A Corpus-based Study On The Use Of Four-word Lexical Bundles In Expository Timed Writings Of English Majors

In recent years, with the development of corpus linguistics, the related study indicates that90%of human natural language consisted of fixed or semi-fixed lexical bundles, which combine the characteristics of both lexics and syntax, assist language learners to promote nativeness and appropriacy of expressions and facilitate the language generation. Therefore, lexical bundles are considered as the ideal units of vocabulary study. Scholars have long been interested in the acquisition of formulaic language of second language learners. Many studies conducted by foreign researchers have offered concrete systems of terminology and classification for the empirical study on lexical bundles. In our country, the related studies on lexical bundles have been conducted but failed to reach agreement in terminology and classification. The majority of previous studies are based on argumentative writings of English majors, therefore, it’s significant to investigate the use of four-word lexical bundles in expository timed writings of English Majors in this present study.The corpus applied in present study is WECCL (Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners), a sub-corpus of SWECCL (Spoken and Written English Corpus of Chinese Learners). The study addresses three key research questions:(1). What are the most frequent four-word lexical bundles used in expository timed writing of English major?(2). Is there any relevance between the use of the most frequent lexical bundles and the level of writing?(3). Is there any difference between high-score essay and low-score essay in the usage of lexical bundles? In order to answer the research questions, with the experiences of previous study on lexical bundles, this study applied data managing software AntConc3.2.1, statistical software SPSS16.0, Excel2007and manual statistic with friends’help to increase the processing speed, reliability and validity..The results reveal that the outputs of lexical bundles of English majors are far from enough. Furthermore, the diversity in both structural and functional classifications of lexical bundles is limited. The subject English major students’lexical bundle competence is far from satisfactory. There are small correlation between the use of the most frequent lexical bundles and the Level of Writing, in other words, the more lexical bundles are used, the higher in the students’writing score. There are significant differences between high-score and low-score essays in the use of lexical bundles.The paper concludes with limitations and suggestions also some reasonable implications on vocabulary teaching and learning.