ABSTRACT
Self-repair is a universal phenomenon in the process of oral output. Researches on the self-repair behavior in SLA have great important theoretical and pedagogical significance.
This study adopts corpus analysis, marking the subtypes of self-repair that occurred in the oral production of an non-English major postgraduates’ English speech contest held by Jiangsu University. The study focuses on analyzing the distribution of each subtype of self-repair and the correction rate in view of two variables: oral proficiency and gender. Thus, the relevance between self-repair and oral proficiency and self-repair and gender will be concluded.
The result of the study shows that, as for the distribution, the same information self-repair has the highest proportion, followed by the appropriateness self-repair, the error self-repair and the different information self-repair. In addition, there is certain relevance between self-repair and non-English major postgraduates’ oral proficiency and their gender. It can be concluded that the higher the oral proficiency is, the more appropriateness self-repair will be used; while the lower the oral proficiency is, the more same information self-repair will be used. Besides, the correction rate of high proficiency level is higher than low proficiency group. In terms of gender, males use error self-repair most while females have preference for appropriateness self-repair, and the correction rate of female group is higher than that of male group.
This study can help the teachers deepen the understanding of self-repair and obtain enlightenment in second language teaching.
Key words: self-repair; Chinese non-English major postgraduates; oral production
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
ABSTRACT
摘要
Chapter One INTRODUCTION-1
1.1 Need for the Study-1
1.2 Object of the Study-1
1.3 Significance of the Study-2
1.4 Overview of the Thesis-2
Chapter Two LITERATURE REVIEW-4
2.1 The Definitions and Classification of Repair-4
2.1.1 The definitions of repair-4
2.1.2 The classification of repair-5
2.2 The Preference for Self-repair-6
2.2.1 The concept of self-repair-6
2.2.2 The classification of self-repair-7
2.3 Language Proficiency and Self-repair-8
2.4 Gender and Self-repair-9
Chapter Three METHODOLOGY-10
3.1 Research Questions -10
3.2 Subjects-10
3.3 Data Collection-12
3.4 Data Analysis-15
Chapter Four RESULTS AND DISCUSSION-17
4.1 The Overall Distribution of Self-repairs-17
4.1.1 Distribution of self-repairs and other-repairs-17
4.1.2 Distribution of the four subtypes of self-repairs-18
4.2 The Relationship between Oral Proficiency and Self-repairs-19
4.2.1 Comparison of self-repairs between high and lowproficiency groups-19
4.2.2 Comparison of self-repair correction rates between high and low proficiency groups-21
4.3 The Relationship between Gender and Self-repairs-22
4.3.1 Comparison of self-repairs between male and female learners-22
4.3.2 Comparison of self-repair correction rates between male and female learners-23
Chapter Five CONCLUSION-25
5.1 Major Research Findings-25
5.2 Implications of the Study-26
5.3 Limitations of the Study and Suggestions for Future Research-26
REFERENCES-28
