Another factor that may influence ESL adult reading comprehension is the utilization of conditional statements in technical documentation. In chapter one it was noted in DeBrito’s (1998) study that conditional statements in sentences such as ‘if/then’, negatively impact flight crewmembers ability to understand written English language technical information. However, DeBrito’s (1998) study did not elaborate on conditional statements impact on flight crewmembers reading and interpretation of written English language text in technical information. Furthermore, the study did not address English language proficiency factors that may have influenced flight crewmembers ability to understand written English language text. Therefore, more information must be gathered to substantiate this claim. It is paramount to understand fundamentals of conditional statements in written English language sentences, before understanding how they may impact ESL adult reading comprehension of written English language in technical information. The following questions need to be answered regarding conditional statements: What variables do ESL adults need to consider when they read conditional statements in sentences (e.g. design of the statement or enhanced text)? What types of conditional statements are common in written English language? What impact does written English language conditionals in technical documentation have on ESL adult reading comprehension?
The if-conditional statement is normally comprised of conditional and general clauses. The conditional clause starts with the conjunction ‘if’ followed by the condition (general clause) (Phoocharoensil, 2014). Regarding ‘then’ conditional clause, it describes the outcome of the situation. Accordingly, conditional statements in written English language sentences describe cause and effect. Conditional sentences have been
considered difficult to read and understand by ESL adults (Ramirez, 2005). The primary challenge that an ESL adult experiences when reading if/then conditional statements in sentences, is the structure of the sentence. The structure of conditional statements has the potential to confuse ESL adults due to clauses (if/then), which are essentially the form and tense pattern (function) (e.g. present, future, past) (Jacobsen, 2012). The following example Figure 9 illustrates how ESL flight crewmembers could be confused, or
misunderstand written English language conditional statements in text corpora. Figure 9 is from a QRH checklist on the emergency conditions section named ‘smoke in the cabin’ which is also a crew alert on the flight deck. The conditional statement on QRH checklist does not contain the required form of presenting a conditional statement. It only contains ‘if’ clause but no corresponding conditional clause. The statement should have included ‘then’, which would have represented proper form of the conditional statement. This conditional statement has the potential to impact ESL flight crewmembers ability to recognize, understand tense, or time related factors associated with the conditional statement.
Figure 9 QRH checklist conditional statement From Villain & Pfeiffer (2006)
According toLai-chun (2005),written English language conditional statements are grouped into four distinct categories: present factual, future predictive, present
counterfactual, and past counterfactual. Present factual describes a situation that does not change, and is often found often in technical documentation. For example, ‘if you turn on the aircraft bleed system, air flows through the cabin’. Future predictive describes a situation that has the potential to change considering future possibilities. For example, ‘if the air bleed system turns off it may be an indication that the system has failed’. In this sentence, the word ‘may’ introduces a contingency regarding the condition of the system. In other words, the word ‘may’ indicates that the system could have failed or it may be something else that caused the system failure. Future predictive conditionals are utilized most often in English written language. Present counterfactuals are related to a current situation that is false or could not occur logically. For example, ‘if William Boeing were alive, he would design a 787 aircraft’. Past counterfactuals are related to a situation in the past that is false or could not occur logically. For example, if William Boeing knew about composite technology in the early 1900s, he would have designed a lighter aircraft. These types of variables in conditional sentences are important to understand, as they have the potential to be found in technical information. The next studies describe the impact of written English language conditionals on ESL adult reading comprehension. A study conducted by Yeh and Gentner (2005) investigated ESL adult reading
comprehension of present factual and present counterfactual conditional statements in written English language texts. Yeh and Gentner (2005) compared ESL adults and English speaking adults with respect to reading comprehension and reaction time. The authors measured ESL adults and English-speaking adults performance while they read four texts that contained the two types of counterfactuals. The authors also wanted to determine if the present factual conditional was easier to detect (form and function) in text than the present counterfactual. To evaluate the degree of detectability, the authors utilized a rule of thumb method. The rule of thumb method consisted of participants using the following strategy to read the texts: a.) their background knowledge of the texts b.) searching for context clues within the texts. Both of strategies were used to evaluate ESL and English-speaking adult accuracy of reading the correct conditional statement in texts. The authors hypothesized that ESL participants would take longer to complete the task of reading each of the texts than English speaking participants. A time limitation was not levied on the participants. There were 84 ESL participants that had more than a decade of English language training. Each of the ESL participants provided self-ratings of their English language proficiency levels. The rating levels for each of the ESL participants provided indicated they had low levels of English language proficiency. Thirty English-speaking participants participated in the study and their English language
proficiency self-ratings were not completed. Results indicated that English-speaking participants’ reading comprehension performance was better than ESL participants, when they read counterfactual conditional statements in the texts. Background knowledge (rule of thumb strategy) use by ESL and English speaking adults to read texts, conveyed small percentage differences in strategy use. Reading comprehension percentages were equal between ESL adults and English speaking adults that read factual conditionals in texts. Percentages were also equal for ESL adults and English speaking adults when they used background knowledge and searching context clues in the texts. Regarding accuracy of detecting counterfactual statements in texts using searching context clues strategy, ESL participants’ performance was unsatisfactory. On the other hand, English-speaking participants’ performance was satisfactory with accuracy of detecting counterfactuals using searching context clues strategy. Regarding each of the conditional statements read by ESL adults and English speaking participants, and their strategy use while reading the texts, their mean reaction times indicated they were not significantly different.
