Grammatical Collocations Research Articles

The Effect of Task Complexity on Iranian Pre-intermediate EFL Learners’ Incidental Learning of Grammatical Collocations through Reading

The aim of this research was to examine the effect of task complexity instruction on EFL pre-intermediate learner’s incidental learning of grammatical collocations through reading. To do so, the test of general English proficiency, OPT, was administered to 140 participants to homogenize subjects. Based on the mean score (X= 34.5) and standard deviation of students’ scores (SD= 2.8), 90 subjects were selected, those scoring between half a standard deviation above and half a standard deviation below. They were assigned in three classes with 30 students in each. Each of these classes was randomly assigned to one of the three tasks (fill in the blank, sentence writing, and translation sentences). Then the pretest, based on fifty fill in the blank questions was administered. After ten treatment sessions, the post-test which was the same as pretest was given to the participants to measure their knowledge of grammatical collocations in the tasks. Paired samples t-test, one-way ANOVA, and post-hoc tests were used to calculate for the productive and receptive knowledge of the students. The findings showed that there is significant main effect for all three groups. The result of this experiment is discussed in light of the involvement load hypothesis.

The Use of Grammatical Collocations by Advanced Saudi EFL Learners in the UK and KSA

This study attempts to investigate the production of English grammatical collocations amongst Saudi students majoring in English in the KSA and those in the UK. It also shows the most frequent types of errors that may occur as well as some possible reasons for their occurrence. For this purpose, the researcher analysed essays written by the participants. The results reveal that Saudi EFL learners in the UK do grammatical collocation errors less than those who learn English in the KSA. Additionally, the highest number of errors in both groups was recorded on the grammatical collocations patterns, noun + preposition and adjective + preposition. It seems that L1 interference plays a crucial role in students' erroneous responses, especially those which contain a preposition. For instance, the majority of noun + preposition, adjective + preposition and preposition + noun are used incorrectly throughout the essays. Furthermore, the avoidance phenomenon in SLA may be used by Saudi students. They tend to avoid using some grammatical collocation categories such as adjective + that- clause and noun + that-clause since they are beyond their English proficiency level. Finally, the lack of knowledge of grammatical collocations is another possible reason behind such errors. Educational leaders, curriculum designers and teachers need to shed light on these types, especially as the English language curricula used in the KSA do not pay a great deal of attention to grammatical collocations.

On The Use of English Collocations by Iranian Postgraduate Learners of ESP

Collocation is usually defined as two or more words which co-occur and must be learned as an integral whole. L2 learners should have a rich collocational competence to communicate effectively and fluently. Despite the importance of collocations in second language learning and teaching, no study has yet been carried out to investigate the Iranian postgraduate students` collocation knowledge of English for Specific Purposes (ESP). Therefore, this study explored the impact of type of test (receptive vs. productive) on the students` performance in collocation tests. Also, the collocation knowledge of the students was investigated across different fields of study and different collocation categories. For the purposes of this study, 100 ESP master students majoring in different fields of study were selected randomly from three national universities located in Yasouj and Isfahan provinces. The participants took a collocation test including a receptive multiple-choice test and a productive translation test. Both grammatical and lexical collocations were examined in the study. The results indicated that the participants had more difficulty with the productive test rather than the receptive test. Furthermore, the overall collocation knowledge of the students was significantly different across different fields of study and various collocation categories. It could be concluded that increasing knowledge of accurate collocational patterns, especially the productive collocation knowledge, is necessary for Iranian ESP postgraduate students.

A corpus-based study of phrasal verbs: CARRY OUT, FIND OUT, and POINT OUT

This study, which is exploratory and corpus-based research, aims to investigate the grammatical patterns and the collocates of three phrasal verbs (PVs) in English, i.e., carry out, find out, and point out . They were chosen because the combination of the lexical verbs carry, find, and point , and the adverbial particle out put the three PVs among the top 50 PVs in the British National Corpus or BNC (Gardner & Davies, 2007), and in the Corpus of Contemporary American English or COCA (Liu, 2011). A total of 500 concordance lines were searched from COCA for each PV, and were then placed in an Excel spreadsheet for analysis. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary (OALD, 2010) was used as the main reference for information about the definitions of the target PVs, as well as grammatical information and collocates. The results reveal that although most of the grammatical patterns found in this study seem to be in accordance with those displayed in OALD (2010), certain patterns are not provided in the dictionary. The reason could be the limited space of the dictionary and users’ stylistic variation in PV use. Regarding the collocates of the target PVs, most of them are lexical collocation, such as nouns, pronouns, and wh-words, followed by grammatical collocation, such as preposition. Pedagogically speaking, the corpus-based data could help provide additional information not illustrated in dictionaries. In addition, learners can explore the language patterns and search for naturally-occurring samples through the use of corpora.

