Iranian Undergraduate Non-English Majors’ Interpretation Of English Structures

Abstract

The present study sought to determine whether Iranian non-English major students withor without the experience of attending language institutes, were more influenced by thetype of verb or the argument structure patterns in their interpretation of English structures.To answer this question, 100 non-English major participants took part in a grouping taskwhich was designed to reveal the participants' preference in sentence interpretation.Except for those who did not have the required knowledge base and displayed nogrouping preference, the participants of the study exhibited three different grouping orsorting strategies in their performance: verb-centered strategy and two types ofconstruction-based performance. The results of a Chi square test indicated that regardlessof attending language institutes, the said participants were more inclined to group thestructures (i.e., through interpreting them) by relying on the structures' verb types ratherthan paying attention to the argument structure patterns around which the structures wereconfigured.The implication of these findings is that at least in a foreign language context,a verb valency-based reading strategy is needed to enhance the foreign language learners’information processing skills. The pedagogical overtones of the findings would affectboth teaching activities as well as syllabus design and material development for non-English majors’ English books used in the university.