Use of degree and epistemic adverbs by low advanced english language learners in a corpus of speech

This paper explores the use of degree and epistemic adverbs by 40 low-advanced English language learners. The data was collected at an Intensive English Program in a midwestern university (USA). This research focuses on a corpus of oral data, as opposed to previous studies which mostly focused on written data from L2 learners. The tokens found in the data were counted, then compared and analyzed in context following a list of specific adverbs. The list included two degree adverbs, very and really, and epistemic adverbs such as maybe, actually, probably, hopefully, unfortunately. Results showed a higher number of degree tokens than epistemic tokens by learners, suggesting difficulties to express stance at this level of proficiency. However, an analysis in context highlighted the use of different constructions with degree adverbs hinting at an attempt to take a stance with degree adverbs rather than epistemic adverbs. In parallel, epistemic tokens showed a use in context closer to hedging rather than taking a stance, hinting at the idea of a continuum (Payne 2013) between hedging and stance taking when it comes to the use of adverbs in English.