A Corpus-based Study On The Placement Of Frequency Adverbs

This thesis aims at analyzing the characteristics of frequency adverbs' distribution by investigating the positions of frequency adverbs in sentences in Brown, and also by comparing different usage of frequency adverbs in sentences appeared between Brown and CLEC. Positions of frequency adverbs as an essential part belonging to adverbs have attracted lots of linguists' attention. The existed theories not only throw some light on the application of adverbs, but also help us gain some insights into the strategies the learner employing in the learning process.Though much research has been done on the positions of frequency adverbs (FAs), statistical studies of the frequency adverbs positions are still insufficient. With the help of SPSS, the present study explores the common characteristics of FAs' positions based on corpus. After a systematic research, the following conclusions are draw: firstly, it is obvious to see that media position is a numerically dominant position for most FAs functioning as adverbials in sentences as Quirk's statements. Secondly, Chinese structure-dependency to a greater or lesser extent influences Chinese students' usage of frequency adverbs.A careful study of the positions of FAs will reveal the common characteristics shared by the language learners, and it will be of great help to both the language teachers and language learners.