The Interplay of Task Complexity(±Here-and-Now)and Students’Proficiency in the Written Narratives in English as a Foreign Language

Task-Based Language Teaching has witnessed growing interest in the impact of task complexity on Second language(L2)learners’linguistic performance.Within this field,the influence of resource-directing and resource-dispersing features of cognitive task complexity has attracted much attention.Research on task complexity focuses on the influence of different task features on language learners’production in terms of linguistic complexity,accuracy,fluency and lexis.Within this field,a line of investigation that has attracted much attention is the influence of resource-directing and resource-dispersing features of cognitive task complexity.The review is helpful for better understanding of task complexity and allows to draw some preliminary pedagogical implications that may be useful for task-based syllabus design.

Task Complexity and Second Language Teaching

In the past few years, the notion of task complexity has been receiving substantial attention in the field of second language acquisition. This paper explores task complexity from the cognitive perspective by analyzing two studies with Skehan＇s limited capacity hypothesis and Robinson＇s cognition hypothesis. The two studies, namely You-Jin Kim＇s （2012） and Mirdamadi and Jong （2015）, explore on how linguistic complexity affects language performance. Two hypotheses, Skehan＇s limited capacity hypothesis and Robinson＇s cognition hypothesis, explain the two studies from the cognitive perspective by predicting either that increasing task complexity reduces a pool of attentional capacity during task performance or that increasing complex tasks promotes greater accuracy and complexity of speech and writing. It is suggested that language teaching, syllabus designing in particular, should be based on the basis of task complexity.

The Impact of Storyline Complexity on L2 Learners’Written Performance

Task-based Language Teaching(TBLT)research has provided ample evidence that cognitive complexity is an important aspect of task design that influences learner’s performance in terms of fluency,accuracy,and syntactic complexity.Despite the substantial number of empirical investigations into task complexity in journal articles,storyline complexity,one of the features of it,is scarcely investigated.Previous research mainly focused on the impact of storyline complexity on learners’oral performance,but the impact on learners’written performance is less investigated.Thus,this study aims at investigating the effects of narrative complexity of storyline on senior high school students’written performance,as displayed by its complexity,fluency,and accuracy.The present study has important pedagogical implications.That is,task design and assessment should make a distinction between different types of narrative tasks.For example,the task with single or dual storyline.Results on task complexity may contribute to informing the pedagogical choices made by teachers when prioritizing work with a specific linguistic dimension.

An Empirical Study of Meaning Negotiation from the Perspective of Task Characteristics——Task Difficulty and Task Complexity

文章首先概括了意义协商的概念、分类、基本模式、重要作用及其与任务特性——任务难度、复杂度的关系。以此为基础,本研究着重探讨了任务特性——任务复杂度及任务难度对意义协商的质与量的影响。实验中的受试为吉林大学英语专业40名本科生。本实验采用了三种研究方法:4项以小组讨论为主的任务、问卷调查和访谈。本研究的主要发现是:任务复杂度对意义协商的质的影响错综复杂、极不均衡;协调作用不容忽视——认知难度较大的任务,受试所运用语言的复杂度越高,但其准确度、流利度较低;反之亦然;任务的认知难度与意义协商的量相互作用;任务复杂度与任务难度呈正相关。

Complex task planning method of space-aeronautics cooperative observation based on multi-layer interaction

With the new development trend of multi-resource coordinated Earth observation and the new goal of Earth observation application of“short response time,high observation accuracy,and wide coverage”,space-aeronautics cooperative complex task planning problem has become an urgent problem to be solved.The focus of this problem is to use multiple resources to perform collaborative observations on complex tasks.By analyzing the process from task assignment to receiving task observation results,we propose a multi-layer interactive task planning framework which is composed of a preprocessing method for complex tasks,a task allocation layer,a task planning layer,and a task coordination layer.According to the characteristics of the framework,a hybrid genetic parallel tabu(HGPT)algorithm is proposed on this basis.The algorithm uses genetic annealing algorithm(GAA),parallel tabu(PT)algorithm,and heuristic rules to achieve task allocation,task planning,and task coordination.At the same time,coding improvements,operator design,annealing operations,and parallel calculations are added to the algorithm.In order to verify the effectiveness of the algorithm,simulation experiments under complex task scenarios of different scales are carried out.Experimental results show that this method can effectively solve the problems of observing complex tasks.Meanwhile,the optimization effect and convergence speed of the HGPT is better than that of the related algorithms.

Application of Social Media Tool in Disaster Management in Disaster-Prone Communities in Freetown, Sierra Leone

This study used both the “digital divide” and “attribution theory” to analyze the propensity of social media use by disaster-prone communities. The study focused on the variables that may affect how social media is used for disaster management. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was utilized in the study to analyze the data and test the hypotheses after using a survey questionnaire to collect the data. The study’s findings show that: 1) communities that are vulnerable to disasters are less likely to use social media for disaster management, 2) personal effort and intention to use social media for disaster management are positively correlated, and 3) task complexity and intention to use social media for disaster management are negatively correlated. The study added to the body of knowledge regarding the role social media plays in disaster management.

REVIEW OF TASK-BASED INSTRUCTION

As a new ideology, task-based instruction aims at achieving the balanced development of language. The paper reviews the origin, the development and the future of task-based instruction, with the aim of providing a clear picture of tasks and task-based instruction and in the hope of removing doubts and suspicions and pointing out the problems faced by task-based instruction.

A kind of biomimetic control method to anthropomorphize a redundant manipulator for complex tasks

It is an urgent problem for robots to operate complex tasks with some unknown motion mechanisms caused by the strong coupling of force and motion. However, humans can perform complex tasks well due to their natural evolution and postnatal training. A novel biomimetic control method based on a human motion mechanism with high movement adaptability is proposed in this paper. The core is to present a novel variable-parameter compliance controller based on human operation mechanisms with an action-planning method derived from optimization by human motion, and the main contribution is to change the parameters of compliance controller according to human operating intention synchronized with humanoid motion;this change could establish a humanoid map between the force and motion for a seven degree-of-freedom redundant manipulator to deal with the unknown motion mechanism in complex tasks, so the redundant manipulator can operate complex tasks with high performance. Sufficient experiments were performed, and the results validated the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.