A SECCL-based Study Of Self-repairs In English Majors' Oral Production

Self-repair, which is one of the important features in oral discourse, refers to the way in which speakers correct their speech errors or inappropriateness before or after the speech has been produced. The speaker can employ the repair behavior not only in content layer, but also in linguistic form layer, even at different levels such as phonology, word, and grammar. Self-repair is the common feature of spoken language in L1 and L2, so the research on this phenomenon can help us to understand the nature of spoken language and monitoring mechanism. Based on existing theories of self-repair research and SECCL, this paper adopts quantitative and qualitative methods and attempts to investigate features of self-repairs in English majors' oral production, the difference in using self-repair among different proficiency levels, and the relationship between repair content and its structure.Psycholinguistically, self-monitoring is a psychological behavior in the process of implement speech. Speakers can monitor their speech according to the language rules and the criteria of society. This research is done from this theory and with the aid of data from SECCL, in which fifty-four oral compositions are selected, and then the researcher identifies types of self-repairs in these oral compositions. At first, the researcher finds a higher frequency of self-repairs, of which error repair accounts for the largest proportion, with fewer percentage of different information repair and appropriateness repair. Secondly, correlation analysis shows that the frequency of self-repair is correlated positively with subjects' oral proficiency. The ANOVA results indicate that there is significant difference among subjects in different proficiency levels in using error repair and appropriateness repair. Moreover, the correction rate of error repair is also different across different proficiency levels. Finally, the result shows that there is a relationship between self-repair and its approach to restart. The editing terms used by English majors in speech are monotonous. In this research, the researcher finds that the features of tasks can influence the frequency and distribution of self-repairs.Based on the above results, the researcher proposes that teachers should devote attention to the phenomenon of self-repair in students' oral production. Furthermore, different tasks can be adopted to enhance students' correction rates of self-repairs and their oral proficiency.