The effect of two feedback strategies on EFL writing quality from the perspective of syntactic complexity

Abstract

This paper aims to present the results of the study investigating the efficacy of computer-mediated feedback on EFL learners' performance in writing with regard to syntactic complexity as an aspect of writing quality. The research design of the study took the form of a pre-test/post-test quasi-experiment with two comparison groups which received different treatments. The participants of the study were 65 advanced EFL learners of English for Specific Purposes who were divided into two groups. The first group (33 students) was provided with the treatment in the form of teacher-only multiple-draft feedback while the other group (32 students) was given the treatment in the form of combined peer-teacher multiple-draft feedback.The study investigated if there were any differences in syntactic complexity at a global, a clausal and a phrasal level between pre-test and post-test and what the implications of these differences for writing quality were in individual groups together with comparing the differences between the groups. Syntactic complexity was automatically measured by selected indices of L2 Syntactic Complexity Analyzer (Lu, 2010), a freely available natural language processing tool. The study yielded four major findings. First, the results indicate some statistically significant improvements in writing quality with regard to syntactic complexity and with respect to the proficiency level of the participants in both groups. Second, syntactic complexity developed in both groups between the pre-test and post-test, but with no significant difference in post-test performance between the comparison groups. Third, teacher-only feedback seems to be more effective at the global and phrasal level of syntactic complexity while combined peer-teacher feedback is more effective at the clausal level. Finally, teacher-only feedback contributed to more homogenous post-test writing production.