awareness and that of Chinese compound awareness to Chinese reading compre-
hension. In other words, the unique contribution of English morphological aware-
ness to Chinese reading comprehension might not indicate a transfer facilitation
effect without partialing out the influence of Chinese morphological awareness. A
similar concern rests with Pasquarella et al.’s (2011) study as well. For instance,
it is unclear why English compound awareness, as opposed to Chinese compound
awareness (i.e., a lack of within-language effect), contributed to Chinese reading
comprehension and why compound awareness in the two languages did not even
have a significant relationship. In addition, because the study did not measure
Chinese derivational awareness, as was the case in Wang, Cheng, et al. (2006),
there was a lack of understanding about the relationship between derivational
awareness in the two languages and its relationship to vocabulary knowledge and
reading comprehension cross-linguistically. Finally, although both studies revealed
that English compound awareness predicted Chinese reading comprehension, it
remains unclear how this link was established. Logic suggests that this cross-
linguistic contribution should happen via children’s ability to infer meanings of
unknown words they have encountered while reading; thus, this “on the spot
vocabulary learning” (Nagy, 2007, p. 64), or lexical inference, might have helped
learners resolve vocabulary gaps in reading and lead to better comprehension.
Consequently, without having a clear understanding of the relationship of mor-
phological awareness to lexical inference across languages, how morphological
awareness subsequently facilitates reading comprehension would remain unclear.

THE PRESENT STUDY

The primary goal of the present study was to investigate a potential linguistic
distance effect on cross-linguistic transfer of morphological awareness. We aimed
to address how the facilitation effect of L1 morphological awareness transfer on
L2 lexical inference ability is affected by the linguistic distance between Chinese
and English. In other words, do Chinese compound awareness and derivational
awareness have a similar level of facilitation on Chinese EFL learners’ ability to
infer meanings of unknown English compound and derivational words, respec-
tively? Based on the transfer facilitation model (Koda, 2005, 2008) and earlier
delineations of the morphological structure of Chinese and English, we predicted
that the transfer facilitation effect from Chinese compound awareness on English
compound word meaning inference is stronger than that from Chinese derivational
awareness on English derived word meaning inference.

METHOD
Participants
Participants were sixth graders of a public elementary school located in the central
town of a small county in Northeast China. Because the town is the county’s
business and political center, most of its residents are generally better educated
and financially better off than those living in more rural areas. Nevertheless,
Applied Psycholinguistics 7
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

most of the town residents still belong to the working class. The town is a largely
monolingual community. Mandarin Chinese is predominantly used for both formal
and informal communications. The 204 children participating in the current study
included 115 boys and 89 girls with an average age of 12.08 years (SD = 0.61).
They all spoke Mandarin Chinese as their home language. From Grade 3, these
children had four 40-min English classes per week. With about 18 weeks in a
semester, they should have received over 350 hr of classroom instruction at the
time when the current study was conducted.

English tasks
English derivational awareness. Two tasks were used to measure derivational
awareness in English. The morphological relation task touched on children’s abil-
ity to perform morpheme segmentation for derived words. The children were asked
to judge whether the second word in a word pair “came from,” or was morpholog-
ically related to, the first word. A similar test had been used in previous research to
measure monolingual and bilingual children’s English morphological awareness
(e.g., Nagy et al., 2006; Saiegh-Haddad & Geva, 2008). The task included 10
related (e.g., teach and teacher) and 10 unrelated (e.g., man and many) word pairs,
plus a practice item.
The affix choice task was based on Nagy et al. (2006). It measured children’s
knowledge about the functions of English derivational affixes. The children were
presented with a sentence frame followed by three derived words sharing a stem.
They were to select an appropriate derived form to fill into the sentence. To
minimize confounding from grammatical knowledge, all sentence frames were
very simple in grammatical structure. An example is My little sister brings us a lot
of ___ (happily, unhappy, happiness). To choose happiness as the correct answer,
the children needed to know the function of the suffix -ness. This test consisted of
10 test items and 1 practice item.

English compound awareness. Two tasks were used to measure English com-
pound awareness. The compound structure task followed Nagy et al. (2006). It
measured the understanding of the modifier–head structure of English nominal
compounds. Children were to choose a better answer to a riddle from two given
options, for example, Which is a better name for a bee that lives in the grass:
a grass bee or a bee grass? Each riddle was paired with a version in which the
modifier–head relationship between the two nouns was switched, for example,
Which is a better name for grass where a lot of bees like to hide: bee grass or
grass bee? The children had learned the relative clause structure on which the
riddle questions were based. The task consisted of 20 items with 10 riddle pairs,
plus 1 practice item.
The morpheme discrimination task was constructed following Ku and Anderson
(2003). It measured the understanding that a word part shared by different words
may vary in meaning in these words. Children were presented with groups of three
words (e.g., classroom, bedroom, and mushroom); two words in each group were
transparent compound words with the target word component having the same
meaning (classroom and bedroom). Children were to circle the word that did not
Applied Psycholinguistics 8
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

belong (mushroom) to demonstrate their ability to differentiate meanings of the

same morpheme in different words. There were 10 test items, plus 1 practice item.

