Collocations in a learner corpus SB

Collocations in a Learner Corpus Studies in Corpus Linguistics SCL focuses on the application of corpus method throughout language study, the development of a computational approach to linguistics, and the development of new tools for processing language General Editor Elena Tognini-Bonelli Consulting Editor Wolfgang Teubert Advisory Board Michael Barlow Graeme Kennedy Rice University, Houston Victoria University of Wellington Robert de Beaugrande Geoffrey Leech Federal University of Minas Gerais University of Lancaster Douglas Biber Anna Mauranen North Arizona University University of Tampere Chris Butler John Sinclair University of Wales, Swansea University of Birmingham Sylviane Granger Piet van Sterkenburg University of Louvain Institute for Dutch Lexicology, Leiden M A K Halliday Michael Stubbs University of Sydney University of Trier Susan Hunston Jan Svartvik University of Birmingham University of Lund Stig Johansson H-Z Yang Oslo University Jiao Tong University, Shanghai Volume 14 Collocations in a Learner Corpus by Nadja Nesselhauf Collocations in a Learner Corpus Nadja Nesselhauf University of Heidelberg John Benjamins Publishing Company Amsterdam/Philadelphia TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences – Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ansi z39.48-1984 Cover design: Françoise Berserik Cover illustration from original painting Random Order by Lorenzo Pezzatini, Florence, 1996 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Nadja Nesselhauf Collocations in a Learner Corpus / Nadja Nesselhauf p cm (Studies in Corpus Linguistics, issn 1388–0373 ; v 14) Based on the author’s thesis (doctoral) University of Basel, 2003 under title: Collocations in the English of advanced learners : a study based on a learner corpus Includes bibliographical references and indexes Language and languages Study and teaching Phraseology-Study and teaching I Title II Series P53.6123.N47 2004 418’.0071-dc22 isbn 90 272 2285 (Eur.) / 58811 524 (US) (Hb; alk paper) 2004058483 © 2005 – John Benjamins B.V No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any other means, without written permission from the publisher John Benjamins Publishing Co · P.O Box 36224 · 1020 me Amsterdam · The Netherlands John Benjamins North America · P.O Box 27519 · Philadelphia pa 19118-0519 · usa Table of contents Abbreviations ix Acknowledgements xi Chapter Collocations in native and non-native speaker language 1.1 The role of collocations in language and language teaching 1.2 Previous research on collocations in learner English 1.3 Aims and scope of the study Chapter Investigating collocations in a learner corpus 2.1 The notion of ‘collocations’ 11 2.1.1 Definitions of collocations 11 2.1.2 Related concepts 18 2.1.3 Classifications of collocations 21 2.1.4 The definition of collocations in this study 25 2.1.5 The classification of collocations in this study 34 2.2 The question of norm in ELT and the notion of error 37 2.3 Learner corpora and the analysis of learner language 40 2.4 Data and procedure 44 2.4.1 The learner corpus used 44 2.4.2 The syntactic patterns considered 47 2.4.3 Determining the degree of acceptability of the combinations 49 2.4.4 Delimiting collocations from other types of word combinations 54 1 11  Table of contents Chapter The use of collocations by advanced learners 3.1 Overall results 65 3.2 Deviations in the verb 73 3.2.1 Types and frequencies 73 3.2.2 Deviations only involving simple verbs 74 3.2.3 Deviations involving phrasal verbs 79 3.2.4 Deviations involving prepositional verbs 81 3.2.5 Other deviations concerning the verb 86 3.2.6 Regularities in verb deviations across categories 86 3.3 Deviations in the noun phrase or prepositional phrase 96 3.3.1 Deviations concerning the noun 96 3.3.2 Deviations concerning the determiner 104 3.3.3 Deviations concerning noun complementation 106 3.3.4 Deviations in the preposition of the prepositional phrase 111 3.4 More global deviations 112 3.4.1 Stretched verb construction instead of the corresponding verb 112 3.4.2 Whole