Effects of Written Corrective Feedback on EFL Learners’ Written Accuracy in Using the English Passive Structure: Individual Differences in Focus
Tohid Golqasem Qarebagh
1
(
Department of English Language and Literature, Urmia University, Urmia, Iran
)
Mehdi Sarkhosh
2
(
Department of English Language and Literature, Urmia University, Urmia, Iran
)
Parviz Alavinia
3
(
Department of English Language and Literature, Urmia University, Urmia, Iran
)
Javad Gholami
4
(
Department of English Language and Literature, Urmia University, Urmia, Iran
)
الکلمات المفتاحية: English passive voice, second language acquisition, individual differences, written corrective feedback,
ملخص المقالة :
The extent to which written CF plays a role in learners’ acquiring the target language is a question that has received a lot of attention over the last 20-30 years. This paper, by drawing on a cognitive view, continued with that focus, exploring not only the efficacy of written CF on the improved accuracy of learners but also the extent to which working memory and phonological short-term memory may moderate the effects of different types of feedback.
The study was undertaken with 100 university students in Iran. Firstly, a quasi-experimental study was used, with a pre-test, treatment, immediate and delayed post-tests, to investigate the effectiveness of four types of written CF (direct CF, direct CF plus revision, metalinguistic explanation, metalinguistic explanation plus revision) on a complex linguistic structure, the English passive voice. The results regarding the moderating effect of working memory and phonological short term memory revealed that (1) working memory moderated the impact of the metalinguistic explanation and combined metalinguistic explanation groups and the combined metalinguistic and direct CF groups both immediately and over time; and (2) working memory moderated the direct CF plus revision and combined revision groups only in the long term. Furthermore, the findings suggest that more explicit types of written CF may be more effective than less explicit types of written CF.
