Syntactic Transfer Among Syrian EFL Learners

This correlational study aims to examine the relationship between years of English language learning and the occurrences of intentional and unintentional syntactic transfer among Syrian bilingual learners. It also aims to investigate whether increased formal exposure to English is associated with a greater metalinguistic awareness, as indicated by the tendency to strategically employ intentional syntactic transfer. The study utilizes an empirical reading-based task to identify instances of syntactic transfer, which are categorized as intentional or unintentional based on the learners’ self-reporting and the researchers’ analysis. Quantitative data analysis is used to examine how years of English study predict the likelihood of intentional versus unintentional syntactic transfer. The findings indicate that increased exposure and explicit English language instruction can enhance learners’ ability to consciously utilize cross-linguistic similarities in language production. These results contribute to a better understanding of how learning experience shapes syntactic transfer and offers pedagogical implications for translanguaging practices and second language instruction.