collocation inappropriate 116 3.4.3 Deviations in the structure of the collocation 121 3.5 Deviations in collocations versus collocational deviations 123 3.6 Deviations involving collocations in non-collocations 129 3.7 Groups of deviations across categories 135 3.8 Further aspects of learner collocation use 145 3.8.1 Variation, repetition, and title recycling 145 3.8.2 The use of quotation marks 150 3.8.3 Coordination 152 3.8.4 Learners’ use of adjectives in verb-noun collocations 157 Chapter Building material of non-native-like collocations 4.1 L2 building material 165 4.1.1 The use of L2 elements 165 4.1.2 The use of L2 chunks 167 4.1.3 The use of semantically or formally related elements 170 4.1.4 Blends of related L2 material 176 65 165 Table of contents  4.2 L1 building material 179 4.2.1 The influence of L1 elements and chunks 179 4.2.2 How and when L1 influence operates 185 4.3 Further building material 195 4.4 Relation and interaction of the different types of building material 197 Chapter Factors correlating with learners’ difficulties with collocations 5.1 Intralinguistic factors 199 5.1.1 The degree of restriction of a collocation 199 5.1.2 The fact that a combination is a collocation 204 5.1.3 The fact that a collocation is a stretched verb construction 5.1.4 The syntactic pattern of a collocation 214 5.1.5 Congruence of a collocation in L1 and L2 221 5.2 Extralinguistic factors 229 5.2.1 The circumstances of production 229 5.2.2 The learners’ exposure to English 234 Chapter Implications of the findings 6.1 Summary of the findings 237 6.2 Implications for second language storage and processing 247 6.3 Implications for teaching 252 6.3.1 Exposure, consciousness-raising and explicit teaching 252 6.3.2 Selecting collocations for teaching 254 6.3.3 Principles of collocation teaching 264 6.4 Ways forward 272 Notes References Appendix I Appendix II Index 199 211 237 275 307 321 325 329 Abbreviations Corpora: BNC GeCLE ICLE S-GeCLE British National Corpus German Corpus of Learner English International Corpus of Learner English Subcorpus of GeCLE Dictionaries: BBI CCED OALD ODEI OED PC The BBI Dictionary of English Word Combinations (= Benson et al 1997) Collins COBUILD English Dictionary Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary Oxford Dictionary of English Idioms (= Cowie et al 1993) The Oxford English Dictionary PONS-Collins Großwörterbuch Other abbreviations: appr coll comb compl dev det EFL ELF ELT eNP ESL etw appropriate collocation(s) combination complementation deviation determiner English as a foreign language English as a lingua franca English language teaching extended noun phrase (cf Section 3.3.1) English as a second language etwas References  Schmitt, Norbert & McCarthy, Michael (Eds.) (1997) Vocabulary Description, Acquisition and Pedagogy Cambridge: CUP Schneider, Edgar W (1988) Variabilität, Polysemie und Unschärfe der Wortbedeutung Vol 1: Theoretische und methodische Grundlagen Tübingen: Niemeyer Seidlhofer, Barbara (2000) “Mind the gap: English as a mother tongue vs English as a lingua franca.” Vienna English Working Papers, (1), 51–68 Shei, Chi-Chiang (1999) “A brief survey of English verb-noun collocation[sic!].” http://www.dai.ed.ac.uk/homes/shei/survey.html Sinclair, John (1966) “Beginning the study of lexis.” In Charles E Bazell et al (Eds.), In Memory of J R Firth (pp 410–430) Sinclair, John (1991) Corpus, Concordance, Collocation Oxford: OUP Sinclair, John & Renouf, Antoinette J (1988) “A lexical syllabus for language learning.” In Ron Carter & Michael McCarthy (Eds.), Vocabulary in Language Teaching (pp 140– 160) Sinclair, John (1999) “The computer, the corpus and the theory of language.” In Gabriele Azzaro & Margherita Ulrych (Eds.), Transiti linguistici e culturali Atti del XVIII Congresso nazionale dell’A.I.A (pp 1–15) Triest: E.U.T Singleton, David (1999) Exploring the Second Language Mental Lexicon Cambridge: CUP Sjöholm, Kai (1995) The Influence of Crosslinguistic, Semantic and Input Factors on the Acquisition of English Phrasal Verbs A Comparison Between Finnish and Swedish Learners