中文之負向轉移往往造成以中文為母語之學生英文寫作上的錯誤，也導致學生在英文寫作上無法有所突破。本研究以負面轉移為理論基礎，旨在分類與分析以中文為母語之研究生英文寫作上常犯之錯誤。此研究有三項目標 : (1) 比較中英文語言結構之差異(英文 : 形合 ; 中文 : 意合)，並以此作為分類基礎以分析以英文為第二外語者之寫作上的錯誤 ; (2) 於學生英文寫作中找出中文詞彙負向轉移之證據 ; (3) 於學生英文寫作中找出中文句型負向轉移之證據。
研究對象為淡江大學七位研究生，參與實驗者須於閱讀完中文與英文之參考文章後各寫出一篇英文心得。學生文章中之錯誤將由兩個面向來加以分類與分析 : (1) 中式英文分析 ; (2) 句型分析。中式英文分析涵蓋 : (1) 詞彙分析 ; (2) 文法分析. 句型分析則包含 : (1) 句型內之結構差異 ; (2) 句型連接之結構差異。本研究也質化的檢視每一項錯誤分類於中文與英文參考文章之變數下於受母語轉移之影響程度差異。此研究更額外納入第三篇參考文章用以檢視文章主題之背景知識是否也會影響學生之作文表現。經過質化的檢視三篇文章後，研究顯示參考文章選用之語言與句型結構上之錯誤相關聯，而寫作主題之背景知識則會影響寫作中用詞錯誤之多寡。此研究指出了於英語寫作教學上三項不可或缺之因素 : 學習者之第一語言與第二外語間結構上的差異，參考文章所提供的書寫語言以及寫作主題的背景知識。第一語言與第二外語間的結構比較也可使學生產生自覺以免於寫作上常犯之母語轉移錯誤。

The negative transfer from Chinese causes errors in Chinese students’ English writing and also impedes students from reaching better English writing performance. This study aims to categorize and analyze errors in Chinese graduate students’ English writing from the perspective of Chinese negative transfer. The study has three purposes: (1) Showing structural differences between hypotactic English and paratactic Chinese to establish a classification for analyzing English L2 learners’ errors. (2) Finding evidence of L1 negative transfer at word level on Chinese students’ English-writing pieces. (3) Finding evidence of L1 negative transfer at syntactic level on the same written data. The participants are seven graduate students from Tamkang University. They are required to write English reflections after reading the resource articles with the input language from their L1 and L2. Errors in students’ written data are categorized and analyzed at two stages: (1) Chinglish analysis and (2) syntactic analysis. The Chinglish analysis includes: (1) Lexical analysis and (2) grammatical analysis. The syntactic analysis contains: (1) intra-sentence level and (2) inter-sentence level. The study also qualitatively examines the degree of Chinese interference in each error category under the variable of different language inputs in the two writing tasks. The research further includes the third resource article to examine whether the background knowledge of the writing topic also impacts on students’ writing performance. A qualitative examination of the three writing tasks reveals a relation between input languages and errors at syntactic level and the impact of background knowledge on errors at lexical level. The findings highlight the importance of structural differences between learners’ L1 and L2, the input languages and background knowledge of the resource article when teaching English writing. The comparison between the target construction in L1 and L2 also serves an awareness-raising approach to prevent students from making transfer errors.

Acknowledgement……………………………………………………………................................ⅰ
Chines Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………….ⅱ
English Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………ⅲ
Table of Contents…………………………………………………………………………………..ⅴ
Chapter                                                                    Page
1  Introduction.................................................................................................................................1 
 1.1.  Background.............................................................................................................................1
 1.2.  The Purpose and Significance of the Study............................................................................3      
2  Literature Review........................................................................................................................4
 2.1.  Learner Language....................................................................................................................4
 2.2.  Language Transfer....................................................................................................................5 
 2.3.  Chinglish..................................................................................................................................6
 2.4.  Background Knowledge……………………………………………………………………..8
 2.5.  Comparison of English and Chinese........................................................................................9 
    2.5.1. Hypotaxis-prominence in English V.S. Parataxis-prominence in Chinese……………...10
    2.5.2. Hypotaxis and parataxis at the intra-sentential level........................................................11  
        2.5.2.1. Subject-predicate mechanism in English...............................................................11
        2.5.2.2. The use of expletive“it”....................................................................................12     
        2.5.2.3. Topic-comment construction in Chinese...............................................................14 
        2.5.2.4. Use of prepositions................................................................................................17  
     2.5.3. Hypotaxis and parataxis at the inter-sentential Level....................................................21                    
        2.5.3.1. Use of coordinate conjunction...............................................................................21
        2.5.3.2. Use of subordinate conjunction............................................................................23
3  Research Method.......................................................................................................................26 
 3.1.  Participants............................................................................................................................26
 3.2.  Data Collection......................................................................................................................26
4  Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................29
 4.1.  Stage1 : Chinglish Analysis………………………………………………...........................29
    4.1.1. Lxical analysis………………………………………………………………………….29
       4.1.1.1. Improper word choice…………………………………………………………….29
       4.1.1.2. Improper collocation……………………………………………...........................34
4.1.1.3. Redundancy or wordiness………………………………………...........................36
4.1.1.4. Summary………………………………………………………………………….40
     4.1.2. Grammatical analysis………………………………………………………………….41
 4.1.2.1. Agreement in person and number…………………………………………………41
 4.1.2.2. Use of articles and plural markers………………………………………………...42
 4.1.2.3. Misuse of tenses…………………………………………………………………..45
 4.1.2.4. Summary…………………………………………………………………………..47
4.2.   Stage2 : Syntactic Analysis………………………………………………………………….48
    4.2.1. Intra-sentence level……………………………………………………………………...48
       4.2.1.1. Misuse in topic and subject construction…………………………………………48
       4.2.1.2. Use of prepositional phrases………………………………………………………52
       4.2.1.3. Summary…………………………………………………………………………..57
    4.2.2. Inter-sentence level……………………………………………………………………..58
        4.2.2.1. Coordinate construction…………………………………………………………58
        4.2.2.2. Subordinate construction………………………………………..........................62
        4.2.2.3. Summary………………………………………………………………………...65
    4.3. Other error categories……………………………………………………………………66
        4.3.1. Voice……………………………………………………………………………...66
        4.3.2. Pronoun usage…………………………………………………………………….68  
5   Result and Finding…………………………………………………………..........................71
 5.1. The Comparison between the Writing Task 1 and the Writing Task 2……………………….71
 5.2. The Comparison between the Writing Task 1 and the Writing Task 3……………………….75
5.3. The Comparison between the Writing Task 2 and the Writing Task 3……………………….76
5.4. Input Language and L2 Writing Performance………………………………………………...77
5.5. Background Knowledge and L2 Writing Performance…………………….............................79 
 5.6. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………….80
 5.7. Limitations of the Study………………………………………………………………………81
References.........................................................................................................................................83
Appendix A........................................................................................................................................89 Appendix B........................................................................................................................................90
Appendix C…………………………………………………………………………………………91
Appendix D…………………………………………………………………………………………92

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