The Effect of Grammatical Collocation Instruction on Understanding ESP Texts for Undergraduate Computer Engineering Students

The researcher administered a Comprehensive English Language Test (CELT) to 80 learners and then according to their grades limited them to 60.The subjects were divided into two homogenous groups (30 subjects in control group and 30 subjects in experimental). Then a pretest was administered to both groups. The subjects who played the role of the control group kept pace with the teacher who taught the book named “English for Computer Science”. It should be noted that this group were taught the mentioned book without instructing grammatical collocations (just through a curriculum book). The experimental group was taught the same book through instructing grammatical collocations. Both groups had instruction for sixty- minute periods for ten sessions. To be sure of the effect of the treatment, the researcher tested both groups by using a posttest. The scores on the result of pre and posttest showed the efficiency of the two methods. Finally, a T-test was conducted to examine the differences of the mean test scores of the two groups. The results of the pre and posttest showed a t-value greater than the t-critical. Therefore, the null hypothesis was rejected and we came to this conclusion that grammatical collocation instruction had significant effect on understanding ESP texts for undergraduate computer engineering students.

A Comparative Study of the Use of Collocation in Iranian High School Textbooks and American English File Books

The present study investigates the extent to which lexical and grammatical collocations are used in Iranian high school English textbooks, compared with the American English File books. To achieve the purposes of this study, this study had to be carried out in two phases. In the first phase, the content of the instructional textbooks, that is, American English File book series, Book 2 and Iranian high school English Book 3, were analyzed to find the frequencies and proportions of the collocations used in the textbooks. Since the instructional textbooks used in the two teaching environments (i.e., Iranian high schools and language institutes) were not equal with regard to the density of texts, from each textbook just the first 6000 words, content words as well as function words, were considered. Then, the frequencies of the collocations among the first 6000 words in high school English Book 3 and American English File Book 2 were determined.The results of the statistical analyses revealed that the two text book series differ marginally in terms of frequency and type of collocations. Major difference existed between them when it came to lexical collocations in American English File book 2.

A Study on the Characteristics of Korean Grammatical Collocations Needed to be Included in the Discussion on Transitivity

A Study on the Characteristics of Korean Grammatical Collocations Needed to be Included in the Discussion on Transitivity

Intercultural communication problems relating to translation from English into Sesotho

In this article, certain translative communication problems associated with the linguistic and stylistic differences between English and Sesotho are identified and discussed. With a view to help improve translation between the two languages where inaccurate and stilted communication frequently occurs, issues of equivalence, fidelity/faithfulness and the purpose of translation are delved into. It is furthermore argued that in South African multilingual contexts, like legal courts, criminal cases/hearings and hospitals clinics and similar health establishments, inaccurate translation and/or misinterpreting can lead to serious miscarriages of justice and poor service delivery. The reasons for such unfortunate eventualities sometimes relate to the translator-interpreter’s poor understanding of the cultural factors behind the English or Sesotho message. As such, emphasis is lain on the need for a translator-interpreter’s cultural understanding of the source language/text (SL/T) and target language/text (TL/T) to deliver an accurate version (in the target language or text – TL/T) of the original message. It is furthermore shown that one cause of social and legal injustice is closely related to the translator- interpreter’s insufficient knowledge of both the English and Sesotho culture as it exists in grammatical forms, idiomatic structures, collocation patterns and stylistic patterns of the SL/T and the TL/T.