English lexical inference. Lexical inference was defined as making appropriate

predictions of meanings of unknown morphologically complex words based on
morphological analysis and knowledge of the meanings of constituent morphemes.
Although contextual and other factors have been found to support inference of
meanings of unfamiliar words, they were not examined in this study. The lexical
inference task covered both derived and compound words. Each target derived
or compound word was followed by four English meaning choices constructed
with simple grammatical structures. The children were to select the best meaning
interpretation for each word. There were 15 derived words and 15 compound
words, plus 1 word for practice.
The derived word part measured the ability to apply knowledge of affixes and
word structure to infer meanings of derivational words. For example, reachable
had as its four meaning choices to touch something, very far away, able to be
grasped, and to ache again. To choose able to be grasped as the correct answer,
children needed to correctly identify the base reach and then use knowledge of
-able to modify its meaning. For the three inappropriate answers, the first was
close in meaning but had a wrong part of speech (POS); the second was correct in
POS but wrong in meaning; the fourth showed an orthographic resemblance only,
and hence was wrong in both POS and meaning.
The compound word part measured the ability to apply knowledge of compound
structure to infer the meaning of a target word. All target words were semantically
transparent nominals with noun–noun structure because such compounds have a
generally clear endocentric structure. For instance, houseboat had four choices:
a boat good for living in as a home, a house that looks like a boat, to build a
house on a big boat, and there is a small boat in a house. Children should be
able to choose the first one as the best meaning explanation if they understood the
modifier–head relationship between house and boat and the rule of noun–noun
combination in yielding a nominal compound.
To control for potential confound of vocabulary knowledge, all words in the
morphological awareness tasks, except those derived word choices in the affix
choice task, were selected from the children’s textbooks for earlier grades. The
children’s English teachers were also consulted so that the words that they thought
might be difficult to some children were replaced by simpler ones. For the lexical
inference task, all target words were relatively low in frequency. They had not
appeared in the children’s textbooks and, thus, should have been unfamiliar to the
children. In contrast, the base morphemes were all highly frequent and had been
learned by the children. The children’s English teachers were consulted in the task
construction process.

Chinese tasks
Chinese derivational awareness. Two tasks similar to the English ones were used
to measure Chinese derivational awareness. For the morphological relation task,
the children were presented a two-character derived word, followed by a character
Applied Psycholinguistics 9
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

that appeared in the derived word but was not necessarily its base. They were
to judge whether the character was morphologically related to the two-character
word. The task included 10 related (e.g., – ) and 10 unrelated word–character
pairs (e.g., – ). A practice item was also provided.
The affix choice task tested the children’s knowledge of the function of Chinese
derivational affixes. It asked them to select, from among three derived forms,
an appropriate one to fill an incomplete sentence. All characters in the sen-
tence frames were highly frequent and familiar to the children. All derived word
choices were two-character forms sharing a pseudocharacter base. For example,
___ (He wants to be a ___ after he grows up) ( , ,
). To choose the correct answer , the children needed to know the function
of the suffix and discriminate it from the other two affixes (denoting change)
and (-able). This task consisted of 10 test items and 1 practice item.

Chinese compound awareness. The form of the two Chinese compound aware-
ness tasks was similar to that of the English ones. The compound structure task
was constructed after Wang, Cheng, et al. (2006) and Chen et al. (2008). Chil-
dren were to choose a two-character compound that better answered a riddle,
for example, : (Which is a better name
for the flower that grows in a tree: a tree flower or a flower tree?). Its paired
version was : ? (Which is a better name for
the tree that grows a flower: a tree flower or a flower tree?). Following Wang,
Cheng, et al. (2006), more complex riddles involving three-character compounds
were also used to increase the difficulty level of this task. For example,
: , , , ? (Which is a
better name for a candy that is packed in a box made out of bronze: bronze candy
box, bronze box candy, candy box bronze, or box bronze candy?). The task con-
sisted of 20 items with seven riddle-pairs of two-character compounds and three
of three-character compounds, plus 1 practice item.
Based on Ku and Anderson (2003), the morpheme discrimination task measured
whether children understood that a root or a bound root might vary in meaning in
different compound words. For example, means commerce in (business)
and (commercial product) but discuss or consult in . There were 10 test
items, plus 1 practice item. All words in this task were familiar to 6th graders.

Chinese lexical inference. This task included both derived and compound words.
Like the English task, four meaning interpretations were provided for each target
word, and the children were to select the best interpretation. All of the target words,
as opposed to the base morphemes, were low in frequency and unfamiliar to the
children. In addition, as in the English task, all the compound words in this task
were transparent nominals with the noun–noun structure. There were 15 derived
and 15 compound words, plus 1 word for practice. Most items were from Ku and
Anderson (2003) and had been previously used on Grade 6 Chinese children. A
compound example is : (a) , (b) , (c) ,
and (d) ; a derivative example is : (a) ,
(b) , (c) , and (d) .
Applied Psycholinguistics 10
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

Data collection and analysis procedures

Data were collected in the participants’ regular English and Chinese classes near
the end of their Grade 6 year, and lasted about a month. All the instruments were
printed on paper and administered in a whole class format. The morphological
awareness tasks were administered first, followed by the lexical inference tasks.
Children first worked on a practice item, and their questions related to the tests
were then answered before they formally worked on the test items. To minimize
potential confounding of decoding ability, children were encouraged to ask their
English teachers about pronunciations of words in the tests.
The cross-linguistic relations between morphological awareness and lexical
inference, or transfer of Chinese morphological awareness, were analyzed using
the structural equation modeling (SEM) method (Kline, 2004). All SEM analyses
were conducted on EQS 6.1 (Bentler & Wu, 2002). Because the chi-square value is
sensitive to sample size and is often significant with a large sample size, fit indices
are adopted in covariance structure analysis to examine goodness of model fit. Hu
and Bentler (1999) suggest that a comparative fit index (CFI) larger than 0.95 and
root mean squared error of approximation (RMSEA) smaller than 0.06 indicate a
very good model. The current study used these two indices to judge goodness of
model fit.

