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A Correlational Study of the Relationships Between Syntactical Accuracy, Lexical Accuracy and the Quality of Turkish EFL Student Writing

Gonulal, Talip
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1337810713

Abstract Details

2012, Master of Arts, Ohio State University, EDU Teaching and Learning.
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of the frequency of syntactical and lexical errors on the assessment of compositions written by Turkish EFL college students. It attempted to examine a) the most frequent types of syntactical errors and lexical errors in EFL students’ compositions; b) the relationship between the types of writing prompt and the frequency of syntactical and lexical errors; c) the relationship between the frequency of syntactical and lexical errors and the holistic score of the compositions. The data, 210 compositions, were gathered from 80 Turkish university freshmen enrolled in a Basic English course at Bozok University during the second semester of 2009. The results of randomly selected 150 compositions written by Bozok University freshmen majoring in Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Computer Programming and History revealed that the students had the greatest problem with prepositions in syntactical error category and formal mis-selection of words in lexical error category. The results showed that the type of writing prompt seemed to have an effect on the frequency of occurrence of errors, whether they be syntactical or lexical errors. A low negative correlation was found between the holistic scores and the frequency of syntactical errors. Similarly, a low negative correlation was found between the holistic scores and the frequency of lexical errors. When it comes to the relationship between the frequencies of syntactical and lexical errors, and the holistic scores, a moderate negative correlation was found. Overgeneralization, inadequate application of rules, incomplete mastery, ignorance of rule restrictions and particularly negative transfer were found to be possible factors contributing to the occurrences of errors. The results also provided evidence that as the frequency of syntactical and lexical errors decreases the quality of the compositions relatively seems to increase.
Charles Hancock, PhD (Advisor)
Alan Hirvela, PhD (Committee Member)
132 p.
Foreign Language
Syntactical accuracy; lexical accuracy; intralingual error; interlingual error; holistic assessment

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Citations

  • Gonulal, T. (2012). A Correlational Study of the Relationships Between Syntactical Accuracy, Lexical Accuracy and the Quality of Turkish EFL Student Writing [Master's thesis, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1337810713

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Gonulal, Talip. A Correlational Study of the Relationships Between Syntactical Accuracy, Lexical Accuracy and the Quality of Turkish EFL Student Writing. 2012. Ohio State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1337810713.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Gonulal, Talip. "A Correlational Study of the Relationships Between Syntactical Accuracy, Lexical Accuracy and the Quality of Turkish EFL Student Writing." Master's thesis, Ohio State University, 2012. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1337810713

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1337810713
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© 2012, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.