Verb-Noun Collocation Proficiency and Academic Years

Generally vocabulary and collocations in particular have significant roles in language proficiency. A collocation includes two words that are frequently joined concurrently in the memory of native speakers. There have been many linguistic studies trying to define, to describe, and to categorise English collocations. It contains grammatical collocations and lexical collocations which include nouns, adjectives, verbs, and adverb. In the context of a foreign language environment such as Iran, collocational proficiency can be useful because it helps the students improve their language proficiency. This paper investigates the possible relationship between verb-noun collocation proficiency among students from one academic year to the next. To reach this goal, a test of verb-noun collocations was administered to Iranian learners. The participants in the study were 212 Iranian students in an Iranian university. They were selected from the second term of freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior years. The students’ age ranged from 18 to 35.The results of ANOVA showed there was variability in the verb-noun collocations proficiency within each academic year and between the four academic years. The results of a post hoc multiple comparison tests demonstrated that the means are significantly different between the first year and the third and fourth years, and between the third and the fourth academic year; however, students require at least two years to show significant development in verb-noun collocation proficiency. These findings provided a vital implication that lexical collocations are learnt and developed through four academic years of university, but requires at least two years showing significant development in the language proficiency.

Collocation as Source of Translation Unacceptabilty: Indonesian Students’ Experiences

The aims of the present study are to explore wrong English collocations made by some Indonesian English learners and to find out the causes of the wrong collocations. Twenty seven wrong English lexical collocations and nine wrong grammatical collocations collected from the students’ translation and writing assignments have been examined. After comparing the patterns of English collocations and the Indonesian collocations it is found out that the erroneous English collocations are attributed to four causes: (1) learners’ lack of knowledge of collocation, (2) differences of collocations between English and Bahasa Indonesia, (3) learners’ low mastery of vocabulary and (4) strong interferences of the learners’ native language.It is suggested that the students should be informed that collocation, like grammar, is one aspect of not only English but all other languages that should be learnt if they want their English sound natural and mastery of vocabulary can contribute to the constructing of correct collocations.

A Contrastive Analysis of Patterns of Grammatical Collocations between the English “Animal Farm” and Its Azeri Turkish Translation

The present study investigates the patterns of English and Azeri Turkish grammatical collocations in the original English novella “Animal Farm” and its Turkish translation. The specific objective of this study is to identify the similarities and differences of the patterns of English and Azeri Turkish grammatical collocations. To answer the research questions of the study, grammatical collocations throughout the English novella have been identified and categorized on the basis of Benson’s (1986b) categorization of English grammatical collocations. The classified English collocations were then compared and contrasted with their Turkish correspondences. As a result of comparison and contrast of these collocations in English and Turkish it became clear that the word order patterns in the grammatical collocations of these two languages are different in most cases. Accordingly, on the basis of the strong version of contrastive analysis it is predicted that learning English grammatical collocations will be troublesome for Iranian Azeri Turkish speakers.

Investigating the Role of L2 Language Proficiency in Word Association Behavior of L2 Learners: A Case of Iranian EFL Learners

In the last few decades word association research has provided precise insight into the development and organization of the mental lexicon; however, there is still sufficient ground for more exploration to gain a better understanding of how L2 learners’ mental lexicon might be organized and how word association behavior may vary according to L2 proficiency level. This paper was intended to investigate the development of mental lexicon through a psycholinguistic experiment and more specifically, to explore the possible role L2 language proficiency may have in word association behaviors of Iranian EFL learners. To this end, a standardized English placement test (OPT) and a word association test were administered to 120 undergraduate EFL learners. The elicited responses were classified based on Peppard's (2007) model and then analyzed in terms of the frequency of each type of word association. The results indicated that upper intermediate students' responses were significantly more frequent than beginners' responses in the categories of Synonymy and Hypernymy and Hyponymy which are paradigmatic relations and the beginners' responses were significantly more frequent in the category of Grammatical collocation which is a syntagmatic relation. These findings, which support McCarthy (1990) and Meara (1982), are not in line with Wolter’(2001) belief about the re-evaluation of the syntagmatic-paradigmatic shift in the case of nonnative speakers. The study implies important implications for vocabulary teaching through assisting learners in building stronger semantic links between words.