RESULTS
Transfer of compound awareness
To examine a potential linguistic distance effect on cross-linguistic transfer of
morphological awareness (i.e., how the similarities and differences in the morpho-
logical structure of Chinese and English influenced the pattern of transfer), this
section and the section that follows report the analyses for transfer of compound
awareness and derivational awareness, respectively. The means and standard de-
viations of children’s performance on all tasks are provided in Table 1.
Table 2 shows the bivariate correlations between compound awareness and
compound word meaning inference measures in Chinese and English. Chinese
compound structure and English compound structure correlated significantly (r =
.152, p < .05), so did Chinese morpheme discrimination and English morpheme
discrimination (r = .211, p < .01). The two measures of Chinese compound
awareness only weakly correlated with English compound word meaning infer-
ence; neither correlation has achieved significance. On the other hand, both English
compound structure (r = .218, p < .01) and English morpheme discrimination
(r = .209, p < .01) significantly correlated with Chinese compound word meaning
inference. Finally, the measure of compound word meaning inference in the two
languages significantly correlated (r = .213, p < .01).
SEM analysis was performed to investigate further the cross-linguistic relations
and test transfer of Chinese compound awareness in facilitating English compound
word meaning inference. Based on the findings of previous research, we hypoth-
esized that English compound word meaning inference was predicted by English
compound awareness, Chinese compound word meaning inference, as well as Chi-
nese compound awareness; in addition, Chinese compound awareness predicted
Applied Psycholinguistics 11
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness
Table 1. Means and standard deviations of all variables

Variables n M SD α

Chinese
Morphological relation 20 0.698 0.13 0.78
Affix choice 10 0.759 0.17 0.64
Compound structure 20 0.873 0.15 0.83
Morpheme discrimination 10 0.782 0.13 0.69
Derived word meaning inference 15 0.752 0.18 0.80
Compound word meaning inference 15 0.634 0.16 0.71
English
Morphological relation 20 0.588 0.13 0.75
Affix choice 10 0.380 0.15 0.53
Compound structure 20 0.705 0.14 0.78
Morpheme discrimination 10 0.553 0.18 0.61
Derived word meaning inference 15 0.292 0.11 0.75
Compound word meaning inference 15 0.323 0.13 0.63

Note: The mean is the mean proportion correct, and the α is the Cronbach α.

English compound awareness and Chinese compound word meaning inference

(see Figure 1 for a diagraphic representation of the hypothesized model).
We constructed a baseline model based on the above hypotheses, with both mea-
surement and structural components. In the baseline model, compound structure
and morpheme discrimination in the respective language were indicators of the
factor of compound awareness in that language. Chinese and English compound
word meaning inference had only one indicator, namely, children’s performance
on the compound word part of the lexical inference task in Chinese and English,
respectively. In testing the model, factor loadings of Chinese compound structure
and English compound structure were made unitary as 1.0. For model optimization,
a Lagrange Multiplier Test was first performed to see whether adding any param-
eter(s) would lead to improvement of model fit, followed by a Wald test, which
helped reveal whether removing any parameter(s) would maintain the goodness
of model fit while making the model more parsimonious.
The baseline model showed very good model fit, χ2 (6, N = 204) = 5.191,
p = .520; CFI = 1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, confidence interval (CI) = 0.000, 0.084.
The normalized estimate of the Mardia κ was 2.32, which did not seem to result in
chi-square and standard error biases, as Bentler and Wu (2002) suggest that only
values greater than 3 indicate nontrivial positive kurtosis. Therefore, adjustment of
multivariate nonnormality and a test with the robust methodology were not needed
(Satorra & Bentler, 1988). A Lagrange Multiplier Test was performed to optimize
the baseline model. The result revealed no significant improvement of goodness
of model fit by adding any parameter(s). A Wald test was thus performed next,
the result of which suggested that the model would become more parsimonious
with no significant change of goodness of model fit from the baseline model, if
the path from Chinese compound awareness to English compound word meaning
Table 2. Cross-linguistic correlations between morphological awareness and lexical inference

EMADER EMAAFFIX EMACOMST EMAMORDI ELEXDER ELEXCOM

CMADER .277*** .115 .196** .165* .056 .039

CMAAFFIX .190** .194** .171* .155* .105 .044
CMACOMST .261*** .088 .152* .128 .108 .099
CMAMORDI .234*** .145* .046 .211** .047 .076
CLEXDER .316*** .208** .187** .191** .097 .188**
CLEXCOM .315*** .095 .218** .209** .080 .213**

