Extending the Decreased Activation Hypothesis

Some studies in the field of anaphora resolution have highlighted that even bilingual speakers of two null subject languages may over-use overt subject pronouns in their null subject second language. In this work we analyze the overt subject pronouns produced in Italian by a group of near-native L2 speakers with L1 Serbian, in comparison to those produced by a group of near-native L2 speakers with L1 Greek, and a group of Italian natives. Results reveal that Serbian L2ers, like Greek L2ers, over-produce overt subject pronouns, using them also in the context(s) of topic continuity. Topic continuing overt subject pronouns are produced by Serbian L2ers when two referents are active, supporting the view that their peculiarities in referential choice emerge in case of referents’ decreased activation.