The Effects of Input Flood and Consciousness-Raising Approach on Collocation Knowledge Development of Language Learners

Many researchers stress the importance of lexical coherence and emphasize the need for teaching collocations at all levels of language proficiency. Thus, this study was conducted to measure the relative effectiveness of explicit (consciousness-raising approach) versus implicit (input flood) collocation instruction with regard to learners’ knowledge of both lexical and grammatical collocations. Ninety-five upper-intermediate learners, who were randomly assigned to the control and experimental groups, served as the participants of this study. While one of the experimental groups was provided with input flood treatment, the other group received explicit collocation instruction. In contrast, the participants in the control group did not receive any instruction on learning collocations. The results of the study, which were collected through pre-test, immediate post-test and delayed post-test, revealed that although both methods of teaching collocations proved effective, the explicit method of consciousness-raising approach was significantly superior to the implicit method of input flood treatment.

The Structure of an Afrikaans Collocation and Phrase Dictionary

In this article an Afrikaans collocation and phrase dictionary for mother-tongue speakers (primary target group) as well as advanced learners (secondary target group) is discussed. The position which such a dictionary occupies among other dictionary types is pointed out. A motivation is also given for the inclusion of idioms and other fixed phrases in the proposed dictionary. The three key approaches with regard to the interpretation of the term collocation are examined, i.e. the text-oriented approach of Halliday and Hasan (1976), the statistically-oriented approach of Sinclair (Collins Cobuild) and the significance-oriented approach of Hausmann (1984). The arguments in this article favour Benson et al.’s (1986) implementation of the significance-oriented approach. Statistical evidence could be used to examine the usage frequency of collocations and phrases. The advantages and/or disadvantages of these approaches are considered. Three types of words and their treatment in the dictionary are discussed: those which have a very wide range of combination, those which have selectional restrictions imposed by general semantic features, and those of which the range of combination is restricted by certain other words. It is argued that only the last two types should be included in this dictionary. As one of the target groups is unsophisticated learners with a limited grammatical background, the ideal would be to enter lexical collocations both at their bases and at the collocators. To save space however, more information such as examples could then be provided at the bases only. Grammatical collocations should be entered at the bases, i.e. nouns, verbs and adjectives. The division of the dictionary articles into two components to meet the needs of both intended target groups, is discussed.

The Effect of Planning on the Iranian EFL Learners` Performance of Grammatical Collocations in Speech

The present study explores the effects of pre-task as well as on-line planning on the production of grammatical collocations in speech. Also the impact of language of inner speech during planning was probed. Participants of the study were 45 advanced Iranian EFL learners in a private English institute. Data was elicited through using a narrative task. The results indicate that although on-line planning can significantly improve learners` production of grammatical collocations in speech, effect of pre-task planning on learners` performance of grammatical collocations is not noticeable. Also thinking in Persian combined with English during planning had the most noticed effect on the accuracy rate of participants’ speech. Giving sufficient time to learners during task performance and the prominence of metecognitive strategy training can be considered as the pedagogical implications of the study.

추측을 나타내는 양태 표현의 문법 제약 - 문법적 연어구성을 중심으로 -

The purpose of this paper is to find the grammatical characteristics of Korean modal expressions of “conjecture” which are composed of grammatical collocations. The modal expressions dealt with on this paper are 8 kinds: ‘-enga/nunga/na bo-’, ‘-enga/nunga/na sip-’, ‘-en/nun/ul moyang-’, ‘-en/nun/ul gat-’, ‘-en/nun/ul duta-’, ‘-en/nun/ul dusip-’, ‘-en/nun/ul seongsip-’, ‘-en/nun/ul beopa-’. We experimented the syntactic phenomena like the combination restrictions of tense pre-final-endings in pre-verb, the lexical restrictions in pre-verb, the sentence type restrictions, the combination restrictions of tense pre-final-endings in modal expressions, the co-occurrence restrictions to connective endings, the structural dependence of modal expressions of Conjecture. These experiments are designed to investigate whether the modal expressions are the lexical items in the proposition or whether or not they are composed as a grammatical categorization out of the proposition. From the results of the experimental, we found the syntactic characteristics of Korean modal expressions of “conjecture” which are composed of grammatical collocations are closely related with the progression of their grammaticalization type. And we also found the sentence type implementation may differ based on who is the subject of “conjecture”.

