Collocational Development during a Stay Abroad

TR Number
Date
2021-01-12
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
MDPI
Abstract

The purpose of the current study was to explore if and how additional-language learners may show changes in phraseological patterns over the course of a stay in a target-language environment. In particular, we focused on noun+adjective combinations produced by a group of additional-language speakers of French at three points in time, spanning 21 months and including an academic year in France. We extracted each combination from a longitudinal corpus and determined frequency counts and two strength-of-association measures (Mutual information [MI] score and Log Dice) for each combination. Separate analyses were conducted for frequency and the strength-of-association measures, revealing that phraseological patterns are significantly predicted by adjective position in the case of all three measures, and that MI scores showed significant change over time. We interpret the results in light of past research that has reported contradictory findings concerning change in phraseological patterns following an immersion experience.

Description
Keywords
collocation, frequency, MI score, Log Dice, French, stay abroad
Citation
Edmonds, A.; Gudmestad, A. Collocational Development during a Stay Abroad. Languages 2021, 6, 12.