Note: EMADER, English morphological relation; EMAAFFIX, English affix choice; EMACOMST, English compound
structure; EMAMORDI, English morpheme discrimination; ELEXDER, English derived word meaning inference;
ELEXCOM, English compound word meaning inference. CMADER, Chinese morphological relation; CMAAFFIX,
Chinese affix choice; CMACOMST, Chinese compound structure; CMAMORDI, Chinese morpheme discrimination;
CLEXDER, Chinese derived word meaning inference; CLEXCOM, Chinese compound word meaning inference.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.
Applied Psycholinguistics 13
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

Figure 1. The hypothesized model of transfer of compound awareness.

inference was removed. The optimized model showed χ2 (7, N = 204) = 5.494,
p = .600; CFI = 1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, CI = 0.000, 0.074. This new model
displayed very good model fit, and while making the model more parsimonious,
it did not lead to significant change to the baseline model:
χ2 (1) = 0.303,
p = .582. Therefore, this optimized model was considered the final model for
the cross-linguistic relationship between compound awareness and compound
word meaning inference in Chinese and English. Figure 2 provides a graphic
representation of the final model.
Table 3 details the standardized parameter estimates. For the measurement
model, both measures of Chinese compound awareness loaded significantly on
the factor of Chinese compound awareness (β = 0.559 and 0.339 for compound
structure and morpheme discrimination, respectively). The factor explained about
31.2% and 11.5% of the variance in the two measures, respectively. The two
English compound awareness measures also significantly loaded on the factor of
English compound awareness (β = 0.303 and 0.321 for compound structure and
morpheme discrimination, respectively). The latent variable explained about 9.2%
and 10.3% of the variance in these two measures of English compound awareness,
respectively.
Table 3 also provides the standardized parameter estimates for the structural
model with direct, indirect, and total effects. Chinese compound awareness signifi-
cantly predicted both Chinese compound word meaning inference (β = 0.883, p <
.001; 77.9% of variance explained) and English compound awareness (β = 0.785,
p < .01; 61.6% of variance explained). English compound awareness and Chinese
compound word meaning inference together explained about 6.9% of the variance
in English compound word meaning inference. However, neither variable’s unique
contribution achieved significance at β = 0.216 for English compound awareness
and β = 0.063 for Chinese compound word meaning inference. Different from the
baseline model, the indirect effects of Chinese compound awareness on English
Figure 2. The final model of transfer of compound awareness (N = 204). CLEXCOM, Chinese compound word meaning inference; CMACOM, latent
variable of Chinese compound awareness; CMACOMST, Chinese compound structure; CMAMORDI, Chinese morpheme discrimination; ELEXCOM,
English compound word meaning inference; EMACOM, latent variable of English compound awareness; EMACOMST, English compound structure;
EMAMORDI, English morpheme discrimination.
Applied Psycholinguistics 15
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness
Table 3. Parameter estimates of the model for testing transfer
of compound awareness

Direct Effect Indirect Effect Total Effect

Predictor β R2 β β

Factor Loadings of the Measurement Model

CMACOMST ← CMACOM 0.559 .312 — —

CMAMORDI ← CMACOM 0.339*** .115 — —
EMACOMST ← EMACOM 0.303 .092 — —
EMAMORDI ← EMACOM 0.321* .103 — —

Parameter Estimates of the Structural Model

EMACOM ← CMACOM 0.785** .616 — 0.785**

CLEXCOM ← CMACOM 0.883*** .779 — 0.883***
ELEXCOM ← CMACOM — .069 0.225* 0.225*
← EMACOM 0.216 — 0.216
← CLEXCOM 0.063 — 0.063

Note: CMACOMST, Chinese compound structure; CMACOM, latent variable of

Chinese compound awareness; CMAMORDI, Chinese morpheme discrimination;
EMACOMST, English compound structure; EMACOM, latent variable of
English compound awareness; EMAMORDI, English morpheme discrimination;
CLEXCOM, Chinese compound word meaning inference; ELEXCOM, English
compound word meaning inference.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

compound word meaning inference, which were equal to the total effects of Chi-
nese compound awareness in the final model, became significant (β = 0.225, p <
.05).
Two limitations were noted in the above analyses of indirect effects. First, the
indirect effects were tested using a z test (Sobel, 1982), which requires a normal
sampling distribution. As an indirect effect is made up of a multiplicative effect
(e.g., γ31× β13 in Figure 1) whose sampling distribution is often unknown, the indi-
rect effects reported above might be biased. Shrout and Bolger (2002) proposed the
use of bootstrapping, a data-based simulation method for statistical inference, for
testing indirect effects. The bootstrapping method uses empirical sample data to
generate a certain number of bootstrap samples (typically 1,000) through random
sampling with replacement. Each bootstrap sample is then analyzed to estimate a
parameter. As the method uses CI to determine whether a statistic is significantly
different from zero, it does not have the assumption of normality of sampling distri-
bution. Cheung and Lau (2008) showed that the bootstrapping method performed
the best in estimating indirect effects, in comparison to a number of other methods.
Second, like many other SEM programs, EQS only reports total indirect effects
in the output. When there are multiple indirect effects of an independent variable
on a dependent variable through different pathways, the indirect effect through
Applied Psycholinguistics 16
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness
Table 4. 95% Confidence interval for examining frequency distribution
of indirect effect parameters in testing transfer of compound awareness

Indirect Effects 95% CI

CMACOM → EMACOM → ELEXCOM (γ31 β13 ) −1.1050–6.2490

CMACOM → CLEXCOM → ELEXCOM (γ21 β12 ) −5.9912–1.3681
CMACOM → ELEXCOM (γ31 β13 + γ21 β12 )a 0.0807–0.6383

Note: CMACOM, latent variable of Chinese compound awareness;

