Lexical Priming Effects of Textbooks on EFL Learners’ Use of Give

Abstract

The study aims to investigate to what extent Chinese EFL learners' language use is influenced by English textbooks. Such influence may suggest the existence of lexical priming effects. Based on detailed and systematic analysis of a learner English corpus, in comparison with a textbook corpus, the present study revealed striking similarities of the use of give ditransitive constructions between students' writing and the contents of textbooks. These similarities, at least to some extent, reflected lexical priming effects of English textbooks at the levels of colligations, collocates, and semantic associations. The study also offers suggestions for compilation of teaching materials and classroom teaching practice.