The Study On Whether Output Can Promote Non-English Majors' Noticing And Acquisition Of The Target Linguistic Form

Swain's (1995)"Output Hypothesis"maintains that output performs three functions, namely, the"noticing/triggering"function, the"hypothesis testing"function, the"metalinguistic"function. The noticing function means that the activity of producing the target language may prompt second language (L2) learners to recognize their linguistic problems and notice the gap between their interlanguage and the target language, and as a result, their second language acquisition will be facilitated.Based on this hypothesis, the current study tries to investigate whether the two output tasks (the guided writing task and the text-reconstruction task) that ask learners to produce precise language in the target language could help non-English majors recognize their linguistic problems in their output and notice the gap between their output and the target language and thus lead to the noticing and learning of the target linguistic form (English past hypothetical conditional).48 non-English majors participated in the whole experiment. They are the freshmen from Inner Mongolia University of Technology, majoring in civil engineering. The experimental group (n=24) wrote an essay after reading the writing prompt and reconstructed a passage after reading it. The comparison group (n=24) did the comprehension tasks with the same materials. And the research instruments include comprehension tasks, questionnaires, pre-test and post-test. Before the experiment, both groups take part in the pre-test to determine whether they have the same level with English past hypothetical conditional and after the experiment, the participants take another test to examine whether they have difference in acquisition of the target linguistic form, that is, post-test.The major findings of the study are as follows:1. According to the"underlining"data analysis, the experimental group didn't outperform the comparison group in noticing of the target linguistic form. But the difference lies in that the output task may help the experimental group learners recognize their own linguistic problems and notice the gap between their interlanguage and the target linguistic form after being exposed to the subsequent input while the comparison group learners notice the target linguistic form because of the salience of it.2. According to the"output"data analysis, the experimental group learners'performance of target linguistic form in the second output have greatly improved, which indicates that they have noticed their linguistic problems and incorporated immediately what they have noticed and learned in input material into the second output.3. According to the"test"data analysis, the experimental group showed better acquisition of the target linguistic form than the comparison group learners, which convinced that the two output tasks facilitated the acquisition of the target linguistic form. Thus the output tasks showed superiority over the comprehension tasks.The major findings in this study extend strong support to Swain's Output Hypothesis and have some important implications for improving the accuracy of linguistic form acquisition through output tasks in the practice of teaching.The thesis includes five chapters. The first chapter is the introduction. In this section the purpose of the research is put forward. Chapter two is literature review in which some relevant theories are overviewed and studies on output are discussed. Chapter three displays the design and implementation of the experimental research. Data analysis and major findings are presented in chapter four. In the last chapter, the author summarizes the results of the research. And a conclusion is reached based on the findings and discussions. In addition, some helpful suggestions are offered and a few limitations are pointed out.