EMACOM, latent variable of English compound awareness; ELEXCOM,
English compound word meaning inference; CLEXCOM, Chinese
compound word meaning inference.
a
Total indirect effects of CMACOM on ELEXCOM from both paths.

each individual pathway and its relative contribution are unknown. For example,
in the final model (see Figure 2), Chinese morphological awareness contributed to
English lexical inference indirectly through two pathways: one via Chinese lexical
inference (γ21 β12 ) and the other via English morphological awareness (γ31 β13 ).
From the EQS-based SEM analyses, it was unknown whether these individual
indirect effects were significant on their own, although the total indirect effects
(γ31 β13 + γ21 β12 ) achieved significance. The bootstrapping method provides a
robust way to disentangle and estimate these component indirect effects.
Considering these limitations, 1,000 bootstrap samples were generated from
the original sample data to estimate the component indirect effects of Chinese
morphological awareness on English lexical inference. To examine the frequency
distribution of the parameters to be estimated, percentile scores of 2.5% and
97.5% were requested for computing 95% CI. As shown in Table 4, the total
indirect effects of Chinese compound awareness on English compound word
meaning inference (γ31 β13 + γ21 β12 ) were significantly different from zero, which
confirmed the result of the Sobel test (95% CI = 0.0807–0.6383). However, neither
the indirect effect via Chinese compound word meaning inference (γ21 β12 ) nor the
one via English compound awareness (γ31 β13 ) was significant, because their CIs
included zero (CI = −1.1050–6.2490 for γ31 β13 and −5.9912–1.3681 for γ21 β12 ,
respectively).

Transfer of derivational awareness

The cross-linguistic relations between derivational awareness and derived word
meaning inference in Chinese and English can first be seen from the correlations
in Table 2. There were significant correlations between Chinese morphologi-
cal relation and Chinese affix choice and their counterpart English measures,
except the correlation between Chinese morphological relation and English affix
choice. Neither Chinese morphological relation (r = .056) nor Chinese affix choice
(r = .105) correlated significantly with English derived word meaning inference.
However, the two English derivational awareness measures both correlated sig-
nificantly with Chinese derived word meaning inference (r = .316, p < .001 for
Applied Psycholinguistics 17
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

Figure 3. The hypothesized model of transfer of derivational awareness.

English morphological relation, r = .208, p < .01 for English affix choice). The
correlation between derived word meaning inference in Chinese and English was
weak and did not achieve significance (r = .097).
A similar model of cross-linguistic predictive relations between morpholog-
ical awareness and lexical inference was hypothesized for derived words (see
Figure 3). Chinese derivational awareness predicted its English counterpart (γ31 )
and L1 derived word meaning inference (γ21 ). English derived word meaning
inference was predicted by English derivational awareness (β13 ), Chinese derived
word meaning inference (β12 ), as well as Chinese derivational awareness (γ11 ).
Based on the above hypotheses, we proposed a baseline model for transfer
of L1 derivational awareness. In the model, Chinese morphological relation and
affix choice loaded on the factor of Chinese derivational awareness and English
morphological relation and affix choice on the factor of English derivational
awareness. Derived word meaning inference in both Chinese and English had
only one indicator, namely, children’s performance on the derived word part of
the lexical inference task in the respective language. In testing the baseline model,
factor loadings of Chinese morphological relation and English morphological
relation were fixed at 1.0.
The baseline model displayed good fit, χ2 (6, N = 204) = 6.106, p = .411;
CFI = 0.999, RMSEA = 0.009, CI = 0.000, 0.092. The normalized estimate of the
Mardia κ was 1.45. No adjustment of multivariate nonnormality was needed and
regular chi-square was reported without Satorra–Bentler correction. To optimize
the baseline model, a Lagrange Multiplier Test was first performed. The result
suggested that adding no path would significantly improve the baseline model’s
goodness of fit. A Wald test was performed next. The optimized model after the
Wald test displayed very good model fit, χ2 (7, N = 204) = 6.229, p = .513; CFI =
1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, CI = 0.000, 0.074. There was no significant change of
goodness of model fit from the baseline model:
χ2 (1) = .123, p = .726. Thus,
Applied Psycholinguistics 18
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

this new model was considered as the final model (see Figure 4 for a graphic
representation of the model).
Table 5 details the standardized parameter estimates. In the measurement model,
the two measures of Chinese derivational awareness significantly loaded on the
latent variable at β = 0.479 for morphological relation (23.0% of variance ex-
plained) and β = 0.505, p < .001 for affix choice (25.5% of variance explained).
The factor loadings of the two measures of English derivational awareness were
also significant (β = 0.664 for morphological relation, β = 0.497, p < .001 for
affix choice). The factor, English derivational morphological awareness, explained
about 44.1% and 24.7% of the variance in the two observed variables, respectively.
In the structural model, Chinese derivational awareness significantly predicted
both Chinese derived word meaning inference (β = 0.766, p < .001; 58.7% of
variance explained) and English derivational awareness (β = 0.628, p < .01;
39.4% of variance explained). English derivational awareness (β = 0.211) and
Chinese derived word meaning inference (β = −0.003) explained about 4.4% of
the variance in English derived word meaning inference. Neither variable’s unique
contribution achieved significance. The indirect effects of Chinese derivational
awareness on English derived word meaning inference, now equal to its total
effects, were not significant (β = 0.131). A further bootstrap-based analysis with
1,000 samples confirmed this finding in that the 95% CI −0.0161–0.6367 of the
parameter for the total indirect effects (γ31 β13 + γ21 β12 ) included zero. As the total
indirect effects were not significant, the two component indirect effects, one via
English derivational awareness and the other via Chinese derived word meaning
inference, could not be significant.

