An Empirical Study of Avoidance of Prepositions in English Writings by Chinese Higher Vocational College Students

Jinbai Zhang

doi:10.5539/ells.v6n1p117

Abstract

<p>This study investigates the avoidance of prepositions in English writings by Chinese higher vocational College students of different English proficiency levels and the main reasons for the avoidance, using English writing tasks and a questionnaire. The result indicates that the students at low English level tend to avoid using English prepositions but the students at high English level do not avoid prepositions. Low English proficiency level is the main cause of avoidance. L2 complexity, L1 and L2 differences, Psychological factors also contribute to the avoidance of English Prepositions by Chinese high vocational College students.</p>

Highlights

The notion of avoidance was first put forward by Schachter (1974)
This study investigates the avoidance of prepositions in English writings by Chinese higher vocational College students of different English proficiency levels and the main reasons for the avoidance, using English writing tasks and a questionnaire
The questionnaire is designed by the researcher and was expected to help find out whether the Chinese subjects have a tendency of avoiding prepositions in their English writings and what causes the avoidance

Summary

Introduction

Her study noticed that the number of English relative clauses produced by the Chinese and Japanese students was much less compared with the Persian and Arab students. She supposed that Chinese and Japanese students produced less relative clauses because they are not sure if they can use them correctly and so they avoid using them. She considered it a phenomenon of avoidance due to a difficulty which could be predicted by the apriori approach. After Schachter, other researches confirmed the prevailing existence of avoidance phenomenon in foreign language learning (Kleinmann, 1977; Dagut & Laufer, 1985; Hulstijn & Marchena, 1989; Kellerman, 1992). Brown (2002) divided avoidance strategy into four categories: phonological avoidance, lexical avoidance, syntactical avoidance and topic avoidance

Methods

Results

Conclusion