Effects of multi-turn xu-based comparative continuation writing on the development of phraseological complexity: A bigram-based longitudinal study

Abstract

This study examined the impacts of multi-turn xu-based comparative continuation writing on the development of Chinese EFL learners’ phraseological complexity. The participants were 75 first-year high-school students assigned to a comparative continuation writing group (n = 38) and an independent writing group (n = 37). Each group completed 8 turns of writing in 15 weeks, and 600 essays were collected and analyzed. Linear mixed-effects models were employed to track the participants’ production of bigrams in respect to two key dimensions of phraseological complexity, that is, diversity as measured by Moving Average Type-Token Ratio (MATTR) and sophistication as measured by Pointwise Mutual Information (PMI). The results revealed that compared to the independent writing, the comparative continuation writing significantly improved the diversity and sophistication of bigrams, reduced the proportions of non-collocational bigrams and increased the use of bigrams with high association strengths. This paper concluded with pedagogical implications for incorporating the xu-based approach into EFL education.