An Analysis of Variation Sources in Written Corrective Feedback Studies: What is the Next Step?

Abstract

<jats:p>While there is a significant amount of compelling evidence to support written corrective feedback (error correction), it is also acknowledged that research findings may not be applicable or conclusive enough given the great variability among studies. Nevertheless, no systematic attempt has been made to review and synthesize the extensive amount of literature to identify the sources that lead to such variation. This study aims to identify such variables. Results indicate that in a research base of 76 relevant publications, variations can be explained based on 11 main sources. Pursuant to these findings, this study sketches the main variance-related problems and outlines design recommendations to further expand L2 research and practice of error correction in Second Language Acquisition. </jats:p>

An Updated Typology of Written Corrective Feedback: Resolving Terminology Issues

“…Because the present article extends previous work (cf. Bonilla, 2020), an effort was made to include the same publications to guarantee consistency in the analysis and reliability in the results. For this reason, the retrieval of information was carried out with a manual and online search through the combination of key words such as error, correction, written, writing, feedback, grammatical, grammar, and accuracy.…”

“…us far, the distinction could be valid, but it is worthy of note that of all the available written CF strategies, some have received more empirical attention than others (cf. Bonilla, 2020). erefore, the umbrella direct/indirect distinction could become problematic when conclusions about the advantages (or lack thereof) of either type include by default strategies whose effect still remain unclear.…”

“…As Evans, James and Strong-Krause (2011) argue, "many practitioners who use WCF [i.e., written CF] continue to struggle with the inconsistencies in the research" (p. 230). In this respect, a systematic literature review in Bonilla (2020) revealed that the written CF research base falls so short of consistency that problems with key definitions made it impossible to attain any conclusion on the number of written CF studies by both scope and type. To illustrate, Bonilla identified 11 sources of variation which may both hinder comparability across studies and cloud L2 teachers' and researcher´s understanding of the empirical evidence.…”