| Abstract | 第7-8页 |
| 摘要 | 第9-11页 |
| Abbreviations | 第11-12页 |
| Chapter one Introduction | 第12-15页 |
| 1.1 Research Objectives | 第12-13页 |
| 1.2 Purpose and Significance of this Research | 第13-14页 |
| 1.3 Structure of the Thesis | 第14-15页 |
| Chapter Two Literature Review | 第15-26页 |
| 2.1 Previous Studies at Home and Abroad on Modal Verbs | 第15-20页 |
| 2.2 Corpus Research | 第20-26页 |
| 2.2.1 Definition and Classification of Corpus | 第21-22页 |
| 2.2.2 Corpus Linguistics | 第22-23页 |
| 2.2.3 The Features of the Corpus Research | 第23-26页 |
| Chapter Three Theoretical Framework | 第26-35页 |
| 3.1 Definition and Characteristics of Modal Verbs | 第26-29页 |
| 3.2 Semantic Classification and Grammatical Description of Modal Verbs | 第29-35页 |
| Chapter Four Methodology | 第35-43页 |
| 4.1 Research Methodology | 第35-38页 |
| 4.1.1 Corpus-based Methodology | 第35-37页 |
| 4.1.2 Comparative Analysis | 第37-38页 |
| 4.2 Research Design | 第38-43页 |
| 4.2.1 Research Questions | 第38页 |
| 4.2.2 Corpora Adopted in this Research | 第38-39页 |
| 4.2.3 Software Tools Adopted in this Research | 第39-40页 |
| 4.2.4 Research Procedures | 第40-43页 |
| Chapter Five Results and Discussion | 第43-80页 |
| 5.1 Overall Frequency of Modal Verbs | 第43-53页 |
| 5.1.1 Underused Modal Verbs | 第46-49页 |
| 5.1.2 Overused Modal Verbs | 第49-52页 |
| 5.1.3 Comparison between Chinese Authors and Native Speakers | 第52-53页 |
| 5.2 The Results of the Semantic Meaning Distribution of Modal Verbs | 第53-77页 |
| 5.2.1 Semantic features of CAN | 第54-56页 |
| 5.2.2 Semantic features of WILL | 第56-58页 |
| 5.2.3 Semantic features of SHOULD | 第58-61页 |
| 5.2.4 Semantic features of WOULD | 第61-64页 |
| 5.2.5 Semantic features of COULD | 第64-67页 |
| 5.2.6 Semantic features of MAY | 第67-68页 |
| 5.2.7 Semantic features of MUST | 第68-72页 |
| 5.2.8 Semantic features of MIGHT | 第72-75页 |
| 5.2.9 Semantic features of SHALL | 第75-77页 |
| 5.3 Summary | 第77-80页 |
| Chapter Six Conclusion | 第80-85页 |
| 6.1 Major Findings | 第80-82页 |
| 6.2 Implications of this Researc h | 第82-83页 |
| 6.3 Limitations of this Research | 第83-85页 |
| Bibliography | 第85-90页 |
| Acknowledgements | 第90-91页 |
| Appendix A | 第91页 |
