Discourse Analysis of Argumentative Essays of English Learners Based on CEFR Level

Blaise Hanel, Leila Kosseim


Abstract
In this paper, we investigate the relationship between the use of discourse relations and the CEFR-level of argumentative English learner essays. Using both the Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST) and the Penn Discourse TreeBank (PDTB) frameworks, we analyze essays from The International Corpus Network of Asian Learners (ICNALE), and the Corpus and Repository of Writing (CROW). Results show that the use of the RST relations of Explanation and Background, as well as the first-level PDTB sense of Contingency, are influenced by the English proficiency level of the writer.
Anthology ID:
2023.ranlp-1.52
Volume:
Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Recent Advances in Natural Language Processing
Month:
September
Year:
2023
Address:
Varna, Bulgaria
Editors:
Ruslan Mitkov, Galia Angelova
Venue:
RANLP
SIG:
Publisher:
INCOMA Ltd., Shoumen, Bulgaria
Note:
Pages:
468–474
Language:
URL:
https://aclanthology.org/2023.ranlp-1.52
DOI:
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Blaise Hanel and Leila Kosseim. 2023. Discourse Analysis of Argumentative Essays of English Learners Based on CEFR Level. In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Recent Advances in Natural Language Processing, pages 468–474, Varna, Bulgaria. INCOMA Ltd., Shoumen, Bulgaria.
Cite (Informal):
Discourse Analysis of Argumentative Essays of English Learners Based on CEFR Level (Hanel & Kosseim, RANLP 2023)
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PDF:
https://aclanthology.org/2023.ranlp-1.52.pdf