Learner characteristics in an EAP thesis-writing class: Looking into students' responses to genre-based instruction and pedagogical tasks

The individual differences of learners in genre-focused EAP writing classes, as well as their learning trajectories, have become a subject of focused attention in recent ESP research on the learning of academic genres. However, questions still remain as to whether learner characteristics and any characteristics they have in common may need to be considered in ESP genre-based pedagogy. This study examines the characteristics of the students in an EAP thesis preparatory course at a Chinese university. Drawing on data from interviews, participants' process logs, and their written texts in the course, the study identifies two salient learner characteristics that influenced the learning process. One was the students' self-direction in response to the general EAP instruction of thesis writing, a characteristic conditioned by the teacher's role and the pedagogical writing tasks. The second characteristic was the learners' positioning themselves as merely doing assignments when doing thesis-preparation writing tasks, which revealed a potential mismatch between the course goal of increasing students' genre awareness and the pedagogical nature of the EAP writing tasks. The two learner characteristics suggest potential challenges for how students respond to EAP instruction and tasks, which in turn have pedagogical implications for genre-focused EAP writing classes.