Schema theory is an influential approach to text comprehension, which can account for inferring process in L2 text reading. According to the schema theory, comprehending a text is an interactive process between the reader's prior knowledge(top-down processing) and the text(bottom-up processing). Both top-down and bottom-up processing are necessary for the inferring in reading comprehension. This paper explores how good and poor Chinese learners adopts top-down processing and bottom-up processing to make inferences in L2 reading, and finds some differences and similarities in using textual materials and background knowledge to make inferences in L2 reading by good and poor Chinese EFL learners respectively.
This paper re-examines the comparison of the demonstratives in English and Chinese,which has been discussed by many linguists.They argue that the demonstratives in English and Chinese don't correspond symmetrically,and that '这' in Chinese,for example,is more widely used than this in English.Earlier approaches to the comparison in terms of space,time and text distance are reviewed.This paper assumes that,compared with English demonstratives,the proximity indicated by Chinese demonstratives is more influenced by psychological factors.This paper holds that the space,time and text distance as well as psychological distance act upon each other,co-determining the choice of demonstratives in Chinese.
This study investigates whether L2 learners of English rely on their L1 (in this case Chinese) when attempting to comprehend an idiom in English and whether the student's level of proficiency has any effect on L1 use in understanding L2 idioms. Using think-aloud protocol, the following conclusions were reached: 1) Almost all subjects translated English idioms into Chinese and searched a match, i.e. there exist transfer and interference of L1 in understanding L2 idioms.2) When the L1 was unable to help for understanding different idioms, good students were able to use conceptual strategies (i.e. metaphors and schema) better than poor students. This paper concludes with a suggestion that metaphor instruction be used to teach L2 idioms since a student cannot get very far when relying solely on his L1.
