Examining ESL Learners’ Knowledge of Collocations (original) (raw)
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The development of ESL collocational knowledge
1996
This study examines the development of collocational knowledge in learners of ESL. A number of previous studies have underscored the importance of collocations for L2 acquisition, and the problems that learners face with learning and using collocations. However, there have been few attempts to systematically study how the development of collocational knowledge relates to the overall development of language proficiency with a particular intention in identifying possible stages in the development of L2 collocational knowledge. This study adopts a structure-based framework for the study of collocations based on previous studies (Zhang 1993; Biscup 1992) and the BBI Combinatory Dictionary of English, and attempts to describe how collocational knowledge develops across different language proficiency levels with respect to 37 collocation types. Data were collected from 275 Greek learners of ESL at three proficiency levels (post-beginners, intermediate, and post-intermediate) using three tasks: essay writing, translation test, and blankfilling. The essay writing provided evidence of accurate free production of collocations, while the translation and blank-filling tests measured accuracy in the subjects' knowledge of collocations in cued production tasks. The data were examined with respect to the between-and within-group differences in accuracy on all three dependent measures. Statistical measures were employed to determine the significance of the observed between-group and within-group differences, and implicational scaling analyses was used to reveal accuracy orders in the acquisition of collocations. Results show that there are patterns of iii development of collocational knowledge across and within the different proficiency groups for both the free and the cued production data. Collocational knowledge was shown to increase steadily as the level of proficiency increased, and there were group-specific accuracy orders showing that grammatical collocations are easier to acquire than lexical collocations. The development of collocational knowledge was found to be influenced by the syntactic complexity of the collocation types, and also by exposure and maturation. Finally, three stages for the development of collocational knowledge are proposed. In the first stage learners acquire collocations as unanalysed lexical items, and hence the learners are more accurate with lexical collocations than complex grammatical ones. At the second stage the learners' grammatical knowledge develops enabling learners to use complex grammatical collocations with greater accuracy than in stage one. At the third stage of collocational development, learners are able to use both grammatical and lexical collocations with greater accuracy than in the other two stages, and they are on their way to a more advanced level of collocational knowledge. Pedagogical implications and directions for future research are provided in light of the research findings.
An Investigation into the Developmental Patterns of Lexical Collocation among Iranian EFL Learners
Applied Linguistics Research Journal, 2019
It is commonly accepted that collocations are of utmost importance in the field of L2 acquisition. However, EFL/ESL learners' deficiency in knowledge of English collocations along with the trouble they encounter in learning and using them is well documented. Furthermore, it is not clear which pattern of lexical collocation (adjective + noun or verb + noun) exerts more degree of difficulty on learners. Therefore, the current study investigated the Iranian EFL learners' (N=56) receptive and productive knowledge of collocations in one hand and tried to analyze the degree of difficulty each pattern of lexical collocation (adjective + noun or verb + noun) brings to bear on learners, on the other. To measure the learners' knowledge of lexical collocation, the authors constructed, validated and used a 100 test, consisting of 50 multiple-choice and 50 blank-filling collocation items. Pearson correlation along with a series of pairedsamples t-test was run to analyze the data. The findings of the study showed that 1) the participants' receptive and productive knowledge of collocations are not significantly related to each other, 2) their productive knowledge of collocations lagged far behind their receptive knowledge of collocations, and 3) the participants' performance were similar on the two patterns of lexical collocation tested. The findings of the study suggest the need for a broader view of knowledge of collocations and adopting a pedagogical approach to the teaching and learning of this important aspect of L2.
Although it is widely acknowledged that collocations play an important role in the field of second language acquisition, a number of previous studies have reported students" lack of collocational competence and the difficulties they encounter in learning and using collocations. The present study examines the productive and receptive knowledge of lexical and grammatical collocations among advanced Arabic-speaking learners of English. Furthermore, it investigates whether the language environment (ESL or EFL) has an influence on the acquisition of collocations. It also explores whether there is a significant difference between participants" performance on three types of collocations: verb-noun, adjective-noun, and verb-preposition.
