華裔中文學習者多義詞之習得：以「吃」為例

Heritage Learners’Acquisition of Polysemous Meanings in Chinese: Evidence from the Verb Chi

本研究旨在探討華裔中文學習者如何理解中文多義詞「吃」的不同義項。主要探討三個因素：各義項的語義相關性、語境線索，以及語言能力效應對學習者的影響。研究對象包括40位華裔中文學習者，根據其華語文能力測驗（TOCFL）成績分為中級與高級組，另有20位中文母語者作為對照組。研究設計包含兩項義項詮釋任務：無語境詮釋任務（IT-WC）與有語境詮釋任務（IT-C）。每項任務包含18題選擇題，測試不同「吃」短語的義項，有語境詮釋任務則提供了語境提示和相關圖片輔助說明。研究結果顯示以下幾個主要發現：首先，華裔學習者在「吃」的義項習得上呈現出一定的習得順序，分為三個難易層次。第一層次：吃1「咀嚼並吞下」、吃2「在某地吃」吃3「依靠」，第二層次：吃6「消耗」，以及第三層次：吃4「獲得」、吃5「遭受」。高級學習者對所有義項的解釋達到母語水準，而中級學習者僅能正確掌握第一層次的義項，對第二層次及第三層次延伸義的理解表現不佳。研究發現，義項與核心意義的語義偏離程度越大，華裔學習者理解的難度越高。其次，語境線索顯著促進了義項理解，特別是在中級學習者對於較難義項（吃4、吃5、吃6）的理解上。

This study examines how heritage learners of Chinese interpret the different meanings of the polysemous verb chi‘to eat,’focusing on three key factors: semantic relatedness among the various senses of chi, the role of contextual clues, and the impact of proficiency levels. Forty heritage learners, grouped into intermediate and advanced levels based on their TOCFL scores, participated alongside 20 native speakers who served as a baseline control group. All participants completed two interpretation tasks: one without context (IT-WC) and one with context (IT-C), each containing 18 multiple-choice items targeting various chi expressions. Results revealed a hierarchy of difficulty in acquiring the meanings of chi: Level 1 (chi₁:‘to chew and swallow,’chi₂:‘to eat at a place,’chi₃:‘to rely on’), Level 2 (chi₆:‘to consume’), and Level 3 (chi₄:‘to obtain,’chi₅:‘to suffer’). Advanced learners performed similarly to native speakers, while intermediate learners struggled particularly with Levels 2 and 3, indicating that greater semantic deviation from the core meaning increases difficulty. Contextual clues significantly enhanced comprehension, especially for intermediate learners facing more abstract or figurative meanings. These findings highlight the importance of sequencing polysemous word instruction by semantic distance and integrating contextual support to facilitate more effective learning for heritage language learners.