This study explores the development of anaphora resolution (AR) in late sequential
bilinguals, namely, adult Greek learners of Spanish at three proficiency levels (intermediate,
lower advanced, upper advanced). The use of an overt/null pronominal subject anaphor is
investigated in three discourse contexts: topic-continuity (a single antecedent requiring a
null pronoun), contrastive-focus (two same-gender potential antecedents requiring an overt
pronoun to avoid ambiguity) and emphatic (three same-gender potential antecedents show-
ing unclear preference for either overt or null pronoun). Crucially, AR behaves similarly
in Greek and Spanish. Results from an offline contextualised acceptability judgement task
show that similarity between the learner’s first (L1) and second (L2) languages does not
necessarily facilitate the learning task. Even very advanced learners show deficits, which
are selective since not all discursive contexts are equally affected. The results are better
accounted for by general pragmatic economy principles: Learners prefer being redundant
(overuse of overt pronouns in topic-continuity contexts) to ambiguous (acceptance of null
pronouns in contrastive-focus contexts). Such tolerance for redundancy may reflect a more
general pragmatic tendency, as also reported in child L1 development, adult L2 development
and also in native grammars.

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• The Development of Anaphora Resolution at the Syntax-Discourse Interface: Pronominal Subjects in Greek Learners of Spanish