Grammatical collocations and verb-particle constructions in Brussels French: a corpus-linguistic approach to transfer

This article shows how a corpus-linguistic approach to transfer based on Jarvis (2000), Jarvis and Pavlenko (2008) and Mougeon, Nadasdi, and Rehner (2005) can help to disentangle internal and external explanations in language variation and change. The focus of the study is on grammatical collocations (Granger & Paquot, 2008) such as chercher après ‘to search for’ and verb-particle constructions (VPCs) such as recevoir dehors ‘to get out’ in Brussels French. The occurrence of such patterns in Romance varieties is often linked to contact with Germanic varieties, in which VPCs are common. This article discusses the syntactic and semantic properties of both types of constructions and argue they are to be considered as replications of grammatical use patterns (Heine & Kuteva, 2005) from the contact language, the regional variety of Dutch. Proof for covert transfer from Dutch is found through a detailed comparison of the frequency of the patterns in a range of spoken and written corpora.

Bible Translation and the Myth of “Literal Accuracy”

A widespread belief among many pastors, Bible teachers, and laypeople holds that the most accurate Bible translation is one that is “literal” or formal equivalent. This is a misunderstanding of the nature of languages, which differ significantly from one another in terms of words (lexemes), syntax, and idioms. This article looks at the fallacy of “literal accuracy” by showing how the differences between languages mean that one must alter the form of the Hebrew and Greek text in order accurately to reproduce the meaning in English. Seeking lexical concordance (word-for-word reproduction) does not work, since words do not have a single “literal” meaning. They have a range of potential senses. Since these senses differ across languages, one must first interpret each word in Hebrew or Greek and then render it with an equivalent word or phrase in English. Similarly, syntactic correspondence does not work, since languages use different grammatical forms, idioms, and collocations to produce the same meanings. Replicating grammatical forms inevitably results in changed meaning, awkward language, and/or obscurity. Indeed, all Bible versions—even those that claim to be “essentially literal”—consistently change forms to reproduce the meaning. While so-called “literal” versions are useful tools for beginning language students to help them identify formal features of the Greek or Hebrew text, as a philosophy of translation formal equivalence is fundamentally flawed.

The Effect of Output Requirement on the Acquisition of Grammatical Collocations by Iranian EFL Learners

The present study investigated: (a) the effect of output requirement on the acquisition of grammatical collocations; and (b) the relative efficacy of output tasks in comparison with that of input enhancement with regard to the acquisition of grammatical collocations. Ninety homogenous adult Iranian intermediate EFL learners were randomly assigned to two experimental (EG1/EG2) and a control group (CG). A pre-test was given to the three groups to measure the students’ knowledge of collocations prior to any treatment. The students in EG1 were required to do certain output tasks dealing with the collocations in focus after reading a passage whereas for those in EG2 the same target forms were visually enhanced. The students in the CG received neither visually enhanced input, nor output tasks and they were asked to simply read the passage, and answer some questions about it. After the treatment phase, a post-test was administered to measure the gains. The results indicated that both output and input enhancement exert a significant effect on the acquisition of grammatical collocations by the learners. It was also found that input enhancement group outperformed the output group; however; the observed difference was not statistically significant. Accordingly, it can be claimed that an implicit and unobtrusive method such as input enhancement can be as effective as an output task which requires actual production of language on the part of L2 learners.

KETIDAKLAZIMAN KOLOKASI PEMBELAJAR BIPA DAN IMPLIKASINYA TERHADAP PEMBELAJARAN BAHASA

Abstract: Unacceptable Collocations by Learners of Indonesian as a ForeignLanguage and the Implication in Language Learning. Foreign language learners’ability to collocate words that are natural and acceptable in the target language isimportant in foreign language learning; however, it is notoriously difficult forforeign language learners and sometimes makes them frustrated. This studyattempts to describe the negative transfer of English collocations into Indonesiancollocations made by learners of Indonesian as a foreign language in their writingassignments. This study employed a qualitative descriptive method. The data werecollected from 36 writing assignments by 12 learners whose mother tongue isEnglish. They were trainee teachers with experience in teaching Indonesian inAustralia. The finding shows that there are 176 unnatural Indonesian collocations,some of which are negative transfers of learners’ mother tongue. This suggests thatdirect teaching of collocations should be given special emphasis in teachingIndonesian as a foreign language.Keywords: collocation, lexical collocation, grammatical collocation, languagelearning