| Abstract | 第1-11页 |
| List of tables & figures | 第11-13页 |
| Chapter 1: Introduction | 第13-20页 |
| ·Research orientation | 第13-15页 |
| ·Motivation of the present study | 第15-17页 |
| ·Overview of the thesis | 第17-20页 |
| Chapter 2: Literature Review | 第20-51页 |
| ·Overview | 第20页 |
| ·Syntactic perspectives on topic structures | 第20-23页 |
| ·Topic structures in Chinese and English: A comparative study | 第23-33页 |
| ·Core in Chinese and marginal in English | 第24-26页 |
| ·Legal in Chinese and illegal in English | 第26-29页 |
| ·Left dislocation | 第29-32页 |
| ·Sum-up of Chinese and English topic-prominent features | 第32-33页 |
| ·A general review of the previous studies on topic-prominent constructions in English and Chinese | 第33-37页 |
| ·Topic/subject prominence and second language acquisition s | 第37-50页 |
| ·Previous research concerned with L2 acquisition of subject prominence from topic-prominent L1 | 第38-44页 |
| ·Previous research concerned with L2 acquisition of topic prominence from subject-prominent L1 | 第44-47页 |
| ·An important hint of the previous findings of the acquisition of topic/subject prominence | 第47-50页 |
| ·Summary | 第50-51页 |
| Chapter 3: The Study | 第51-70页 |
| ·Overview | 第51页 |
| ·Research questions and hypotheses | 第51-58页 |
| ·Specific research questions | 第51-55页 |
| ·A pre-study observation | 第55-57页 |
| ·Hypotheses | 第57-58页 |
| ·The conceptual framework of the present study | 第58-60页 |
| ·Research design | 第60-61页 |
| ·Subjects | 第61-63页 |
| ·Instrumentation | 第63-68页 |
| ·The translation task | 第63-64页 |
| ·The acceptability judgment | 第64-65页 |
| ·The development of the tests | 第65-67页 |
| ·The pilot study | 第67-68页 |
| ·Procedure for data collections and statistical analyses | 第68-69页 |
| ·Summary | 第69-70页 |
| Chapter 4: Results | 第70-87页 |
| ·Overview | 第70页 |
| ·Results of the translation task | 第70-74页 |
| ·Results of the acceptability judgment | 第74-85页 |
| ·A sharp contrast: control sentences vs. experimental sentences | 第74-79页 |
| ·Group-by-group comparison | 第79-84页 |
| ·Sum-up of the second test | 第84-85页 |
| ·Summary . | 第85-87页 |
| Chapter 5: Discussion and Conclusion | 第87-99页 |
| ·Overview | 第87页 |
| ·Summary of the major findings of the two tests | 第87-88页 |
| ·Asymmetry of possible L1 transfer of topic prominence and immunity from L1-like topic prominence | 第88-91页 |
| ·Possible over-generalization of object-fronting structure | 第91-92页 |
| ·Reflections on gradual L2 acquisition process | 第92-93页 |
| ·Degree of difficulty in unlearning topic prominence | 第93-96页 |
| ·Availability of indirect positive evidence of root IP | 第94-95页 |
| ·Difficulty in dealing with CP | 第95-96页 |
| ·Additional proof of the trigger of indirect positive evidence | 第96页 |
| ·Conclusion | 第96-97页 |
| ·Limitations and suggestions for future research | 第97-99页 |
| References | 第99-103页 |
| Appendix A | 第103-108页 |
| A1. Translation task for Chinese subjects | 第103页 |
| A2. Acceptability Judgment | 第103-108页 |
| A2.1 Questionnaire of the acceptability judgment for Chinese subjects | 第103-105页 |
| A2.2 Questionnaire for the native speakers of English | 第105-108页 |
| Appendix B | 第108-110页 |
| B1. Examples of topic-prominent sentences in the translation task | 第108-109页 |
| B2. Examples of misuse of prepositional phrases in the translation task | 第109-110页 |
