A corpus-based analysis of stance adverbials as hedges and boosters in English argumentative essays of American university students and Turkish non-native university students
A corpus-based analysis of stance adverbials as hedges and boosters in English argumentative essays of American university students and Turkish non-native university students

Summary/Abstract: This article focuses on stance adverbials as hedges and boosters employed by Turkish non-native EFL (English as a Foreign Language) and American university students in their argumentative essays. The data of this study consist of the argumentative essays of the American university students (LOCNESS corpus) and of the Turkish non-native students from the corpus of argumentative essays written by first-year Turkish students at the English Language Teaching (ELT) Department. Simple random sampling is used in order to choose 200 argumentative essays (100 from each student group) and native corpus consists of 84,851 words, whereas non-native corpus consists of 86,554 words. In order to analyze the data, both qualitative and quantitative methods are used: percentages, mean frequencies per 10,000 words and Log-likelihood results for each item are calculated and interpreted. All occurrences of stance adverbials as hedges and boosters are identified in both corpora by using a concordance program, Ant. Conc. 3.3.4. and each occurrence is analyzed in its local and wider context to distinguish stance expressions. The results of the quantitative analyses show that the frequencies and percentages of individual items in hedging and boosting devices differ in native and non-native students’ essays. Argumentative essays of students are characterized by extensive use of boosters, and less by the use of hedges. Functional uses of each adverbial are explained within their own contexts and examples from each corpus are also presented and interpreted.

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