The Second Language Acquisition of Second-Person Singular Forms of Address: Navigating Usage and Perception in a Tripartite System in Medellin, Colombia

Previous studies have found that second language learners can acquire sociolinguistic variation. However, there is a lack of studies that examine the L2 acquisition of second-person singular forms of address (2PS) in Spanish, especially in the immersion context of study abroad. The current study examines the acquisition of Spanish 2PS by seven adults learning Spanish in Medellin, Colombia. Participants completed an oral discourse completion task and a matched guise task to measure language perceptions toward each 2PS. Learners’ results are compared to findings from 38 native Spanish speakers from Medellin. Learners produced very few instances of the local variant vos and overproduced tú, differing greatly from native speakers. Two factors were found to significantly condition 2PS usage for learners: speaker gender and interlocutor relationship. Findings show that although learners perceive vos to a somewhat native-like extent and the role that it plays in the local variety, learners do not actually use it.