Part 1 Introduction
1.1The problem
In the field of second language acquisition, the study of interlanguage hasattracted the attention of more and more researchers. Since Selinker firstly putforward the term “interlanguage” in 1969, other scholars began to deeplyinvestigate this term as well. Interlanguage is independent of the first languageand the target language from various aspects.Scholars described the same linguistic phenomenon by use of various terms. Forexample, Nemser proposed the concept of “proximal system”. Corder (1971) putforward the terms of “dialect” and “transitional words”. Although all of theseterms are different, Ellis (1985) pointed out that these concepts put forward bydifferent scholars are related but absolutely different. Firstly, interlanguage refersto learners build the structure system at any stages of development of languageitself. Secondly, it refers to “built-in” outline of chain system called by Corder(1967).In the late 1960s and early 1970s generally researchers held that interlanguagewas systematic. Although afterward interlanguage was developed in various ways,researchers still focused on the systematicity of inter-language.
…………
1.2Research Questions and Objectives
As mentioned previously, although researchers had the common view thatinterlanguage variation would occur in different situations and different tasks;they still had not full knowledge of causes of interlanguage variation and thevariable rules. Some factors of interlanguage variation have been testified.However, it can not mean there are not any other reasons. Just some reasonswhich are possible to vary the variable performances of the learners have notbeen proved by experiments and not convincing. In addition, most of studies justpaid more attention to the single factor’s influence on the interlanguage variationof Chinese English Learners. Few studies are concerned with the multi-factor’sinfluence on the interlanguage variation or interaction of these factors. Onlywhen the study about interlanguage variation reaches a certain level and form anindependent branch, we can say the study of interlanguage variation is successful.Basing on the above problems, the research objective of the present paper is toconclude and analyze the multi-factor’s influence on the interlanguage variation in view of the existed study. All of the possible causes of interlanguage variationwill be considered. Thus considering the complexity and variability of thelearners’ language, the author will adopt the multi-factor method to analyze thevariable performances of interlanguage in this paper.
……………
Part 2 Theoretical Framework and RelatedLiterature
2.1 Theoretical Framework
This paper aims to study interlanguage variation, making use of theintra-language factors and the extra-language factors in a conjunct way, namelythe multi-factor approach. The author chooses it as the framework for this studybecause such multi-factor approach is both theory-found and valuable.More and more scholars are interested in the phenomenon of the learners’interlanguage variation. The viewpoint about interlanguage variation is becomingmore and more perse. Different experts and scholars explore and analyzeinterlanguage variation from different angles based on various theoretical views.Ellis (1994:119-120) held that there were totally three kinds of approaches usedto illustrate the clear difference between variability and systematicity of thesecond language.The first approach is that practiced by linguists in the Chomskyan tradition, whoadopt what Tarone (1983) has called “the homogeneous competence model”.From this approach, variation is not regard as the potential knowledge system ofthe learners but as a characteristic of language performance. That is to say, it isnecessary to regard the learners’ performance rather than the underlyingknowledge system of learners as a standard of variation in order to investigate language. Therefore, the problem of variation is to distinguish between “ability”and “performance”. What’s more, it needs to establish the description andexplanation of linguistic competence.The second approach is used to illustrate the clear contradiction betweenvariability and systematicity of the second language in the perspective ofsociology. Its goal is to investigate language by relating to the social environment.Researchers mainly investigated the linguistic competence and sociolinguisticcompetence of the learners in the view of sociology. They are related so that whatthe learners know is the systematic knowledge of the second language and how toapply them in the daily communication. The researchers proved it with datareflecting the actual utterance not by institution. Therefore, if it can be provedthat the performance of utterances is not only variable but also systematical, andthen the problem of variation will be solved.
……………
2.2 Related Literature
In this chapter, the author will first introduce the definition and the categorizationof interlanguage variation that are pertinent to the purpose of the presentresearch. American linguist Salinger put forward the concept “inter-language” for the firsttime in 1969, and then in 1972 he proposed the interlanguage hypothesis in hisfamous essay “inter-language”: he pointed out that the hypothesis ofinterlanguage aims to explore the language system and the acquisition ofhypothesis when acquiring the second language. Salinger’s hypothesis ofinterlanguage has a great significance in the research history of second languageacquisition.According to Tarone (1988), when the second language learners try to conveytheir meaning, the language produced will be changed in their grammar andpronunciation accuracy with the changes in the specific environment. (Tarone,1988:73) this kind of variation about production accuracy can occur in a period,sometimes in minutes and these special variations can be predicted in thesituations and tasks.
……………
Part 3 Method........ 26
3.1 Introduction ........ 26
3.2 Materials....... 26
3.3 Design .... 26
3.3.1 Subjects ....... 27
3.3.2 Instruments........ 27
3.4 Analysis ........ 28
3.5 Procedure...... 29
Part 4 Results......... 30
4.1 Introduction ........ 30
4.2 Results of Cloze Tasks ......... 30
4.2.1 Task checking clause type’s difference ....... 30
4.2.2 Task checking syntactic function’s difference......... 34
4.3 Results of Translation Task ........ 37
4.4 Results of the Interview ....... 41
Part 5 Discussion ......... 44
5.1 Introduction ........ 44
5.2 Findings........ 44
5.3 Implication for English Teaching ..... 52
Part 5 Discussion
5.1 Introduction
In this section, the author will discuss and analysis according to the relevantresults presented in the chapter 4. According to the data obtained in the research,the phenomenon of the learners’ interlanguage variation is really complicated.The results in the research indicate that the learners will vary their interlanguagewith the change of the specific factors. Although their performances produced avery high grammatical accuracy in some situations, they produced a less accuracyin the same task in other situations. Therefore, it is difficult for us to determinewhether the learners have acquired the target language or not. So next the threefactors mentioned in the study (the clause types, the syntactic function, timepressure) will be analyzed how to have an effect on interlanguage variation or notone by one.
…………
Conclusion
This paper mainly commits itself to the exploration of interlanguage variationwith the multi-factor approach. In the first part, the author gives an introductionfor the whole study, including the problem, research questions and objectives,In the second, the author first clarifies the theoretical frame, it is a newlymodel—the multi-factor approach. It mainly combines the intra-linguistic factorsand the extra-linguistic factors. Then the author reviews fore scholars’ researcheson interlanguage variation in various ways such as the labovian paradigm, thedynamic paradigm, the function-form model etc. In the third part, the authorgives an introduction of research design and also gives the detailed analysis ofthe experiment. Then, coming to the most central part of the paper, analysis andresults, the author takes the method of SPSS 16.0 to analyze the data results fromthree aspects, namely the clause type, syntactic function and time pressure. In thefifth part, the author further discusses the effects of three proposed factors on theperformances of the learners when learning the absolute structure and gives thema comprehensive summary. Then this part is the conclusion of the paper.
……………
Reference (omitted)