Combining sociocognitive-transformative approach and form-focused instruction: effects on L2 learners’ complexity, accuracy and fluency in writing

Abstract

Many pedagogical approaches have attempted to systematically integrate form-focused instruction (FFI) into L2 writing, namely the process approach, the product approach, the post-process approach, and the process-genre approach. However, these approaches continue to provide conflicting findings on how they can improve students’ overall writing skills and grammatical accuracy and fail to consider the sociocognitive aspect of L2 writing. Thus, the current study examined the effects of a combined sociocognitive-transformative (ST) approach and FFI on L2 writers’ complexity, accuracy, and fluency (CAF) in writing. This quasi-experimental study involved 72 students from a private university in Pakistan. The findings revealed that L2 writers significantly improved in all fluency measures and in certain accuracy and complexity measures after being exposed to the treatment. The improvement in writing fluency was attributed to their increased rhetorical awareness and focus on content during writing. Meanwhile, the improvement in accuracy was linked to the contextualised teaching of linguistic items and learners’ psycholinguistic readiness in learning these items. Finally, the mixed results in fine-grained measures of accuracy and complexity were linked to the possible interaction between these measures. Implications for L2 writing pedagogy and future studies are discussed.