Grammar proficiency of editors/ writers of the Los Baños Science Community

Date

1991

Abstract

A survey of editors/writers of seven selected member agencies of the Los Bafios Science Community (LBSC) was conducted in October 1990 to: (a) find out the LIK:C editors/writers' socioeconomic-demographic characteristics, reading habits, and editing/writing experiences; (b) determine the LBSC editors/writers' levels of proficiency in the English grammar; and (c) ascertain the relationships between the LBSC editors/writers' grammar proficiency and their socioeconomic-demographic characteristics, reading habits, and editing/writing experience.Fifty-four respondents were asked to accomplish two sets of questionnaire: the'questionnaire proper and the grammar proficiency test. The questionnaires were personally distributed and collected by the researcher and his assistant.Data were analyzed through frequency counts and percentages and the Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient (Pearson r).Results showed that respondents had an average age of 31.6; majority (64.8%) were females; more than half (55.6%) were married; a bigger number (46.2%) were college graduates; almost three fourths (74.1%) occupied nonsupervisory/junior positions; and more than one-third (35.2%) earned P50,000-P59,999 per year.Results also showed that respondents read newspaper-(100%), magazines (89%), books (85%), pocket books (67%), and journals (61%) with varying frequency and duration. Most (92.6%) of the respondents read a combination of periodicals and nonperiodiCals.One-half (50%) of the respondents ""always"" read newspapers with almost one-third (31.4%) of them spending a ""short time"" per reading. One-third (33.3%) of the respondents ""never"" read pocket books while those who read (24.2%) spent a ""long time"" reading them.Findings also revealed that one-half (50%) of the respondents had no exposure to editing/writing instructional and/or extension-communication materials; less than half (44.5%) were ""never"" exposed to editing/writing of occasional papers, speeches, messages, and correspondences. Almost one-third (29.6%) of the respondents had moderately long (6-9 years) experience in editing/writing.One-third (33.3%) of the respondents obtained scores of 60-69 in the grammar test. An IRRI respondent got thehighest individual score of 84 (proficient) while a PCARRD respondent obtained the lowest individual score of 36 (unproficient). As a whole, the 54 respondents gained an average score of 62.9 (fairly proficient).Results of grammar test revealed that the young respondents (below 30 years old) performed better than the old ones. The females were more grammatically proficient than the males with their average scores of 64.5 (fairly proficient) and 59.8 (unproficient), respectively. Respondents from IRRI obtained the highest average score of 68.2 (fairly proficient) while the respondents from ERDB got the lowest average score of 51.5 (unproficient).Findings further revealed that there are no significant relationships between the respondents age, educational attainment, and grammar proficiency levels (GPL). However. there is a significant relationship between annual income and grammar proficiency which are positively correlated. Significant relationships exist between the respondents' length of time spent reading newspapers and books, and their GPL. Significant relationship also exists between frequency of reading journals and grammar proficiency. Positive correlations exist between GPL and frequency of exposure to editing/writing of occasional papers/speeches, publications and press releases but their relationships are not significant.No significant relationships exist between the respondents' length of editing/writing experience, kinds of publications read, kinds of editing/writing jobs handled, and grammar proficiency. Further studies on the editors/writers grammar proficiency are needed to confirm the results of this study. These can be done by increasing the number of respondents and by expanding the coverage of the grammar test

Document Type

Master Thesis

Language

English

LC Subject

Grammar, comparative and general, Editors, Authors, Philippines

Location

UPLB Main Library Special Collections Section (USCS)

Call Number

LG 995 1991 D46 M65

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