| Writing may be the most complex task in English learning, so learners often have more difficulties in improving writing skills than in enhancing other skills in language learning. In China, both English major and non-English major students make errors in their writing. In fact, responding to students' writing is one of the essential elements in cultivating students into proficient writers. Negative feedback is correction of errors for the purpose of improving a student's ability to write accurately, which is a part of the response. It is a controversial topic in applied linguistics. In recent years, Chinese researchers begin to attach importance to the effectiveness of negative feedback. Although there are many researches concerning negative feedback, contribution of negative feedback to students' writing development is still unclear in Chinese context. The thesis is conducted to explore the function of negative feedback, effect of different types of negative feedback and students' attitudes toward error and different kinds of negative feedback,aiming to give some suggestions to college English teachers. The thesis consists of six chapters.Chapter One gives a general introduction to the whole thesis. It states the background and purposes of the study and gives the outline of the whole paper.Chapter Two reviews the relative theories and researches which are theoretical basis of the following study. In this chapter, the author first illustrates what negative feedback is– definition and classification of negative feedback, and then reviews the theories on negative feedback including behaviorist perspective and related theories, noticing hypothesis and process writing theory. The theories indicate that language learners need negative feedback that creates opportunities for them to promote second language writing accuracy, including L2 writing development. Meanwhile, relevant empirical studies of negative feedback at home and abroad are also reviewed in this chapter.Chapter Three illustrates the design of the research including the research questions, participants, instruments and empirical procedure. Questionnaires and a one-semester empirical study are conducted. The responses to the Students' Attitude Questionnaire are analyzed according to the frequency and percentage. SPSS 12.0 is employed to analyze the results of it with one-way ANOVA and Paired-Samples T Test being used as the statistical instruments.Chapter Four analyzes and discusses the results of questionnaires and the writing tasks. Questionnaires are analyzed to find out students' attitude and reaction to negative feedback. The writing tasks are designed to investigate whether and how negative feedback helps EFL writers (English majors) improve accuracy, and quality in their writing and different effect of different kinds of negative feedback. The research indicates that negative feedback is effective in improving EFL learners' writing proficiency. Negative feedback has short-term and long-term effects in increasing writing accuracy and writing quality. Coded feedback is the most effective one with better error reduction in writing. The aim of the thesis is to find the appropriate negative feedback which has the potential to lead to improvement of accuracy, and quality in not only students' revision but also new piece of writing.Chapter Five explains the pedagogical implication of the study. To give negative feedback is not as simple as it may seem to be. The present study tries to give some suggestions to college teachers on how and when they give negative feedback.Chapter Six is the conclusion of the thesis stating the summary, limitations of this study and the direction of further research.
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