BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY TONG THI PHUONG THAO A STUDY OF COHESIVE REFERENCE ERRORS IN ESSAYS WRITTEN BY ENGLISH-MAJOR JUNIORS AT THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES MAJOR CODE: 8 22 02 01 MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2023 BINH DUONG PROVINCIAL PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY TONG THI PHUONG THAO A STUDY OF COHESIVE REFERENCE ERRORS IN ESSAYS WRITTEN BY ENGLISH-MAJOR JUNIORS AT THU DAU MOT UNIVERSITY MAJOR: ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES MAJOR CODE: 8 22 02 01 MASTER THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES SUPERVISED BY PHO PHUONG DUNG, PhD. BINH DUONG PROVINCE - 2023 STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY I certify that the intellectual content of the thesis “A study of cohesive reference errors in essays written by English-major juniors at Thu Dau Mot University” is my own work, and it does not contain materials written or published by other people or other people’s ideas, except for the information from the references. This thesis has not been submitted to any other institution for the award of a degree or certification. Binh Duong Province, 2023 Tong Thi Phuong Thao i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, Pho Phuong Dung, PhD., who gave me insightful comments and devoted her valuable time to reading my thesis with great care.
Especially, I am wholeheartedly grateful to her for her unchanging sympathy and unceasing encouragement, which she has given me so far. My special thanks go to my best friends, who gave me helpful advice, although their majors are not English linguistics. Besides, they also accompanied me during my most challenging time. Furthermore, I am truly grateful to my colleagues at the Office of Science and the Faculty of Education.
They took on much of my work, so I had more time to finish this thesis. Finally, I also want to thank my friends who supported me and listened to my complaints when I was stuck on ideas. I am greatly indebted to my parents, who have always been wholeheartedly supportive and understanding, so I could devote all my time to finishing my thesis. ii ABSTRACT Writing skill is challenging for students in general, particularly those who learn English as a foreign language.
Due to errors at the discourse level, even essays with no significant grammatical or spelling errors may give readers a sense of inconsistency and illogic. Besides vocabulary, grammar, and ideas, cohesion is one of the main factors affecting writing quality. Cohesive reference devices are essential components that connect sentences and paragraphs within a text to form a unified whole. This research examined 245 writings produced by English-major juniors at Thu Dau Mot University to determine which cohesive reference errors they constantly commit.
A qualitative and quantitative mix-method study is designed to find results that meet research aims. The research findings also show the ratio of the error types. There are three kinds of cohesive reference errors that the participants commit the most. They are definite article errors, expressing quantity errors, and comparative reference errors.
Based on previous researches, the study also surmises some reasons for committing those errors. Finally, the study provided some recommendations for learners, teachers, and English-major curriculum writers to avoid cohesive reference errors. The research helps identify and eliminate cohesive reference errors in order to improve the quality of English writing. Key words: cohesive reference, cohesive reference error, errors in essays iii TABLE OF CONTENTS STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY .iii TABLE OF CONTENTS.
iv LIST OF TABLES. vii CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION. Background to the study. The importance of writing skills.
The importance of cohesion in writing. Statement of the problem. Aims of the study. Significance of the study.
Scope of the study. Organization of the study. 6 CHAPTER 2 - LITERATURE REVIEW. Definitions of text and essay.
Definitions of text. Definitions of essay. Definitions of cohesion and cohesive reference. Definitions of cohesion.
Definitions of cohesive reference. Studies of cohesion and cohesive reference. Studies of cohesion. Studies of cohesive reference.
Definitions of error and error analysis. Definitions of error. Definitions of error analysis. Studies of error analysis.
Studies of errors. Studies of cohesion errors. Studies of cohesive reference errors. Framework of cohesion.
Frameworks of reference. Framework of the current study. Research participants and subjects. Data collection procedure.
Data analysis procedure. 33 CHAPTER 4 - RESULTS AND DISCUSSION. Cohesive reference errors. Personal reference errors.
Personal pronoun errors. Possessive determiner errors. Reflexive pronoun errors. Demonstrative reference errors.
Definite article errors. Demonstrative determiner errors. Demonstrative pronoun errors. The comparative reference errors.
Pre- and Post-determiner errors. Semi-determiner errors. Adjectives and adverbs of comparison errors. 66 v CHAPTER 5 - CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS.
For curriculum writers. Limitations of the study and recommendation for further research. 83 vi LIST OF TABLES Table 2. Halliday and Hasan’s Cohesion Taxonomy (1976) 21 Table 2.
Type of reference expression 23 Table 2. The framework in Jenei’s dissertation (2014) 24 Table 2. The framework of cohesive reference in the current study 26 Table 3. Coding cohesive reference errors 34 Table 4.
Cohesive reference errors 1 36 Table 4. Personal reference errors 37 Table 4. Personal pronoun reference errors 38 Table 4. Demonstrative reference errors 49 Table 4.
Central determiner errors 49 Table 4. Comparative reference errors 60 Table 4. Pre- and Post-determiner errors 60 Table 4. Quantifier errors 61 Table 4.
