Do you really "think" or "believe"? Japanese ESL Writers' Use of I Think/Believe and in Academic Writing

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This paper investigates Japanese ESL writers' use of the "I + private verb + complement clause" construction both quantitatively and qualitatively. It examines 20 academic essays written by Japanese ESL students and 20 essays written by English native speaker (NS) writers, specifically comparing the use of I believe and I think. The NS writers do not use I believe/think very frequently in academic writing ; however, when they use these expressions, they achieve specific purposes, clearly indicating their personal "beliefs"and "thoughts", and clarifying or evaluating the content of the writing prompt. The NS writers tend to do this type of clarification and confirmation of their "beliefs" and "thoughts" in the introductory part of the essays. The Japanese ESL writers, in the other hand, use I believe/think with high frequency, and their overuse is often considered problematic. While the ESL writers also use I believe/think to describe their own opinions, their attempts often result in weakening their claims because they use these expressions as weak forms of stance marker or softener as they do in spoken discourse, which does not necessarily indicate their strong "beliefs" or "thoughts". The comments made by five NS writing instructors suggest that the ESL writers do not fully realize how I believe/think should indicate stronger writer identity when used in academic writing, and this discrepancy between the ESL writers' use and the NS reader expectations is often perceived as ESL writing weaknesses or problems. The findings of this study reiterate the importance of explicit instruction of academic conventions for ESL writers.

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詳細情報 詳細情報について

  • CRID
    1572824501889920000
  • NII論文ID
    110008895621
  • NII書誌ID
    AA11319906
  • ISSN
    13443984
  • 本文言語コード
    en
  • データソース種別
    • CiNii Articles

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