Following the introduction of the context, research question and hypotheses of the L3 French – L2 English project in the previous chapters, the first structure to be explicated is English nominal plural marking, which has drawn much attention from L2A researchers, especially those studying L1 Chinese – L2 English speakers. As discussed in the L2A literature (e.g. Lardiere, 2008, 2009), English nominal plural marking is often difficult for L1 Chinese speakers.

In the search for an answer to the overall research question and hypotheses stated in Chapter 2, a subset of research hypotheses was specifically devised to investigate English nominal plural marking:

• • Hypothesis 1 (relating to research concern (1), p. 35, and the possibility of reverse transfer involving an L3). Under the influence of their L3 French, the CEF participants will judge and identify English nominal plural marking more accurately, and will produce fewer ungrammatical English nominal plural marking forms than the CE peers.

• • Hypothesis 2 (relating to research concern (2), p. 35, and the possible ‘vulnerability’ of English plural marking – English nominal plural marking will be problematic in some way – as highlighted in L2A studies and the IH). Under the influence of L1 Cantonese, the CEF participants, just like their CE peers, will judge and identify English nominal plural marking less accurately and will produce fewer grammatical English plural markers than the control native participants.

As to be explained below, the above hypotheses are based on an analysis of the features of nominal plural marking in English, Cantonese and French, and are tested with the findings on the L2A of English nominal plural marking among L1 Chinese – L2 English speakers.

This chapter starts with a brief review of the comparison of nominal plural marking in the three languages concerned, namely English, Cantonese and French. The connection between nominal plural marking and the Interface Hypothesis is then elucidated.