DISCUSSION
The significant contribution of Chinese compound awareness to English com-
pound awareness found in this study does not seem to be a surprise, given that
compounding is a productive way of word formation in both Chinese and English
(Fabb, 1998; Packard, 2000). In other words, compound awareness is a shared facet
of morphological awareness typical of both languages. The finding corroborates
previous research that has examined transfer of morphological awareness with
a focus on a shared structure of the focal languages (e.g., Deacon et al., 2007;
Zhang et al., 2010). Zhang et al. (2010), for example, found that young Chinese
EFL learners who received training in the structure of Chinese compound words
developed better insights into English compound structure than did those who
had not received any such training, which suggested a transfer facilitation effect
of Chinese compound awareness on English compound awareness. The present
study extends Zhang et al. (2010) as well in that Chinese compound awareness
also facilitated learners’ ability to infer meanings of unknown English compound
words, albeit indirectly via its influence on English compound awareness and
the ability to infer meanings of Chinese compounds (discussed later). It thus
supports previous research that has observed the contribution of morphological
awareness in one language to reading and its related skills in another language
(e.g., Pasquarella et al., 2011; Ramirez et al., 2010). It suggests that Chinese
Figure 4. The final model of transfer of derivational awareness (N = 204). CLEXDER, Chinese derived word meaning inference; CMAAFFIX,
Chinese affix choice; CMADER, Chinese morphological relation; CMADERIV, latent variable of Chinese derivational awareness; ELEXDER, English
derived word meaning inference; EMAAFFIX, English affix choice; EMADER, English morphological relation; EMADERIV, latent variable of English
derivational awareness.
Applied Psycholinguistics 20
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

Table 5. Parameter estimates of the model for testing transfer of derivational

awareness

Direct Effect Indirect Effect Total Effect

Predictor β R2 β β

Factor Loadings of the Measurement Model

CMADER ← CMADERIV 0.479 .230 — —

CMAAFFIX ← CMADERIV 0.505*** .255 — —
EMADER ← EMADERIV 0.664 .441 — —
EMAAFFIX ← EMADERIV 0.497*** .247 — —

Parameter Estimates of the Structural Model

EMADERIV ← CMADERIV 0.628*** .394 — 0.628***

CLEXDER ← CMADERIV 0.766*** .587 — 0.766***
ELEXDER ← CMADERIV — .044 0.131 0.131
← EMADERIV 0.211 — 0.211
← CLEXDER −0.003 — −0.003

Note: CMADER, Chinese morphological relation; CMADERIV, latent variable of

Chinese derivational awareness; CMAAFFIX, Chinese affix choice; EMADER,
English morphological relation; EMADERIV, latent variable of English derivational
awareness; EMAAFFIX, English affix choice; CLEXDER, Chinese derived word
meaning inference; ELEXDER, English derived word meaning inference.
***p < .001.

children’s L1 compound knowledge can be a good resource for their learning of

English L2 compound words.
Although the close relationship between Chinese and English compound aware-
ness was expected, it was to our surprise that Chinese and English derivational
awareness were also related, because there is clear cross-linguistic variation be-
tween the two languages regarding the productivity of derivational morphology, as
delineated earlier. Because Chinese derivational awareness significantly predicted
its English counterpart, it appears that Chinese children also transferred their
insights into Chinese derivational morphology into the analysis of the structure of
English derived words.
At first sight, the finding seems to contradict previous research that has doc-
umented a linguistic distance effect on transfer of reading subskills (e.g., Wang
et al., 2009; Wang, Park, et al., 2006). A distinction, however, has to be made
between those previous studies and the present study. In both Wang, Park, et al.
(2006) and Wang et al. (2009), the focus was on transfer of phonological versus
orthographic skills in biliteracy acquisition. Because the orthographies of Korean
and Chinese entail different visual processes than that of English, the finding that
Korean and Chinese learners of L2 English did not transfer their L1 orthographic
processing skills to facilitate English reading seems to be justifiable. On the other
hand, in the present study, although the two languages involved, Chinese and
Applied Psycholinguistics 21
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

