Computer-based test (CBT) and paper-based test (PBT) are two test modes to the test takers that have been widely adopted in the field of language testing or assessment over the last few decades. Due to the rapid development of science and technology, it is a trend for universities and educational institutions striving rather hard to deliver the…

As a high-stakes standardized test, IELTS is expected to have comparable forms of test papers so that test takers from different test administration on different dates receive comparable test scores. Therefore, this study examined the text difficulty and task characteristics of four parallel academic IELTS reading tests to reveal to what extent…

The present study attempts to identify difficulties that Japanese students encounter with metadiscursive nouns in writing second language (L2) argumentation essays. Metadiscursive nouns are abstract and unspecific nouns which can serve as cohesive markers by retrieving their meanings in the text where they occur. Using a selected number of nouns…

Cognitive complexity is traditionally used for describing human cognition along a simplicity-complexity axis in tests like TOFEL IBT and GRE where text creation and rhetorical organization are quintessentially important. Accordingly, this study sought to investigate the impact of mentor text modelling on cognitive complexity of academic writing…

Language learners' language experience is predicted to display a significant effect on their accurate perception of foreign language sounds (Flege, 1995). At the superasegmental level, there is still a debate regarding whether tone language speakers are better able to perceive foreign lexical tones than non-tone language speakers (i.e Lee et al.,…

This paper reports a comparative study exploring language learning strategy use and beliefs about language learning of high-school students and students attending English institutes. Oxford's (1990) strategy inventory for language learning (SILL) and Horwitz's (1987) beliefs about language learning inventory (BALLI), were used to collect data.…

This study was intended to determine whether or not the genre of a reading text affects the incidental vocabulary acquisition of L2 learners while reading. To this aim, 40 Iranian EFL students whose vocabulary knowledge was within a limited range (already determined by Nation's Vocabulary Levels Test) were divided into two groups of 20 each for…

No published studies have sufficiently focused on essay topic writability from the perspective of college writers of the new millennium including native English speakers and ESL speakers. In this study, 500 college writers in Metro Toronto in Canada were interviewed to uncover if they found some essay topics easier than other topics. The results…