This study (a) conducted a feature analysis of the spoken data of Chinese university students in pronunciation, grammar, and discourse, (b) investigated the contributions of the discrete linguistic features to the perceptual ratings on foreign accent, comprehensibility, delivery, and general language use. Ten university learners were selected from…

This article reports on a study that investigated the role of metapragmatic awareness of L2 learners in Hong Kong, and the impact it has on language choices when addressing requests in English. Simulated open role-plays and retrospective interviews were used to explore the ways in which mainland Chinese undergraduates assess, plan and produce…

This paper reports on a focused investigation into the immediate effects of oral narrative task repetition by two adult EFL learners of intermediate and high proficiency. Two participants performed a narrative speaking task after watching a cartoon video clip and repeated their performance three times, followed by a retrospective report in an…

This study examined the relation of language to the development of a cultural self. Bilingual children ages 8-14 from Hong Kong (N = 125) were interviewed in either English or Chinese. They recalled autobiographical events and described themselves, and indicated their agreement with Chinese interdependent versus Western independent values.…

Email has revolutionised the way in which professionals work and companies operate, and yet has received surprisingly little scholarly attention in English for Specific Purposes and has an unexpectedly muted presence in many Business English textbooks. The dearth of research into email use in globalised business settings may be one of the factors…

While strategy instruction research generally focuses on the effect of the teaching on learners' use of the strategies targeted for instruction, the present study examines the "wash over" effect on learners' use of pre-existing, non-target strategies. The study involved a treatment class and a comparison class in the ESL oral classroom…

In recent years, the emphasis in second language (L2) oral proficiency assessment has shifted from linguistic accuracy to discourse strategies such as the ability to initiate, respond, and negotiate meaning. This has resulted in a growing interest in the discourse analysis of students' performance in different oral proficiency assessment formats.…

This article presents the findings of an intervention study designed to examine the effects of metacognitive strategy instruction (MCSI) on learners' performance and on strategy use. Two classes in the secondary English oral classroom in Hong Kong participated in the study; one class received eight sessions of MCSI and the other served as a…

This research note reports on a study to investigate what English language skills are used by new graduate employees in their daily work in various departments in four banks in Hong Kong. Through interviews with 16 new bank employees across these four banks and the use of questionnaires, my aim was to determine what proportion of their daily…