Matching Items (4)
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- All Subjects: Linguistics
- Genre: Masters Thesis
- Creators: Prior, Matthew T.
Description
ABSTRACT The teaching of formulaic sequences (FSs) to improve speech fluency is a time honored tradition in the field of English as a Second Language (ESL). However, recent research seems to indicate that certain discourse markers, specifically transition and personal stance markers, are more useful than other FSs. This study is an attempt to partially replicate (on a very small scale) one of these studies to see if the findings are similar when the standardized test materials are from the Test Of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) rather than the International English Language Testing System (IELTS). The hope is that teacher researchers could have access to readily available, standardized assessment materials with which to create their own research studies consisting of a standardized pretest and posttest. Four students of various levels in an Intensive English Program (IEP) were given a practice listening and speaking exam utilizing TOEFL preparation materials found online. The results were analyzed to see if there was a noticeable correlation between the use of the specified discourse markers on the speech portion of the test and the performance of the students on the listening portion of the test. The findings show some discrepancy between the two studies' results. It appears possible to have a high perceived fluency rate and still have a lower overall speaking fluency when taking into account listening comprehension and various other measures.
ContributorsNunn, Theda (Author) / Renaud, Claire (Thesis advisor) / Prior, Matthew T. (Committee member) / James, Mark A (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
The use of blogging tools in the second language classroom has been investigated from a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives (Alm, 2009; Armstrong & Retterer, 2008; Dippold, 2009; Ducate & Lomicka, 2008; Elola & Oskoz, 2008; Jauregi & Banados, 2008; Lee, 2009; Petersen, Divitini, & Chabert, 2008; Pinkman, 2005; Raith, 2009; Soares, 2008; Sun, 2009, 2012; Vurdien, 2011; Yang, 2009) and a growing number of studies examine the use of microblogging tools for language learning (Antenos-Conforti, 2009; Borau, Ullrich, Feng, & Shen, 2009; Lomicka & Lord, 2011; Perifanou, 2009). Grounded in Cultural Historical Activity Theory (Engestrom, 1987), the present study explores the outcomes of a semester-long project based on the Bridging Activities framework (Thorne & Reinhardt, 2008) and implemented in an intermediate hybrid Spanish-language course at a large public university in Arizona, in which students used microblogging and blogging tools to collect digital texts, analyze perspectives of the target culture, and participate as part of an online community of language learners with a broader audience of native speakers. The research questions are: (1) What technology is used by the students, with what frequency and for what purposes in both English and Spanish prior to beginning the project?, (2) What are students' values and attitudes toward using Twitter and Blogger as tools for learning Spanish and how do they change over time through their use in the project during the semester course?, and (3) What tensions emerge in the activity systems of the intermediate Spanish-language students throughout the process of using Twitter and Blogger for the project? What are the underlying reasons for the tensions? How are they resolved? The data was collected using pre-, post-, and periodic surveys, which included Likert and open-ended questions, as well as the participants' microblog and blog posts. The quantitative data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and the qualitative data was analyzed to identify emerging themes following the Constant Comparative Method (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). Finally, three participant outliers were selected as case studies for activity theoretical analysis in order to identify tensions and, through their resolution, evidence of expansive learning.
ContributorsAlvarado, Margaret (Author) / Lafford, Barbara (Thesis advisor) / González, Verónica (Committee member) / Cerron-Palomino, Alvaro (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This sociolinguistic study examines the various functions of Arabic-English code switching in the Egyptian talk show ‘Shabab Beek (literally: Young by You; communicatively: The Young Speak)’. In addition, this study investigates the syntactic categories and types of switches to English. The data consist of approximately four hours and forty-five minutes of YouTube videos of the talk show in which code switching to English occurred. The videos are collected from six episodes of the show that were aired in October 2010. The show featured three categories of speakers, show hosts, guests, and callers. The findings show that most of the switches were produced by show hosts and guests while callers produced very few switches due perhaps to the limited number of phone calls received in the selected episodes. The speakers mostly used nouns when they switched to English. Nouns are followed by adjectives and noun phrases. The most prevalent type of switches in the data is tag switches followed by intrasentential and intersentential switches, which occurred rarely. Finally, analysis revealed eight functions of code switching in the data. These are difficulty retrieving an Arabic expression, quotation, euphemism, reiteration, message qualification, academic or technical terms, association with certain domains, and objectivization.
ContributorsHamouda, Abdelhamid (Author) / Adams, Karen (Thesis advisor) / Prior, Matthew T. (Thesis advisor) / Hussein, Lutfi (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
With the rise of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) among adults in the United States, understanding the processes of trauma, trauma related disorders, and the long-term impact of living with them is an area of continued focus for researchers. This is especially a concern in the case of current and former military service members (veterans), whose work activities and deployment cycles place them at an increased risk of exposure to trauma-inducing experiences but who have a low rate of self-referral to healthcare professionals. There is thus an urgent need for developing procedures for early diagnosis and treatment. The present study examines how the tools and findings of the field of linguistics may contribute to the field of trauma research. Previous research has shown that cognition and language production are closely linked. This study focuses on the role of prosody in PTSD and pilots a procedure for the data collection and analysis. Data consist of monologic talk from a sample of student-veterans and analyzed with speech software (Praat) for pauses greater than 250 milliseconds per 100 words. The pause frequency was compared to a PCL-5 score, an assessment used to check for PTSD symptoms and evaluate need for further assessment and possible diagnosis of PTSD. This pilot study found the methods successfully elicited data that could be used to measure and test the research questions. Although the findings of the study were inconclusive due to limitations of the participant pool, it found that the research model proved effect as a model for future linguistic research on trauma.
ContributorsSouthee, Richard Aaron (Author) / Prior, Matthew T. (Thesis advisor) / Pruitt, Kathryn (Committee member) / Pereira, Jennifer (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020