A Corpus-based Contrast Of Causal Connectives In Chinese EFL Learners' Argumentative Writing

Causal connectives play a significant role in English writing of Chinese EFL learners. Proper use of causal connectives will enhance the cohesiveness and persuasion of English writing. However, Chinese EFL learners' use of causal connectives is still problematic. Scholars at home and abroad have done some relevant researches. Most of them lack statistical work and sufficient cases. One or two statistical researches are not comprehensive and deep enough. The present thesis conducts a contrastive study on the causal connectives in English writing between the Chinese non-English major learners and British native English writers. This study mainly concentrates on the following questions:(1) Is there any significant difference in the use of causal connectives between Chinese EFL learners and native writers? Is there any relation between thewords' frequency and its features? What are the deficiencies of Chinese EFL learners' use of causal connectives?(2) Is there any significant difference in the use of causal connectives by Chinese EFL learners with different English proficiencies?(3) What are the possible causes with regards to the different uses of causal connectives between Chinese EFL learners and native English writers? Is itthe L1 transfer or others?In this thesis, the author explores the use of causal connectives through using corpora and the methodology of CIA (Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis). Considering that CET 4 is the examination with the most examinees, this thesis chooses a sub-corpus of CLEC (St3) as interlanguage corpus,, and BNC (British National; Corpus) as native corpus; Furthermore, this thesis adopts a Chinese corpus (LCMC) as assistant corpus. With the adoption of search tools Wconcord and computer programs (Ultra-Edit, Excel, SPSS etc.), this thesis intends to conduct a quantitative and qualitative study and analyze in detail the use of causal connectives by Chinese EFL learners.The findings reveal that: (1) There is significant difference in the frequencies of causal connectives between Chinese EFL learners and native writers. Chinese EFL learners' overall frequency of the use of causal connectives is much greater than native writers. The Chinese EFL learners attempt to overuse some informal causal connectives and underuse some causal connectives which belong to informal style. Some causal connectives are never used by Chinese EFL learners. This phenomenon is analyzed and explained in this research. Moreover, Chinese EFL learners have displayed radical differences from the native English writers concerning the position of causal connectives. Comparing with native English writers, Chinese EFL learners prefer to initial position other than medial position. All in all, there are many deficiencies in the use of causal connectives by Chinese EFL learners.(2) There is almost no correlation between the learners' frequency of causal connectives and their writing quality. Previous scholars have confirmed this point. However, the present research found that it is not thorough enough to study the correlation between the use of causal connectives and English proficiency just from studying its frequency of use. In the present research, it discovers that the variety of causal connectives used by Chinese EFL learners are positive correlated to students' writing quality.(3) The Chinese EFL learners' improper use of causal connectives might be the result of L1 transfer, the textbooks' and teachers' instruction, and different culture background. These findings strongly confirm what previous studies have found. Furthermore, the present research finds that L2 transfer and English Learners' learning strategy also affect the use of causal connectives by Chinese EFL learners.This study attempts to analyze the use of causal connectives of Chinese EFL learners and propose some suggestions regarding teaching and learning implications so as to raise teachers' and learners' understanding of causal connectives and improve learners' quality of English writings.