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Article published In:
International Journal of Corpus Linguistics
Vol. 28:2 (2023) ► pp.232–262

A comparison of automated and manual analyses of syntactic complexity in L2 English writing

ORCID logo | Vietnam National University, Hanoi | University of Brussels (VUB)
ORCID logo | University of Brussels (VUB)

Automated tools for syntactic complexity measurement are increasingly used for analyzing various kinds of second language corpora, even though these tools were originally developed and tested for texts produced by advanced learners. This study investigates the reliability of automated complexity measurement for beginner and lower-intermediate L2 English data by comparing manual and automated analyses of a corpus of 80 texts written by Dutch-speaking learners. Our quantitative and qualitative analyses reveal that the reliability of automated complexity measurement is substantially affected by learner errors, parser errors, and Tregex pattern undergeneration. We also demonstrate the importance of aligning the definitions of analytical units between the computational tool and human annotators. In order to enhance the reliability of automated analyses, it is recommended that certain modifications are made to the system, and non-advanced L2 English data are preprocessed prior to automated analyses.

Keywords: L2 Syntactic Complexity Analyzer, Tool for the Automatic Analysis of Syntactic Sophistication and Complexity, syntactic complexity, automated analysis
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.L2SCA in L2 English research
    • 2.1 L2SCA system information
    • 2.2 L2SCA system reliability
    • 2.3Studies that used L2SCA
  • 3.Methodology
    • 3.1Corpus
    • 3.2Syntactic complexity measures
    • 3.3Corpus analysis
    • 3.4Comparison of manual and automated analyses
      • 3.4.1System-annotator agreement in unit and structure identification (RQ 1a)
      • 3.4.2Sources of system-annotator disagreement (RQ 1b)
      • 3.4.3System reliability in syntactic complexity scoring (RQ 2)
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1RQ1a: Unit and structure identification
    • 4.2RQ 1b: Sources of system-annotator disagreement
      • 4.2.1Words
      • 4.2.2Clausal and supra-clausal structures
        • Tregex pattern undergeneration
        • Parsing errors
        • Learner errors
    • 4.3RQ 2a: System reliability in syntactic complexity scoring
    • 4.4RQ 2b: Impact of learner errors and the use of broader definitions of clauses and dependent clauses
      • 4.4.1Impact of learner errors
      • 4.4.2Impact of broader clause and dependent clause definitions
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 17 October 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ijcl.20181.cha
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