English, are typologically distant, the focal skill is of a particular linguistic level,
that is, morphology. Morphological awareness is morphological awareness. In
other words, although derivation is very limited in Chinese, once children have
developed insights into this morphological process, they may naturally utilize these
insights for analysis of the structure of English derived words. Previous research
(e.g., Ku & Anderson, 2003) has shown that the low productivity of derivation
in Chinese does not prevent children from developing some insights into this
particular morphological process, although these insights clearly lag behind those
related to compounding.
The next logical question to ask is why such a cross-linguistic relationship
between Chinese derivational awareness and English reading subskill had not
been observed in previous Chinese–English biliteracy studies, such as Paqsuarella
et al. (2011) and Wang, Cheng, et al. (2006). We conjecture that this might be
attributable to two possible reasons: first, Chinese derivational awareness was not
measured in Pasquarella et al. (2011), and consequently, it is unknown if there
would be any relationship of Chinese derivational awareness to English reading
skills in that study. Second, in both studies, the sample included children at diverse
learning/developmental stages, whereas ours was a homogeneous group. Although
grade or age was included as a covariate in the regression or SEM analysis, it is
possible that the identified patterns about derivational awareness might not hold
for each and individual group. Paris (2005) and Duke and Carlisle (2010) discuss
a similar issue in the context of monolingual reading.
Do the above findings refute the prediction of the transfer facilitation model
(Koda, 2005, 2008) with regard to a linguistic distance effect on transfer of
metalinguistic awareness? Not necessarily. As we can see from Tables 3 and
5, the relationship between Chinese and English compound awareness was clearly
stronger than that between derivational awareness in the two languages. Chi-
nese compound awareness explained more than 60% of the variance in English
compound awareness, whereas the proportion was about 40% for derivational
awareness. In addition, SEM results have shown that the indirect effect of Chinese
derivational awareness on English derived word meaning inference did not achieve
significance, whereas that of Chinese compound awareness on English compound
word meaning inference was significant. Therefore, overall, the findings of the
present study are aligned with, rather than divergent from, the prediction of the
transfer facilitation model.
The present study also showed that in the situation where a significant transfer
facilitation effect was observed (i.e., transfer of compound awareness), L1 mor-
phological awareness did not have a significant, direct contribution to L2 lexical
inference. SEM analysis indicated that after partialing out the influence of L2
morphological awareness and L1 lexical inference, L1 morphological awareness
did not uniquely explain a significant amount of variance in L2 lexical inference.
Percentile confidence intervals of bootstrap-based estimates of indirect effect pa-
rameters further revealed that the transfer facilitation effect of L1 morphological
awareness on L2 lexical inference took place indirectly via its influences on L2
morphological awareness and L1 lexical inference.
It makes sense for indirect effects to be available in L2 reading or biliteracy
acquisition because of the close relationship of L1 metalinguistic awareness with
Applied Psycholinguistics 22
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

corresponding L2 metalinguistic awareness and L1 reading on the one hand,

and that of L2 metalinguistic awareness and L1 reading with L2 reading on the
other hand. Such close relationships are not uncommon, as can be seen in the
correlation matrices of many previous biliteracy studies. Yet, a finding similar to
ours has not surfaced in previous research, either because researchers were not
interested in testing indirect effects or the method they used (i.e., conventional
regression analysis) constrained them from doing so. As to the lack of signifi-
cance for either one of the two component indirect effects in the present study,
we speculate that it might be related to the context and stage of learning of the
participants (i.e., Grade 6 EFL learners). Specifically, the low English proficiency
of the learners and their limited exposure to morphologically complex words
at the early stage of English learning in a foreign language context might have
weakened the association between L1 compound awareness and L2 compound
meaning inference as well as between L1 and L2 compound meaning inference
(see Figure 2). Consequently, these two weak paths suppressed the component
indirect effects of L1 compound awareness on L2 compound word meaning
inference.
The question now comes to why there was a lack of a direct effect of L1
morphological awareness on an L2 reading-related measure, which appears to
contradict previous research that has examined a similar issue. Wang, Cheng,
et al. (2006), for example, found that Chinese immigrant children’s English (the
societal language) compound awareness uniquely predicted reading comprehen-
sion in Chinese (the nonsocietal language). Deacon et al.’s (2007) longitudinal
study of English–French biliteracy acquisition revealed that Grade 2 English mor-
phological awareness made a unique contribution to Grade 2 French word reading,
and that Grade 3 French morphological awareness was a significant independent
contributor to Grade 3 English word reading.
A close look at the preceding studies, however, suggests that the discrepancy
of findings regarding whether there was a direct contribution of morphological
awareness in one language to reading development in another language might be
attributable to how relevant variables were statistically controlled in these studies.
The present study tested cross-linguistic transfer within the SEM methodolog-
ical framework where morphological awareness in both L1 and L2 as well as
L1 lexical inference were used as predictors of L2 lexical inference. L1 mor-
phological awareness did not contribute uniquely and significantly to L2 lexical
inference, after controlling for both L2 morphological awareness and L1 lexical
inference. However, such a control of covariates of L1 morphological awareness
was not similarly conducted in most previous research. For example, in Wang,
Cheng, et al. (2006), which observed that English compound awareness uniquely
contributed to Chinese reading comprehension, the two covariates of English
compound awareness (i.e., Chinese compound awareness and English reading
comprehension) were not included into the regression equation. Therefore, their
shared variance with English compound awareness was not accounted for. Deacon
et al. (2007) controlled for English morphological awareness when using French
morphological awareness to predict English reading ability. However, the effect
of French word reading ability on the criterion variable was not accounted for.
Given the relationship between word reading ability in French and English on the
Applied Psycholinguistics 23
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

