Frequently Observed Grammatical Errors of Japanese EFL Learners: Their Theoretical Implications

• YAMADA, Toshiyuki

Abstract

Departmental Bulletin Paper

This preliminary study investigates what grammatical errors are most frequently observed in Japanese EFL (English as a Foreign Language) learners even after the six years of English learning. By a series of free writing tasks, 2691 English sentences were collected from 28 Japanese EFL learners. We identified 882 grammatical errors in the dataset with respect to five major types: determiner, preposition, subject-verb agreement for be-verbs, subject-verb agreement for general verbs, and number agreement within a noun phrase. The ratios of the number of grammatical errors to that of obligatory contexts in which those particular grammatical items must occur were 61.1%, 10.9%, 2.6%, 5.7%, and 18.2%, respectively. There are three major findings: (i) Japanese EFL learners make errors in the determiner most frequently, (ii) they make errors in subject-verb agreement more frequently for general verbs compared to be-verbs, and (iii) they make errors in the determiner more often compared to agreement. Their theoretical implications are discussed.

Journal

• 群馬大学教育学部紀要. 人文・社会科学編

  群馬大学教育学部紀要. 人文・社会科学編 68 129-140, 2019-01-31

  群馬大学教育学部

Keywords

• grammatical errors
• error analysis
• Japanese EFL learners
• free writing tasks
• cross-linguistic differences

Details

• CRID: 1050001338293121280
• NII Article ID: 120006629715
• NII Book ID: AN00068500
• ISSN: 03864294
• HANDLE: 10087/12510
• NDL BIB ID: 029742596
• Web Site: https://gunma-u.repo.nii.ac.jp/records/4239
• Web Site: http://id.ndl.go.jp/bib/029742596
• Web Site: https://ndlsearch.ndl.go.jp/books/R000000004-I029742596
• Text Lang: en
• Article Type: departmental bulletin paper
• Data Source:
  • IRDB
  • NDL
  • CiNii Articles
  • KAKEN