In summary, Yeh and Gentner (2005)provide details on use of written English language conditionals by ESL adults. The results suggest that ESL adults with low English
language proficiency levels are not efficient with reading comprehension of
counterfactual statements. On the contrary, they appear to be efficient with reading comprehension of factual conditionals. English as-a-second language adults’ ability to detect conditionals accurately in texts is an indicator of how well they perform reading conditionals in texts. With respect to ESL adult detection of counterfactual conditional statements in text, their performance was unsatisfactory when they utilized searching context clues strategy to read and understand counterfactuals in text. This result could be that their reading abilities of written English language were not sufficient to read the texts. Their ability to detect the counterfactuals in text could have been negatively impacted.On the other hand, their use of background knowledge strategy to read factual conditionals was adequate. This could be the result of ESL participants possessing some English language background. As indicated byLin and Chern (2014),ESL adults may activate content schema/background knowledge to understand written English language texts. This strategy may have helped ESL adults detect the factual conditional more efficiently than counterfactual conditionals. It is obvious that ESL adult ability to detect counterfactual conditionals in text is important when they read written English language texts.Finally, Yeh and Gentner (2005) indicated that ESL adults’ ability to detect a counterfactual(s) has the potential to impact their mental processing of the counterfactual in text. In other words, if ESL adults are not accurate with detecting a counterfactual(s) they may use more strategies to understand the counterfactual. Therefore, risk of ESL adults re-reading the counterfactual(s) in text, or previous sentences to understand the counterfactual is likely to occur. Although present factual and present counterfactual statements impact ESL adults’ reading comprehension performance, how do future predictive and past counterfactual statements impact ESL adults reading comprehension performance? However, what is the effect of enhancing text (e.g. bold or underlined text design) and the impact on ESL adults’ ability to read and comprehend future predictive counterfactual statements? The final counterfactual of this section that will be discussed is the past counterfactual conditional and future predictive counterfactual.
A study conducted by Saeidi et al (2013) examined impact of enhancing conditionals in text on ESL adults noticing them compared to unenhanced text. It is important to understand that the ability for ESL adults to notice text can impact their ability to read and comprehend text adequately (Schmidt, 1990 and 1993 and Song and Suh 2008). Saeidi et al’s (2013) study contained 60 ESL participants; each had a background in English language learned from a university. Participants had an intermediate English language proficiency level. Each of the participants read a passage and a pretest and posttest administered by the researcher. The passage contained several conditionals including past counterfactual conditional and future counterfactual conditional. The results indicated that overall scores (pretest and posttest) did not change participants’ reading performance. That is, enhancements to past and future counterfactual conditional statements did not create a significant impact to participants’ performance, compared to unenhanced text. These results could mean that ESL adults’ knowledge of conditionals in the form they read was based on syntactic structures of conditionals that were
unenhanced. Therefore, they were used to seeing the unenhanced version of the future counterfactual conditional statement. Collectively, this study provides adequate details on the effect of enhancing past and future counterfactual conditional statements. They describe the effect of enhancing text and that enhancing text does not always increase reading comprehension of the text. As ESL adults had knowledge of the future
counterfactual through a pretest, it may indicate that exposing ESL adults to text prior to their official use (e.g. during a task) may be beneficial. Since there was not a significant increase in comprehension between both forms of text, it may be an indicator that time exposed to the text may impact ESL adult reading comprehension.
3.3 Summary
In summary, all of the studies mentioned in this section indicate reading conditional statements impacts ESL adult reading comprehension performance. Several types of conditionals were discussed. Each of the researchers indicated that ESL adult English language proficiency and background knowledge of English language conditionals are factors that influence ESL adults ability to recognize the form and function of the conditional statement in text corpora. Specifically, Yeh and Gentner (2005)agreed with Saeidi et al (2013)regarding low and intermediate English language proficiency impact ESL adult ability to read and comprehend conditional statements in text. In these studies, future counterfactual, present factual, and present counterfactual conditionals impacted ESL adults’ reading comprehension. InYeh and Gentner’s (2005)study, ESL adults’ reaction time for detecting conditionals indicated no impact to ESL adults’ reading comprehension.Unlike Yeh and Gentner’s (2005)study,Saeidi et al (2013)provided an indication that input enhancement to conditionals do not necessarily increase reading comprehension. But,Saeidi et al (2013)do indicate that even though statistically the results are not statistically significant, input enhancements to conditional statements can help with detecting and noticing conditionals in text.InYeh and Gentner’s (2005) and Saeidi et al’s (2013)studies, structure of text did not appear to impact ESL adults’ performance reading conditionals in text. Conditional statements are found on QRH checklists. English as-a-second language flight crewmembers background knowledge of text on checklists may help facilitate their understanding of conditionals in text. English as-a-second language flight crewmembers use of metacognitive strategies may not bethe
only method to read and understand written English language conditional statements. English as-a-second language flight crewmembers English language proficiency and background knowledge of the text they read, may be indicators of how well they will detect conditional statements (correctly/incorrectly) and recognize them in texts on QRH checklists.
3.4 Abbreviations and Acronyms: A tale of two unique written English