one hand and French morphological awareness and French word reading ability
on the other hand, the significance of the contribution of French morphological
awareness to English word reading might have diminished if French word reading
had been controlled for as another covariate.
In Pasquarella et al. (2011), however, the authors did include English reading
comprehension in the model when Chinese reading comprehension served as a
dependent variable, yet the study revealed a direct effect of English compound
awareness on Chinese reading comprehension. Without concluding which finding,
Pasquarella et al.’s or ours, stands as a better representation of the cross-linguistic
relationship between compound awareness and reading or its related skills, we
offer two explanations that may account for the divergence. First, on the side of
the present study, the divergence might have resulted from its not including other
related variables in the SEM model, a limitation that we explicate at the end of
the paper. Second, with respect to Pasquarella et al.’s study, English and Chinese
reading comprehension, which correlated significantly (see their table 2, p. 31)
and were allowed to be mutually predicted, showed no significant relationship in
the final structural model (see their figure 2, p. 34). In addition, besides Chinese
word reading, neither Chinese vocabulary knowledge nor Chinese compound
awareness, as opposed to English compound awareness, significantly predicted
Chinese reading comprehension. We wondered if allowing all between-language
variables to be bidirectionally predicted (hence, a complex nonrecursive model
with little parsimony) and consequently, the very small participant/parameter ratio
(i.e., 137 children for the estimate of dozens of path coefficients as well as error
terms of all within and between language variables) have led to biased estimations
in Pasquarella et al.’s study.
Whichever explanation above makes more sense, the issue of whether there
is a linguistic distance effect on transfer of morphological awareness warrants
more attention in future L2 reading or biliteracy research. In addition, a few
interesting questions emerged from the findings of the current study, which could
not be addressed here but should provide directions for future research. To begin
with, what would the relationships be between morphological awareness, lexical
inference, and reading comprehension, both intralingually and interlingually, in
biliteracy acquisition? As mentioned earlier, lexical inference seems to a missing
link in previous research on the relationship between morphological awareness and
reading comprehension. With the effects of morphological awareness on lexical
inference documented in this study, it would be interesting to further test how
lexical inference ability functions in establishing the link between morphological
awareness and reading comprehension. A question of interest would be: does
lexical inference serve as a mediator for the effect of morphological awareness on
reading comprehension in children’s L1 as well as L2? Another interesting issue
worth exploring would be: how does L1 morphological awareness contribute
to the development of L2 reading comprehension ability? Zhang and Koda (in
press) noted that adult EFL learners’ morphological awareness predicted reading
comprehension indirectly through the mediation of vocabulary knowledge as well
as the multiple mediation of lexical inference ability and vocabulary knowledge. It
remains a question whether such a relationship is similarly true of young learners’
L1 as well as L2. Finally, future research might want to consider whether the
Applied Psycholinguistics 24
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

cross-linguistic relations identified in this study would hold for EFL learners of
L1 backgrounds other than Chinese. Because the linguistic distance effect on mor-
phological awareness transfer as found in this study was based on the similarities
and variations in morphological structure of Chinese and English, the pattern may
not necessarily hold for learners with L1s that share and contrast morphologically
with English in different ways. To answer such a question, a more sophisticated
statistical method, such as multiple-group SEM, would be needed to compare dif-
ferent learner groups by testing if there is structural invariance of cross-linguistic
relationships.

CONCLUSIONS AND LIMITATIONS

Based on covariance structure as well as bootstrapping analyses, this study ex-
amined the effect of L1 morphological awareness transfer on L2 lexical inference
ability. It showed that young Chinese EFL readers’ L1 compound awareness and
derivational awareness significantly predicted corresponding English morphologi-
cal awareness, but the relationship between Chinese and English compound aware-
ness was stronger than that between derivational awareness in the two languages. In
addition, Chinese compound awareness significantly contributed, albeit indirectly,
to English compound word meaning inference. The indirect effect of Chinese
derivational awareness on English derived word meaning inference, however, did
not achieve significance. Overall, the findings, consistent with the prediction of
the transfer facilitation model (Koda, 2005, 2008), indicated a linguistic distance
effect on transfer of morphological awareness and, therefore, enriched our un-
derstanding about metalinguistic awareness transfer in L2 reading and biliteracy
acquisition.
A few limitations of the study are noted. To begin with, in devising the tasks,
we used children’s textbooks as references and also consulted children’s English
teachers to reduce potential confound of vocabulary and grammatical knowledge.
Yet, the possibility that the variance in children’s performance on the tasks may
partly reflect individual difference in the two types of linguistic knowledge cannot
be completely ruled out. For example, a few choice words in the English affix
choice task might have already been known to the participants, although they did
not appear in their textbooks. In addition, knowledge of English relative clause is
necessary for resolving the riddles in the compound structure task and sometimes
for correctly choosing a meaning explanation for target compound words for
the lexical inference task. Although we had knowledge that the relative clause
structures had been learned by the children, there was no way to ascertain that it
did not influence children’s performance on the tasks. Finally, a few other variables
that might be related to both morphological awareness and lexical inference (e.g.,
language aptitude, home literacy environment, phonological awareness, etc.) were
not considered in the study, such that the robustness of the findings might have
been unfavorably affected. Future research might want to include more related
variables in a cross-linguistic model, although the current literature does not seem
to have produced a reliable list of such variables that are functioning in biliteracy
acquisition.
Applied Psycholinguistics 25
Zhang: Transfer of morphological awareness

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This paper is based on my doctoral dissertation completed at Carnegie Mellon University.
Thanks to Keiko Koda, G. Richard Tucker, and William Nagy for their supervision and
support, and all of the children for their participation in the study.

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