Noun Phrase Complexity in Independent and Source-Based Writing

A Case Study of Chinese EFL Students

DOI

10.2991/assehr.k.220504.460How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Integrated writing; independent writing; noun phrase complexity; noun phrase modifiers

Abstract

A growing body of scholars have explored noun phrase complexity according to the hypothesized noun modifier development sequence of Biber et al. (2011). Nevertheless, few researchers have investigated how this linguistic variable vary in different writing types. In response, the study has compared the noun modification by three Chinese EFL students of different writing proficiency in integrated writing (writing based on a source text while responding to a prompt) and independent writing (writing based on personal experience and knowledge, without reference to any reading materials). Following manual coding and descriptive analysis, the authors observed overall positive role of integrated writing for improving noun complexity. In the integrated writing, the highest-proficiency writer modified the nouns in a more varied way, the writer of intermediate level reduced frequent repetition of the same chunks or collocations, and the lowest-proficiency writer employed certain advanced language features (of phrases as postmodifiers - abstract meanings and multiple prepositional phrases as postmodifiers) more frequently. The findings can inform writing test designers and instructors of the necessity to adopt integrated writing as a way to measure the phrasal complexity of students or test takers.

Copyright

© 2022 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Yao Peng
AU  - Xilin Liu
PY  - 2022
DA  - 2022/06/01
TI  - Noun Phrase Complexity in Independent and Source-Based Writing
BT  - Proceedings of the 2022 8th International Conference on Humanities and Social Science Research (ICHSSR 2022)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 2537
EP  - 2543
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.220504.460
DO  - 10.2991/assehr.k.220504.460
ID  - Peng2022
ER  -