The findings and expectations of four broadly-drawn approaches to the investigation of syntactic complexity frame and inform this corpus-based examination of narrative and argumentative texts written by 22 L2 learners at a university in Japan. A suite of conventional and novel metrics is used to explore complexity, fluency, sentence variety, and sentence development over a two-year period and to compare texts in the two genres. Longitudinal gains in fluency and decreases in fragment use were largely as anticipated for both genres, but significant gains in complexity and increases in sentence variety were unexpectedly limited to narrative texts. In comparing genres, the expected higher value MLTU, the greater complexity of argumentative texts, the differences in clause usage, and the significant divergence in sentence variety values contrast with the surprisingly similar values for MLT. It is suggested that longitudinal changes in the syntactic construction of text are strongly influenced by the constraints and affordances of usage-derived genre, the form, function, and exponents of narrative writing being relatively easier at this level.A Corpus-based, Longitudinal Study of Syntactic Complexity, Fluency, Sentence Variety, and Sentence Development in L2 Genre Writing（Nicholas Wood and Nicolai Struc）
The difficulties posed by argumentation may be compensated for by the use of formulaic constructions and templates. We conclude that understandings of cognition, structure, function, and patterns of acquisition and usage need to be incorporated into a coherent paradigm in order to fully appreciate L2 writing and its development.
A Corpus-based, Longitudinal Study of Syntactic Complexity, Fluency, Sentence Variety, and Sentence Development in L2 Genre Writing
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