L’intensificazione dell’aggettivo in italiano L2: uno studio sugli studenti delle scuole dell’Alto Adige

This study investigates adjective intensification in L2 Italian. Its targets are young learners from South Tyrolean upper secondary schools, where Italian is taught as a second language to L1 German and Ladin students. Data are extracted from a vast written corpus including both narrative and argumentative texts, and from a control corpus of native Italian students. The study investigates the distribution of the different adjective intensification types in learners’ texts; the ways learners’ L1s, language environment, proficiency level and text genre affect the use of intensified adjectives; the differences between learners and L1 students in the use of adjective intensification. Results show a dominant use of the prototypical form booster + adjective, competing with the suffix -issimo, which is used more by learners than by L1 students.