【作者】 金晓玲；

【导师】 梅德明；

【作者基本信息】 上海外国语大学 ， 英语语言文学， 2007， 博士

【摘要】 关系从句是英语中的一个重要句式,研究者们一直在从各个角度对其加以研究。然而,用比较全面的观点来探讨关系从句的研究比较少,而采用多因素理论来研究中国英语学习者关系从句习得的研究就更是微乎其微了。其次,在对以英语为第二语言或外语的学习者关系从句习得的研究中,英语熟练程度很少被作为一个参数来研究。此外,有关二语或外语学习者是否回避使用英语关系从句的争论一直没有停止过。而且,语言共性对中国学生关系从句习得的影响也有待研究。本研究克服以上不足,以迁移理论、对比分析假说、错误分析、关系从句形成策略、名词短语易接近等级假说以及感知困难假说等为理论基础,探讨三个不同语言层次的中国大学生英语关系从句的使用情况,以便为中国英语教学提供一些可供借鉴的启示。本研究为一项实证研究。参与本研究的受试者—112名中国大学生和43名英语本族语大学生都是随机抽取的。中国大学生关系从句的语料是通过以下四个测试获取的:写作、选择题、语法判断题和合并句子。对英语本族语大学生只收集了作文的语料。本研究比较了中国学生和英语本族语学生的作文语料,同时也对不同层次中国学生的语料进行了对比。所有数据都借助于统计软件—社会科学统计软件(SPSS)进行了分析。研究结果证实了本研究的所有假设。首先,写作中,中国学生所使用的关系从句的数目远远少于本族语学生,这一点从前的一些研究也曾讨论过。但是其原因并非是一些研究者所认为的“回避使用”,本课题的研究者拒绝承认“回避”现象的存在,因为“回避”这一术语本身就存在问题,而且它是否可以作为一种学习策略而存在还有待商榷。的确,中国大学生在预感到使用关系从句会有障碍时,会采取一些策略,如简化和结构转换等。其次,中国学生语料中出现的关系从句使用不足和错误多等问题主要是由以下三个方面的因素造成的:语际因素、语内因素和语言共性。本论文分别对其进行了详尽的分析和讨论。再次,本研究结果部分支持语言共性的主要假说之一—名词短语易接近等级假说,但是有两个位置的等级顺序不符合此假说—属格位置和介词宾语位置。前一个例外在从前的一些研究中也曾发现过,但第二个例外从未被讨论过,这一不符合此假说等级的特例似乎暗示出介词宾语位置的关系从句比间接宾语位置的关系从句更容易些。然而这一发现有待于进一步研究与证实。最后,本研究证明了英语熟练程度是影响中国大学生英语关系从句使用的一个重要因素。英语熟练程度不仅影响学生关系从句使用的数目,而且决定关系从句使用的多样性以及所犯错误的数目和种类。但是对于不同程度的学生而言,这种影响是不均衡的。英语熟练程度还影响母语的迁移,语言熟练程度越高,母语迁移越少。学生关系从句使用中转换策略的采纳也受英语熟练程度的影响,英语程度越低的学生越依赖于转换策略。本研究丰富并发展了有关二语及外语学习者英语关系从句习得的研究。本研究的发现和建议有助于中国英语教学,给英语教材编写者和教师提供了一些启示。教材编写者可以根据中国学生英语关系从句习得的顺序合理地安排关系从句的讲授顺序和课时。英语教师可设计多种形式的练习和课堂活动来发现学生关系从句方面的弱项,从而调整教学方法,使学生最大程度地获益。更多还原

【Abstract】 The relative clause is a very important structure in English and it has been studied from different angles in the literature. However, few studies are made from an overall perspective, and even fewer studies examine Chinese speakers’acquisition of English relative clauses by means of a multifactor theory. Besides, the English proficiency level is rarely taken as a parameter in investigating ESL or EFL learners’acquisition of English relative clauses. Moreover, the discussion about whether ESL or EFL learners avoid using English relative clauses never ceases. What’s more, the specific influence of language universal properties on Chinese speakers’English relative clause acquisition needs to be examined.Based on the transfer theory, the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis, the Error Analysis, relative clause formation strategies, the Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy and the Perceptual Difficulty Hypothesis, the study probes into the use of English relative clauses by three different proficiency levels of Chinese college students so that some pedagogical implications may be provided for the teaching and learning of English relative clauses. This study is an empirical research. The subjects in this study, who are 112 Chinese college students and 43 English native college students, are randomly chosen. Four elicitation methods (the composition task, the multiple choice test, the grammaticality judgment test and the sentence combining test) are adopted to gather genuine data from the Chinese subjects. As for the native students, only composition corpus is collected.Comparisons both between the native students and the Chinese students, and between different levels of Chinese students, are made. Data from the subjects are analyzed via the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS).The results of the study have confirmed all the hypotheses of the study. To begin with, the Chinese college students do use fewer English relative clauses on the composition task compared with the native students, which is compatible with the findings of some previous researchers. The reason is not“avoidance”as is claimed by some researchers. The phenomenon of“avoidance”is denied by the researcher of the present study for the term“avoidance”itself is problematic and whether it exists as a learning strategy is still disputable. Indeed, the Chinese students resort to some strategies such as simplification and structural conversion when anticipating difficulties in using relative clauses. Next, the underproduction and various errors found in the Chinese students’corpora are attributed to three reasons: interlingual factors, intralingual factors and language universal properties, each of which has been analyzed and discussed in detail. Then, the universal hypothesis—the Noun Phrase Accessibility Hierarchy is partly supported by the results of the study, always with the genitive position and sometimes with the object of a preposition as exceptions. The former exception has been found by some previous researchers, while the latter has never been reported in any previous study. It seems to imply that the object of a preposition is more easily relativized than the indirect object position in English relative clauses, which needs to be further studied and confirmed. Finally, the English proficiency level is proved to be an important parameter in the use of English relative clauses by the Chinese college students. It not only influences the number of relative clauses the students use, but also determines the variety of relative clauses and the number and variety of errors they make. But the influence is not balanced among different levels of students. The proficiency level has an effect on L1 transfer and the effect diminishes with the increase of the proficiency level. The proficiency level also influences the learners’use of learning strategies. The lower the proficiency level of the students is, the more frequently the strategies are used.The study can enrich the literature on the acquisition of ESL and EFL learners’English relative clauses. The findings and suggestions made in the study will benefit the English teaching in China. The application of the research to teaching is helpful to textbook compilers, teachers and learners. Textbook compilers can compile textbooks reasonably according to the Chinese learners’acquisition order; teachers can try every means to design exercises and classroom activities in order to find out in what aspects the learners are still weak and modify the teaching approaches accordingly; the learners can benefit a lot from the modification of the textbook and teaching approaches and proceed fast to the final acquisition.更多还原