Adult second language acquisition under negligible exposure and no instruction

Abstract This study investigates whether adult learners of Italian as a second language (L2) acquire Obligatory Control (OC) in non-finite gerundive adjuncts, which is the local relationship between the empty subject PRO in the adjunct and the subject of the main clause. Adjunct OC in Italian is neither frequent in input nor explicitly taught. In a self-paced reading experiment with a sentence similarity-judgment task, 34 participants with various L1s and proficiency levels were tested seven months apart. By the second session, participants were more accurate and faster at identifying the main clause subject as the PRO controller and showed faster reading times at the non-finite form in the target-probe matching condition. We explore whether proficiency, exposure, L1, input distribution, or a combination of factors may explain our results.