On Effects Of The Input Text Complexity On Alignment, Fluency, And Accuracy In The Continuation Task

Previous studies have shown that many factors in the continuation writing task may affect learners’ alignment and their general writing performance.However,to date,the input text complexity is not fully explored.This study investigates the effect of the input text complexity on Chinese EFL learners’ linguistic performance and alignment in the reading-writing continuation task,based on Skenhan’s Limited Attentional Capacity Model and Robinson’s Cognition Hypothesis.Specifically,the following questions are addressed:(1)Is there alignment in text complexity between the input text and the continuation writing for high and low level learners,respectively?(2)Does text complexity affect the strength and automaticity of the linguistic alignment between continuations and input text for high and low level learners,respectively?(3)Does text complexity affect writing fluency and accuracy for high and low level learners,respectively?In order to answer the above questions,the study adopted two types of input texts with significantly different degrees of text complexity.A total of 92 senior high school students from Jiangxi Province participated in this experiment,including 58 boys and 34 girls of high and low levels.In this study,students at the same level were divided into homogeneous groups.One group continued an incomplete text with increased text complexity and the other group continued an incomplete text with decreased text complexity.After the continuation task,two participants randomly selected from each group accepted semi-structured stimulated recall interviews.Then the Syntactic Complexity Analyzer,the Lexical Complexity Analyzer,and Ant Conc4.0.0 w were applied to analyze the continuation from the aspects of alignment and language performance.The findings were summarized as follows: 1)Alignment takes place in text complexity,but it is selective for different types of lexical complexity indices.To be more specific,for high-level learners,alignment appeared in the length of sentences and particular structures.But alignment didn’t occur in sentence complexity,subordination,and coordination.In terms of vocabulary complexity,alignment is also selective.To be more specific,alignment appeared in lexical sophistication,the variety of nouns,adjectives,adverbs and modifiers,but alignment didn’t occur in verb variation.For low-level learners,alignment appeared in the length of sentence,but it didn’t occur in sentence complexity,subordination,and particular structures.With respect to lexical complexity,alignment occurred in lexical sophistication and verb diversity.2)Both high-level and low-level learners align more with the preceding text at the lexical level,but show less automation at the phrase and sentence levels.3)An increase in text complexity improves writing fluency but reduces the accuracy of low-level learners and has no effect on the accuracy of high-level learners.The research shows that alignment of text complexity occurs in reading-writing continuation tasks.It promotes vocabulary alignment and improves writing fluency,but probably reduces accuracy and automaticity.Hopefully,the present study will provide valuable implications for teachers concerning the design and implementation of reading-writing continuation tasks in language teaching.