Gender-Based Conversation Styles In EFL Class

Gender is one of the social factors that play a significant role in affecting linguistic behavior. Research on gender-based differences in language use has been done in various fields such as linguistics, psychology, sociology and communication, etc. Sociolinguistic literature has shown ample evidence for gender differences in language use, but the focus is usually on communities of native speakers or monolingual situations. Study of gender-related differences of conversation styles in foreign language learning is still in its infancy.Based on earlier studies made by scholars abroad and at home, a survey of the questionnaire and an analysis of the tape-recorded data in the EFL class are conducted in this study to explore gender-linked conversational styles in language use among undergraduates in China, whose behaviors are conditioned both by the language ideologies of the target language and those of their first language. By means of the theory of Conversation Analysis, a systematic analysis is made concerning the following aspects: topic choices, amount of speech, turns and floors, interruption, back channel responses and conversational self-repair. By transcribing and analyzing the collected data, we find the following results: the students in the EFL class show similar conversational styles as native speakers. The conversation style of the female students is featured by supportiveness and cooperation: they are more sensitive to and concerned about the proper way of expression and the truth and coherence of information than male students; they make a larger amount of speech than the males; they adopt more conversational self-repair and back channel responses than the male students. On the contrary, the speech of male students is characterized by assertiveness and competitiveness; they make more interruptions than the female students. Under this specific EFL context, topics and the ratio of male to female participants in a group play a crucial role in linguistic behaviors of the two genders. This study also indicates the reasons that may account for the speech differences between male students and female students from both social and cultural factors.The significance of the survey result is two-fold: on one hand, it provides insights into gender-related differences of language use among Chinese undergraduates in the EFL class; on...