Metadiscourse Markers Misuses; A Study of EFL Learners’ Argumentative Essays

The present study was conducted to investigate the misuses of two main categories of metadiscourse markers used by a group of university students. To this end, 50 EFL learners of intermediate language proficiency level were chosen by means of administering a TOEFL proficiency test. The participants were female junior students majoring in English literature at Kerman Azad University.These learners were regarded as intermediate ones scoring 400-550 in the proficiency test. Then, the learners were provided with an argumentative topic to write a 250-word essay in 45 minutes. The number of misuses of metadiscourse markers were counted with regard to their use of textual and interpersonal markers of this kind, and the subcategories of textual (logical connectives, frame markers, endophoric markers, evidentials, and code glosses), and the subcategories of interpersonal metadiscourse markers (hedges, emphatics, attitude markers, relational markers, and person markers). Moreover, different classifications of misuses were explored. The results of Chi-square analysis indicated that misuses of metadiscourse makers can be due to overuse of these markers (e.g. logical connective and person markers), punctuation,interlingua, and intralinguaerrors. Finally, using a Pearson correlation to investigate the correlation between the participants’ TOEFL score and essay score, it was concluded that language proficiency has a positive relationship with the uses of metadiscourse markers and essays quality.