Exploring Learners’ Developing L2 Collocational Competence
Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 2014
This research study was aimed at an investigation of Thai EFL learners' collocational competence, with focus on the problems in their collocation use. The data, elicited from essays written by two groups of participants with different L2 proficiency levels, are indicative of actual problems with which the learners are really confronted. With respect to the sources of these collocational errors, native language transfer seems to be the most important contributing factor. Where the collocations in L1 Thai and L2 English are incongruent, deviations often arise. The interlingual errors found pertain to preposition addition, preposition omission, incorrect word choice, and collocate redundancy. It is worth noticing that the high-proficiency learners heavily depend on collocational patterns from their mother tongue, to which low-proficiency students are expected to resort. In addition to L1 transfer, the participants also seem to rely on synonymy and overgeneralization, both of which result in erroneous collocations in English.
An Investigation of High School EFL Learners' Knowledge of English Collocations
Journal of Applied Linguistics and Language Research, 2021
Vocabulary knowledge is an important tool for second language learners. Specifically, in order to communicate effectively, learners need to know collocations, a group of associated words. This study investigated Thai high school learners' receptive and productive knowledge of English lexical and grammatical collocations. Three hundred and fourteen participants, who voluntarily participated in the study, were given four different measures of receptive and productive knowledge of English collocations. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the quantitative data and a correlational analysis was also used to examine the relationship between receptive and productive knowledge of English collocations. The results showed that Thai EFL high school participants had relatively weak knowledge of English collocations, but performed better on receptive collocational tasks than productive tasks. Indeed, Thai EFL high school participants' receptive knowledge of grammatical collocations appears to be acquired first, followed by receptive knowledge of lexical collocations, productive knowledge of lexical collocations, and productive knowledge of grammatical collocations. A correlational analysis also revealed that receptive and productive collocational knowledge were interrelated. Taken together, these findings are consistent with previous studies showing that, like vocabulary, receptive collocational knowledge is acquired before productive collocational knowledge. This study provides insights into vocabulary acquisition and development along the receptive and productive continuum. Future research would benefit from longitudinal studies designed to examine more precisely this developmental continuum.
Collocational Use: A Contrastive Analysis of Strategies Used by Iranian EFL Learners
Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 2015
Despite the role of collocations in many aspects of second language learning, its significance has been neglected by the contrastive analysts in ELT. The current study aimed at investigating learners' use of collocations by analyzing their written performance. It was conducted using 102 male and female EFL learners majoring in English Translation and English Language and Literature at Hakim Sabzevari University in Iran. The researchers analyzed the data to determine the sources of collocational errors, and the strategy types utilized by learners in order to overcome their collocational deficiencies. The percentage of errors resulting from lack or inadequate familiarity of the students with collocations was 75%. The results of the study showed that most of the students' errors in writing did not originate from their insufficient knowledge of the grammar but from their inability with regard to the combination of language units. Moreover, the findings revealed that learners made use of four strategy types including transfer, synonym, repetition and paraphrase to overcome their collocational problems, with transfer strategy ranking as the most frequently used strategy followed by the use of synonym. The implications and applications of the study are discussed.