Cohesive reference errors 2 67 vii CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION Writing is an important skill, and it is also a difficult language skill to learn. Learners often make many kinds of errors, such as grammatical errors, syntactic errors, cohesion errors, and lexical errors, when writing any text. Among those errors, cohesion errors affect the quality of writing badly because they cause readers to misunderstand the writing message if the text includes unrelated components. This study aims to identify the cohesive reference errors committed by English-major juniors at Thu Dau Mot University by analyzing the final paper of the Essay writing in English course.
The first chapter of this study provides an overview of the problem. Furthermore, the research aims, and research questions are presented in detail. Moreover, this chapter also discusses the study’s significance and organization. Background to the study 1.
The importance of writing skills Writing is a difficult skill in language learning, especially for students who learn English as a foreign language. Therefore, being able to write English essays is one of the primary targets for English-major students. Indeed, in order to properly arrange and express ideas, not only linguistic understanding of the English language (phonology, vocabulary, and grammar) but also knowledge of rhetorical conventions must be acquired. Due to the disparities between the language systems of the target language and the student’s native tongue, students typically encounter a variety of issues that are manifested in the form of common mistakes or errors in their English essays.
“Good writing skills allow learners to communicate their message with clarity and ease to a larger audience than through face-to-face or telephone conversations” (Rajih, 2016, p. In this sense, people can inform, conduct business, persuade, infuriate, and express their thoughts through writing. However, writing or learning to write in a foreign language is not as straightforward as writing in one’s native tongue. 1 According to Ulijn and Strother (1995), writing is regarded as “one of the active or productive skills of language usage” (p.
It is needed for taking notes, describing objects or devices and writing essays, answering written questions, creating compositions, writing experimental reports, etc. As a result, writing has long been considered an essential component of the curricula for students majoring in English and for use in academic settings. Because English is the key to overcoming the barrier of language and bringing individuals into the global community, teaching English in schools should also focus on developing students’ writing skills in the English language. Writing skills are essential for effective communication.
They play an important role in everyone’s work. They are special skills to express ideas and communicative intentions through written languages. Some students assume that writing skills are one reason for their success. Moreover, they realize that they have to write many types of text in reality.
Nevertheless, those skills are not innate abilities. They are taken shape and improved through education and practice in reality. In addition, writers have to organize their ideas so that they are harmonious to reach the main target of writing, which is conveying their opinions to the readers. For these reasons, a cohesive text is essential because it decides how much readers understand the writer’s message.
Even essays without serious grammatical errors or misspellings can give readers the impression of inconsistency and illogicality, which is mainly caused by errors at the discourse level. The importance of cohesion in writing According to Ghasemi (2013), cohesion is regarded as “an essential textual component” (p. 1615) both in constructing ordered texts and making the material understandable to the reader. It would appear that cohesion is responsible for ensuring that our words, ideas, and paragraphs fit together.
In 2 place of a series of statements that are not related to one another, it connects a string of sentences to produce a text. Cohesion is also a crucial feature of academic writing because it directly affects our writing style. According to Min (2014), a cohesive essay is not limited to grammatically accurate sentences; instead, it refers to the linkage of ideas at both the sentence and paragraph levels. The content of sentences in the text has to be cohesive.
It means that they have to be organized logically in proper order. Without cohesive devices, the reader experiences the sensation of reading a long list of disconnected thoughts. They frequently struggle to recall what they have read. They also have difficulty grasping the relationships between concepts, which may indicate that they do not get the significant argument of essays.
Therefore, writers have to avoid writing sentences that are incorrect in grammar and do not relate to the topic. It is quite challenging to communicate successfully when the text does not have a coherent flow. Numerous scholars have investigated the relationship between the use of cohesion devices and writing quality. A text is meaningful when its pieces make reference to one another and establish a connection.
Reference, substitution, ellipsis, and conjunction are some examples of grammatical and lexical cohesiveness that can be used to establish the relation. Therefore, cohesiveness can also be achieved by the use of lexicon and grammar. There is a widespread belief that essay quality is highly correlated with its cohesion and coherence. It is reflected in the writing literature (e., Collins, 1998; DeVillez, 2003) as well as in writing instruction textbooks (Golightly & Sanders, 1990).
Because the objective of a text is to communicate ideas, a good text should be easily interpreted by the reader. Consequently, the cohesion of the text is vital since it clarifies its meaning and allows readers to comprehend what the author intends to convey through the text. Statement of the problem In reality, students’ writing skills face some obstacles. Many linguists are interested in this issue and discuss it in numerous academic forums.
Today’s youth frequently fail to clarify their thoughts in writing. Due to a lack of writing skills in their native tongue, Vietnamese students struggle with writing in the target language, especially English. Students’ inability to write in English is the greatest obstacle to their worldwide integration and employment opportunities in foreign companies. Although learners study writing skills through many courses , they still face a lot of difficulties in the writing process.
They cannot organize their ideas for writing, or they find it difficult to outline their writing.