The effects of synchronous text-based computer-mediated communication tasks on the development of L2 and academic literacy: A mixed methods study

Abstract

The dissertation examines how synchronous text-based computer-mediated communication (SCMC) tasks may affect English as a Second Language (ESL) learners’ development of second language (L2) and academic literacy. The study is motivated by two issues concerning the use of SCMC tasks in L2 writing classes. First, although some of the alleged benefits of SCMC, including its visual saliency and the possibility of slower processing speed, have been supported by theories of Second Language Acquisition (SLA), more evidence is still needed since empirical studies have not yet produced enough consistent findings. Second, most studies on SCMC have focused on its influence on learners' development of basic communicative competence while it has been suggested that SCMC may hold great potential for the development of advanced academic literacy (Luo, 2005; Mohan & Luo, 2005) that is considered as an essential goal for L2 writing classes. Therefore, the dissertation addresses these issues using mixed methods research completed in two phases. A quasi-experiment was conducted in the first phase among forty-four international students enrolled in two sections of an ESL academic writing course to examine the differential effects of SCMC and face-to-face tasks. The differential effects were assessed by comparing the students' improvement on measures of L2 grammatical and lexical complexity, accuracy, and fluency (Wolfe-Quintero, Inagaki, & Kim, 1998) from a pre-test to a post-test. The results of the quasi-experiment were also used to help select representative focal students for the multiple case studies in the second phase where the SCMC discourse of the focal students was examined for the details of L2 learning and the development of academic literacy. In analyzing the SCMC