EFL students’ perception of Grammarly’s feedback and how they deal with the inaccuracy

Abstract

Grammarly is one of the famous Automated Writing Evaluation (AWE) tools used by EFL students. Many studies have revealed that this tool can improve students’ writing. However, studies evaluating Grammarly’s feedback accuracy, especially the premium version, are still limited. This study aims to: (1) explore EFL students' perceptions of Grammarly premium feedback, (2) provide a detailed analysis of  types of inaccurate feedback provided by Grammarly premium, and (3) investigate how students handle inaccurate  feedback.  This  mix  method study  used a  questionnaire,  semi-structured interviews, and documentation to collect the data. The participants were undergraduate EFL students who were writing or had completed their thesis. The results indicate that: (1) students have positive and negative perceptions on the use of Grammarly Premium. They claimed that Grammarly Premium helped them in writing. The ‘correctness’ feature improved  spelling,  grammar,  punctuation,  convention,  article,  and  consistency.  The ‘clarity’  feature  improves  readability,  such  as  conciseness  and  passive  voice.  The ‘engagement’  feature made writing varied and the ‘delivery’  feature to get the right tone. On the other hand, students complained about the need of a stable internet connection  to  work  properly  and  require  additional  proofreading  due  to  some inaccuracies. (2) Inaccurate feedback generally occurred in the features of correctness (convention, spelling, punctuation, article, and consistency), clarity (passive voice and conciseness), and engagement  (variety).  (3)  Students  continued to  use Grammarly Premium  because  it  helped  them  self-proofreading  even  though  it  had  some shortcomings. In short, students still preferred to use Grammarly Premium with some concern in accepting the provided feedback.