An Analysis of the Frequency of Acceptable and Unacceptable Collocations Among Iranian Efl Learners
International Journal of Education and Social Science Research, 2021
Although it is broadly recognized that collocations are vital features of second language acquisition, some of previous studies have reported Iranian EFL learners like other EFL students having difficulties to learn and use the English language collocations. This study is carried out to analyze the frequency of acceptable and unacceptable collocations among Iranian EFL learners. 107 students majoring in English and literature in Qazvin, Iran were selected as participants for this study. Their age ranged from 19 to 25 years both male and female, selected through convenience sampling. In this study, a questionnaire that involves 30 multiple-choice items, which was made up according to Benson's collocational approach (lexical and grammatical collocation), was used. All the collocations were selected from Oxford collocation dictionary. The data was analyzed by SPSS. The results showed that the most unacceptable lexical collocations are produced by Iranian EFL learners is in Noun + Verb 73.6% and the most acceptable lexical collocations which they can produce is in Verb + Noun 84.9%. In addition, the most unacceptable grammatical collocations used is in Noun + preposition 56.6% and the most acceptable grammatical collocations which they used is in Noun + To-Infinitive 79.6%. The result of the study suggest that learners are most likely to face difficulties producing acceptable collocations comprising of Noun + To-Infinitive and Verb + Noun respectively.
DOES LEARNERS’ DEGREE OF EXPOSURE TO ENGLISH LANGUAGE INFLUENCE THEIR COLLOCATIONAL KNOWLEDGE?
TJPRC, 2014
Collocational knowledge is indicative of the maturity of learners’ language proficiency and plays an important role for ESL/EFL learners in promoting both their language comprehension and production abilities. This study specifically focused on productive and receptive Verb+ Noun and Adjective+ Noun collocational knowledge of two different groups of learners with different degrees of exposure to the English language. One hundred ninety six, 4th year university students enrolling in two different programs (International Program and English Major Program) participated in the study. Data were collected using two instruments: 1) COLLMATCH 3 receptive collocation test, and 2) productive collocation test. Results indicated that, overall, the two groups of learners had a significantly higher test score of receptive knowledge than productive knowledge, and that the international program students outperformed the English major students on both tests. Besides, the results also revealed that the participants successfully produced Adjective + Noun collocation better than Verb + Noun collocation. Finally, it is recommended that a substantial amount of time should be devoted to learning activities such as essay writing and conversation to elevate language learners’ productive collocational knowledge in these two categories. For further research, focus should be given to measuring EFL learners’ grammatical collocational knowledge or measuring collocational knowledge of learners with different educational levels.
Examining second language receptive knowledge of collocation and factors that affect learning
This study investigated Vietnamese EFL learners' knowledge of verb–noun and adjective–noun collocations at the first three 1,000 word frequency levels, and the extent to which five factors (node word frequency, collocation frequency, mutual information score, congruency, and part of speech) predicted receptive knowledge of collocation. Knowledge of single-word items at the same word frequency levels was also examined. The results indicated that the participants were not close to a level of mastery of collocational knowledge at any word frequency level; knew less than 50% of each type of collocation overall; and that their knowledge of collocation significantly decreased at each level. The analysis also revealed that there were significant large positive correlations between knowledge of collocations and single-word items, and that node word frequency was the strongest predictor of receptive knowledge of collocation.
The Effects of Teaching Lexical Collocations on Speaking Ability of Iranian EFL Learners
Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 2013
The present study aimed at a) investigating the effect of teaching collocations on the speaking ability of EFL Iranian Learners, b) examining the relationship between the participants' knowledge of collocations and the participants' use of collocation taking into consideration, and c) finding out participants' attitude towards teaching collocations. To this end, after administrating the Quick Placement Test (QPT), 40 intermediate L2 learners were selected out of 80, and assigned to two experimental and control groups. For pretests, collocation test and collocation interview were run. Then, Collocation in Use was taught to the experimental group as a treatment. After collocation instruction, another collocation test and interview were conducted on both experimental and control group. The result of paired sample t-test showed that the participants' speaking ability in the experimental group significantly improved in posttest. The analyzed data also revealed that after the collocation instruction in experimental group the participants' performance in interview increased too. Moreover, the result of ANCOVA displayed that the participants had positive attitudes towards explicit instruction of collocations. This study has theoretical and pedagogical implications in the field of foreign/second language teaching and learning. It can be considered as a solution for language teachers, constantly searching for the better ways to train native-like speakers.