Research Results RESEARCH RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

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CHAPTER IV RESEARCH RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

This chapter discusses two parts, namely research results and discussions. The first part presents the results of my analysis on twenty argumentative essays written by the students. It specifically presents the lists of major coherence problems in the essays. Meanwhile, the second part discusses each problem resulting from the data analysis. It covers the discussion on how I could come up with the problems and how I interpret them from the data. In that case, the relation between the problems found by this research, the theoretical review, and the findings revealed by the previous related studies would also be clarified.

A. Research Results

This part aimed to present the results of my analysis on twenty analytical exposition essays written by the students. The results would become the answer to the research question stated in this research. It was what coherence problems do the students’ analytical exposition essays contain? The results of my analysis found three major coherence problems in the essays that became the answer to the research question. The first problem was unclear idea relationships. This problem revealed the difficulties in recognizing the idea relationships in the students’ essays as well as discussed what idea relationships that could be recognized in the essays. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 87 Dealing with the difficulties in recognizing the idea relationships in the essays, this research informed that eighteen students’ essays did not meet the criteria used in order to analyze the idea relationships in the essays. More specifically, the essays did not include transitions and conjunctions that could signal a particular idea relationship. In the essays, some irrelevant ideas to support a thesis statement were also found. The difficulties in recognizing the idea relationships were also affected by other two coherence problems revealed by this research, namely irrelevant topic sentences and irrelevant supporting evidence. In other words, when the students wrote irrelevant topic sentences and supporting evidence in their essay, they would have a possibility to have an unclear idea relationship in the essay. In order to end the discussion in this paragraph, Table 4.1 was used to display the distribution of the idea relationships’ problems in the students’ essays based on the criteria used to analyze the idea relationships. Table 4.1 The Distribution of Unclear Idea Relationships in the Essays Essays The Criteria to Analyze the Idea Relationships Status Cohesive devices to signal an idea relationship A clear pattern of ideas Relevant ideas to a thesis statement 1 √ - - Unclear 2 - - - Unclear 3 - - - Unclear 4 - - - Unclear 5 - - - Unclear 6 √ - - Unclear 7 - - - Unclear 8 √ - - Unclear 9 √ √ √ Clear 10 √ - - Unclear 11 - - - Unclear 12 - - - Unclear 13 √ √ - Unclear 14 - - - Unclear 15 √ √ - Unclear 88 Table 4.1 The Distribution of Unclear Idea Relationships in the Essays cont Essays The Criteria to Analyze the Idea Relationships Status Cohesive devices to signal an idea relationship A clear pattern of ideas Relevant ideas to a thesis statement 16 √ - - Unclear 17 √ √ √ Clear 18 - - - Unclear 19 - - - Unclear 20 - - - Unclear As it was shown in Table 4.1, two different essays showed clear idea relationships. The essays were the ninth essay, showing an enumeration idea relationship and the seventeenth essay, showing an exemplification idea relationship. Unlike in other essays, the students, writing both the ninth and the seventeenth essays, wrote relevant ideas to their thesis statement, so the pattern of ideas in both essays was easily recognized. The use of cohesive devices in both essays also helped to signal both the enumeration and exemplification idea relationships. The second problem was irrelevant topic sentences to a thesis statement in the essay. In this case, the discussion was concerned with some problems on topic sentences that could affect the incoherence in the essay. The problems covered such essential issues as opposing topic sentences to the thesis statement, irrelevant topic sentences to the thesis statement, and descriptive topic sentences. Table 4.2 showed the distribution of these related problems in twenty essays analyzed in this research. . PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 89 Table 4.2 The Distribution of Irrelevant Topic Sentences in the Essays Essays The number of paragraphs Irrelevant Topic Sentences An opposing topic sentence A topic sentence discusses a different point with a thesis statement A descriptive topic sentence 1 8 - 3 problems - paragraphs: 3,5,7 2 7 - 2 problems 1 problem paragraphs: 3, 6 paragraph: 2 3 11 3 problems 2 problems - paragraphs: 5,6,7 paragraphs: 3,4 4 11 - 4 problems 3 problems paragraphs: 2,5,8,9 paragraphs: 3,4,7 5 9 - 4 problems 2 problems paragraphs: 4,6,7,8 paragraphs: 2,3 6 13 - 5 problems 3 problems paragraphs: 3,5,7,8,9 paragraphs: 2,4,5 7 9 - 2 problems - paragraphs: 2,5 8 8 - 2 problems 1 problem paragraphs: 2,3 paragraph: 4 9 5 - - - 10 10 - 2 problems - paragraphs: 3,9 11 14 - 6 problems 1 problem paragraphs: 3,4,5,6,7,8 paragraph: 2 12 8 - 1 problem 1 problem paragraph: 3 paragraph: 2 13 6 - - - 14 8 - 3 problems 3 problems paragraphs: 5,6,7 paragraphs: 2,3,4 15 5 - - - 16 11 - - 2 problems paragraphs: 2,3 90 Table 4.2 The Distribution of Irrelevant Topic Sentences in the Essays cont Essays The number of paragraphs Irrelevant Topic Sentences An opposing topic sentence A topic sentence discusses a different point with a thesis statement A descriptive topic sentence 17 11 - - - 18 8 - 1 problem 1 problem paragraph: 7 paragraph: 2 19 14 - 8 problems - paragraph: 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,13 20 10 - 3 problems 3 problems paragraphs: 2,3,7 paragraphs: 4,5,6 TOTAL 3 problems 48 problems 21 problems 72 irrelevant topic sentences In addition to Table 4.2 above, complete examples of those irrelevant topic sentences were also shown in Appendix I. The third problem was irrelevant supporting evidence. This third problem was also concerned with two other essential issues, namely irrelevant paraphrase made by the students and the number of sentences written in a paragraph. The distribution of the irrelevant supporting evidence could be seen in Table 4.3. Then, dealing with the Table 4.3, this research informed that a paragraph having an irrelevant topic sentence was excluded from the results shown in the Table. In other words, the results displayed in the Table were only related to a paragraph that had a relevant topic sentence, but it did not have relevant supporting evidence to support the topic sentence. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 91 Table 4.3 The Distribution of Irrelevant Supporting Evidence within Paragraphs of the Essays Essays The number of paragraphs Irrelevant Supporting Evidence 3 11 4 problems paragraphs: 2,8,9,10 5 9 1 problem paragraph: 6 6 13 1 problem paragraph: 12 7 9 2 problems paragraphs: 6,8 10 10 2 problems paragraphs: 2,8 12 8 3 problems paragraphs: 4,5,7 13 6 1 problem paragraph: 4 15 5 1 problem paragraph: 3 16 11 1 problem paragraph: 8 20 10 1 problem paragraph: 8 TOTAL 17 paragraphs with irrelevant supporting evidence In addition to Table 4.3 above, complete examples of the irrelevant supporting were also shown in Appendix I. Finally, considering those three major coherence problems, I would provide Figure 4.1 below in order to summarize and to visualize the major coherence problems found in the students’ essays. Figure 4.1 Three Major Coherence Problems Revealed in the Students’ Essays TITLE INTRODUCTION Thesis statement ARGUMENT Topic sentences Supporting Evidence CONCLUSION Thesis restatement 1 st problem unclear idea relationships within the whole essay 2 nd problem irrelevant topic sentences 3 rd problem irrelevant supporting evidence An Argumentative Essay Analytical Exposition 92 The subsequent part would provide deeper and more detailed discussions on each stated coherence problem and its relation to the reviewed theories, the findings on coherence problems revealed by the previous related studies, and the criteria of coherence analysis displayed in the Data Analysis Technique part.

B. Discussions