درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Many studies abroad have focused on neural machine translation and almost all concluded that this method was much closer to humanistic translation than machine translation. Therefore, this paper aimed at investigating whether neural machine translation was more acceptable in English-Persian translation in comparison with machine translation. Hence, two types of text were chosen to be translated by Google Translate. The inputs have been translated in two distinctive methods. The outputs were investigated by the descriptive-comparative human analysis model of Keshavarz. Consequently, the results revealed that approximately the same errors were found in both methods. However, semantic aspects were improved.

The status of teaching ESP has been studied both internationally and locally. However, it seems that the challenges of teaching ESP in medical universities of Iran have not been studied appropriately. The main objective of the present study was to explore the main challenges of teaching ESP in medical universities of Iran. Due to the nature of the study, a qualitative res earch design (Phenomenological) was used. The data were gathered through interviewing 25 ESP stakeholders from two universities of medical sciences in Tehran. The data were analyzed through content analysis techniques. The results showed that the challenges are classified into three main themes: institution challenges, learner related challenges, and teacher related challenges. Institution related challenges consisted of undetermined aims, structure of the curricula, and content of syllabus, evaluation, time limitation and classroom size. The learner related challenges included lack of motivation, poor GEL background, and learners’ focus on test, and learners’ inappropriate needs’ analysis. ESP teachers’ related challenges included teacher’s language proficiency, teachers’ content knowledge, teachers’ perception of ESP, teachers’ teaching method, teachers’ familiarity with material development, and testing skills. The findings of the study can be used to promote the status of teaching ESP in medical universities.

: Individual learner differences play an integral role in second language acquisition and interested researchers and practitioners cannot get a full appreciation of second language learning if they ignore these significant variables. This study investigated how willingness to communicate (WTC), learner subjectivity, and anxiety in learning the L2 correlate with Iranian students’ English pragmatic knowledge. To this end, a total of 140 participants received instruction on request strategy types and their internal and external modification devices for seven weeks through consciousness-raising tasks. The data were obtained through WTC questionnaire, learner subjectivity questionnaire, foreign language classroom anxiety scale, and discourse completion test. The findings indicated that WTC and learner subjectivity correlated positively with the participants’ L2 pragmatic competence. However, no relationship was observed between the learners’ anxiety and their pragmatic achievement. The results suggest that some personal characteristics such as WTC and learner subjectivity are significant contributors to success in acquiring L2 pragmatic knowledge. چکیده: تفاوت های فردی زبان آموزان نقش غیر قابل انکاری در یادگیری زبان دوم ایفا میکنند و محققان علاقه مند نخواهند توانست به درک کامل و درستی از یادگیری زبان دوم برسند اگر چنین متغیرهای مهمی را نادیده بگیرند. این مطالعه به بررسی چگونگی ارتباط تمایل به برقراری ارتباط کلامی (WTC)،  فردیت زبان آموز و اضطراب در یادگیری زبان دوم با دانش منظور شناسی زبان آموزان ایرانی می پردازد. برای این منظور، در مجموع 140 نفر در مورد انواع استراتژی های درخواست و ابزارهای اصلاحی داخلی و خارجی آنها برای هفت هفته از طریق وظایف آگاهی-دهنده (آگاهی برانگیز) مورد آموزش قرار گرفتند. داده ها با استفاده از پرسشنامه های تمایل به برقراری ارتباط کلامی، فردیت، مقیاس اضطراب در کلاس های زبان خارجی و آزمون تکمیل گفتمان جمع آوری گردیدند. یافته های تحقیق حاکی از این داشتند که تمایل به برقراری ارتباط کلامی و فردیت زبان آموزان به طور مثبت با توانایی منظور شناسی آنها در زبان دوم ارتباط داشت. با این وجود، بین اضطراب زبان آموزان و توانایی منظور شناسی آنها در زبان دوم ارتباطی مشاهده نشد. نتایج نشان می دهند که برخی ویژگی های شخصی مانند تمایل به برقراری ارتباط کلامی و فردیت زبان آموزان از اهمیت ویژه و نقش بسزایی درکسب موفقیت آمیز دانش منظور شناسی در زبان دوم برخوردار است.   واژگان کلیدی:تمایل به برقراری ارتباط کلامی، فردیت، اضطراب، درخواست، توانایی منظور شناسی  

Research has shown that writing skill of Iranian learners is not at a satisfactory level. One of the ways to develop writing ability is improving strategic behavior of learners. The current study set out to compare writing performances and patterns of using metacognitive strategies in bilinguals and monolinguals as well as senior and freshmen students. A total of 176 English major university students took part in the study (88 bilinguals and 88 monolinguals). Data were collected through three instruments: a background questionnaire, a writing metacognitive strategy questionnaire, and participants’ compositions. A two-way factorial ANOVA was used to analyze the data obtained through the strategy questionnaire. Since the composition data were not parametric two Kruskall-Wallis tests were employed for data analysis. The results revealed that bilinguals used more metacognitive strategies and had higher writing scores than monolinguals. In addition, seniors had better writing performance than freshmen while the difference between them in using strategies was not significant. Based on the results it can be concluded that teaching writing metacognitive strategies may result in better writing performance.