Underproduction or Overproduction? A Corpus-based Study of Chinese EFL Learners’ Use of English Relative Clauses

Nyasha Malbermore Chandavengerwa,Tawanda Matende

doi:10.32996/ijllt.2020.3.3.13

Nyasha Malbermore Chandavengerwa, Tawanda Matende

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.32996/ijllt.2020.3.3.13

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Abstract

This paper attempts to examine whether Chinese English learners adopt the underproduction or overproduction behavior when using English relative clauses in academic writing. To achieve the objective of the study, the researchers used a corpus-based method to analyze and compare the production of the restrictive relative clause among Chinese students and native English students. The aims were to find out if the Chinese students underproduce the English relative clause and also examine how frequently they use that, which, and zero relative pronouns as reported in the sub-corpus of the Written English Corpus of Chinese Learner (WECCL) and the British Academic Written English corpus (BAWE). Based on the findings, conclusions are drawn as follows; compared to native English students, Chinese EFL learners generally tend to underproduce the restrictive relative clause in academic writing; and on the other hand, overuse the relative pronoun that. The observations from this study concur with the findings from previous studies

Highlights

This paper attempts to examine whether Chinese English learners adopt the underproduction or overproduction behavior when using English relative clauses in academic writing
In foreign language learning the ability to achieve a certain level of autonomy when it comes to the overall mastery of the language is of paramount importance, a growing number of studies have placed much emphasis towards the acquisition and production of this complicated and problematic feature, the relative clause
The general tendency of Chinese EFL learners to underproduce the restrictive relative clause (RC) compared to native speakers and the tendency to overuse that among other restrictive RCs in academic writing

Summary

Introduction

This paper attempts to examine whether Chinese English learners adopt the underproduction or overproduction behavior when using English relative clauses in academic writing. Conclusions are drawn as follows; compared to native English students, Chinese EFL learners generally tend to underproduce the restrictive relative clause in academic writing; and on the other hand, overuse the relative pronoun that. Universal in many languages of the world, the RC tends to vary from language to language in terms of the position of the relative clause with respect to the head noun, the ways RCs have to be marked, and the position of prepositions in the RC, among other things (Marefat & Rahmany, 2009) It is this variability that has been the main source of confusion and errors in the process of RC acquisition among second language learners. Existing studies have reported that due to these difficulties Chinese (EFL) learners eventually end up producing significantly fewer relative clauses compared to other second language learners from other linguistic backgrounds (Persian, Arabic etc.) (Li, 1996; Liao & Fukuya, 2004; Schachter, 1974)

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