Systematicity of L1 Thai Learners’ L2 English Interlanguage of ‘Wish-Clauses’

Abstract

The current study aimed to investigate the production of L2 English ‘wish-clauses’ by L1 Thai learners, based on the Interlanguage Hypothesis (Corder, 1981; Selinker, 1972, 1992). It was hypothesized that L1 Thai learners showed systematicity in their interlanguage in the use of ‘wish-clauses’ and that their IL was shaped by language transfer and transfer of training, which are among the psychological processes of IL construction. English ‘wish-clauses’ examined in the study were three types of hypothetical or counterfactual wish: wish about the present, wish about the past, and wish about the future. A Cloze Test and a Situation Task were administered to 30 L1 Thai undergraduate students, divided equally into two groups: the intermediate group and the advanced group. The results conformed to the hypotheses in that Thai learners of both proficiency levels seemed to exhibit similar systematicity in the production of all types of English ‘wish-clauses’ in both tasks. Also, some systematicity was exhibited mainly in the intermediate group. The systematicity was assumed to be influenced by language transfer, in combination with transfer of training. The results of the study are expected to shed light on the characteristics of English IL of ‘wish-clauses’ among L1 Thai learners and the difficulties they face in the acquisition of English ‘wish-clauses’.

Successful Thai EFL Students and their Language Learning Strategies for Acquiring English If Clause

“…In direct response to the three research questions of the study, findings have revealed 1) an overall poor performance in orally producing English if clause sentences by the participants, 2) the verbs which were not backshifted for type II and III if clause as their general mistakes, and 3) a significant difference in applying certain LLSs between successful and less successful students. The first set of findings confirms the tremendous difficulty of English if clause experienced by Thai EFL students as also reported by previous research (Suraprajit, 2022;Yossatorn et al, 2022;Suteerapongsit and Pongpairoj, 2020;Katip and Gampper, 2016;Hinnon, 2015;Pengpanich, 2014), and even to a greater extent when they had to produce it spontaneously while speaking. Second, the fact that the mistakes were generally intralingual in nature indicates a certain level of knowledge about this English grammatical structure possessed by the participants although it is yet incomplete.…”

“…Thai EFL students are no exception whose acquisition of this grammatical structure is problematic. They have always been reported with a poor ability in both comprehension and production (Katip and Gampper, 2016;Pengpanich, 2014;Suteerapongsit and Pongpairoj, 2020;Yossatorn et al, 2022), and their mistakes are sometimes deemed to have reached fossilization where no amounts of study can assist (Hinnon, 2015;Sattayatham and Honsa, 2007). Broadly speaking, their general mistakes stem from incorrect verb formation and mismatch between verb patterns and meaning.…”