O n f e r e n c e

Cheng-Te Chen
received the PhD degree in Pyschology from National Chung Cheng 
University, Taiwan. He is an assistant professor in the Institute of Learning Sciences, 
National Thing Hua University, Taiwan, R.O.C. His research interests include 
Computerized Adaptive Testing and Item Response Theory.
Hsien-Chin Liou
received the PhD degree in English education from the University of 
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. She is a professor in the Department of Foreign 
Languages and Literature, Feng Chia University, Taiwan, R.O.C. She has done research 
on Computer Assisted Language Learning, EAP, English teacher education, etc., and 
published quite a few book chapters, and journal articles in the past 20 years. 
Abstract 
Learning phrasal paraphrases could enrich writing (Chen et al., 2013; Laufer, 1991). For 
example, the phrases “take a lead in,” “set an example by,” “play an exemplary role in,” 
and “give a lead in” shar
e semantic equivalence but different usages. Grouping these 
synonymous phrases could help language learners systematically acquire a set of 
formulaic sequences along with their corresponding usages in various contexts, and 
promote productive language use. To help language learners expand their vocabulary 
knowledge, we adopted an automatic paraphrase suggestion system, PREFER (Chen et 
al., 2013) to equip learners with various formulaic expressions uses. This system 
suggests paraphrases with their corresponding Chinese translations, usage patterns and 
example sentences. Such information is able to underpin language learners’ 
comprehension of individual phrase usages and facilitate their decisions on the proper 
formulaic expression use for a specific context while writing or speaking. In other words, 
this system aims to assist language learners’ productive language skill. 
To evaluate the effectiveness of PREFER, we carried out an experiment with 49 EFL 
college freshmen in an Asian country. We designed a pre- and post-test to compare 
participants’ performance using a 15 multiple selection question task. After being 
introduced to PREFER, all students were randomly divided into two groups and were 
required to familiarize themselves with the synonymous formulaic expressions and the 
corresponding usages of the given phrases on the worksheet we designed.

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2014 CALL Conference 
LINGUAPOLIS
www.antwerpcall.be 
One group consulted PREFER (P) whereas the control group (C) was allowed to consult 
online dictionaries. The results indicate that students consulting PREFER achieved better 
performance (13.6%) compared with the control group (6.1%). An analysis of variance 
(ANOVA) was conducted showing significant difference between Group P’s and Group C’s 
improvement on the multiple selection question task using different reference tools. 
About 75 percent of students found that PREFER helped them learn formulaic expression 
use more effectively.