ArticleFrontiers in psychology2026
Word frequency modulates the use of initial and final morpheme positional probabilities during Chinese sentence reading in L2 learners: an eye-tracking study.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
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Abstract
Introduction: Chinese text does not mark word boundaries with spaces, requiring readers to rely on statistical cues within character strings for word segmentation and lexical recognition. Morpheme positional probability (MPP), defined as the likelihood that a morpheme occurs in the initial or final position of a two-character word, is one such cue. However, it remains unclear how L2 learners of Chinese use initial and final MPP and whether this use is modulated by whole-word frequency. Methods: Using a controlled sentence-reading eye-tracking task, this study compared native Chinese readers, intermediate L2 learners, and advanced L2 learners during the processing of high- and low-frequency two-character words in which initial and final MPP were manipulated. Eye-movement data from 76 participants were analyzed using cross-material linear mixed-effects models. Results: The results showed significant reader-group effects across first fixation duration, gaze duration, go-past time, and total viewing time. Word frequency significantly affected gaze duration, go-past time, and total viewing time and significantly modulated the effect of initial MPP. The interaction between initial and final MPP varied across frequency conditions: in low-frequency words, initial MPP showed a more stable effect, whereas final MPP mainly influenced processing through its interaction with initial MPP. Discussion: These findings suggest that MPP functions as an important statistical cue in Chinese word segmentation and recognition, but its contribution is conditional on word frequency, processing stage, and cue configuration. L2 learners' sustained sensitivity to MPP may reflect less automatized whole-word representations and greater reliance on sublexical processing. Although the present study examined online lexical processing rather than durable vocabulary learning, the findings provide indirect evidence for understanding the development of L2 Chinese lexical representations.
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