at an Intermediate and Advanced Level Åbo: Åbo Akademi University Press Smadja, Frank (1989) “Lexical co-occurrence: The missing link.” Literary and Linguistic Computing, 4, 163–168 Smadja, Frank (1993) “Retrieving collocations from text: Xtract.” Computational Linguistics, 19 (1), 143–177 Snell-Hornby, Mary (1983) Verb-Descriptivity in German and English A Contrastive Study in Semantic Fields Heidelberg: Winter Stein, Gabriele (1991) “The phrasal verb type ‘to have a look’ in Modern English” International Review of Applied Linguistics, 29, 1–29 Stubbs, Michael (1995) “Collocations and semantic profiles On the cause of the trouble with quantitative studies.” Functions of Language, (1), 23–55 Stubbs, Michael (2001) Words and Phrases: Corpus Studies of Lexical Semantics Oxford: Blackwell Tarone, Elaine (1983) “On the variability of interlanguage systems.” Applied Linguistics, (2), 142–164 Taylor, Linda (1990) Teaching and Learning Vocabulary New York, Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall Tono, Yukio (1996) “Using leaner corpora for L2 lexicography: Information of collocational errors for EFL learners.” LEXICOS, 6, 116–132 (= AFRILEX SERIES, 6) Stellenbosch: Universiteit van Stellenbosch Towell, Richard, Hawkins, Roger, & Bazergui, Nives (1996) “The development of fluency in advanced learners of French.” Applied Linguistics, 17 (1), 84–119 van der Wouden, Ton (1997) Negative Contexts Collocation, Polarity and Multiple Negation London: Routledge Vettel, Franz (1990) English G A3 Wordmaster Berlin: Cornelsen  References Weinreich, Uriel (1972) Explorations in Semantic Theory (= Janua Linguarum, Series Minor, 89, Ed W Labov) The Hague, Paris: Mouton [Repr from Thomas A Sebeok (Ed.) (1966) Current Trends in Linguistics, Vol The Hague and Paris: Mouton.] Widdowson, Henry G (1989) “Knowledge of language and ability for use.” Applied Linguistics, 10 (2), 128–137 Widdowson, Henry G (2000) “On the limitations of linguistics applied.” Applied Linguistics, 21 (1), 3–25 Wiebalck-Zahn, Karin (1990) Die lexikalischen Fähigkeiten deutscher Lerner mit Englisch als Fremdsprache Regensburg: Roderer Willis, Dave (1990) The Lexical Syllabus A New Approach to Language Teaching London and Glasgow: Collins Woolard, George (2000) “Collocation – encouraging learner independence.” In Michael Lewis (Ed.), Teaching Collocation (pp 28–46) Wray, Alison (1999) “Formulaic language in learners and native speakers.” Language Teaching, 32 (4), 213–231 Wray, Alison (2002) Formulaic Language and the Lexicon New York: CUP Yorio, Carlos A (1989) “Idiomaticity as an indicator of second language proficiency.” In Kenneth Hyltenstam & Loraine K Obler (Eds.), Bilingualism Across the Lifespan Aspects of Acquisition, Maturity, and Loss (pp 55–72) Cambridge: CUP Zhang, Xiaolin (1993) English Collocations and Their Effect on the Writing of Native and Non-Native College Freshmen Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Zimmermann, Rüdiger (1986) “Classification and distribution of lexical errors in the written work of German learners of English.” Papers and Studies in Contrastive Linguistics, 21, 31–40 Zughoul, Muhammed Raji (1991) “Lexical choice: Towards writing problematic word lists.” International Review of Applied Linguistics, 29, 45–58 Appendix I Essays included in GeCLE and in S-GeCLE (marked with an asterisk)  Appendix I Appendix I  Appendix II Collocations occurring in the essays of three or more learners1 Collocation take sth into account have an advantage take advantage of give (sb.) advice reach an aim breathe air give an answer have an argument make an attempt attract attention draw attention to sth pay attention have an attitude one’s best ride a bike/bicycle ride on a bike/bicycle give birth take care of make a career have a chance get a chance have a chat have a choice come to a conclusion solve a conflict take sth into consideration lose control commit a crime make a decision make a difference have difficulties have a discussion Number of occurrences (& number of learners) (4) (7) (3) (6) (3) (6) (3) (3) (3) (3) (3) (6) (4) (3) (5) (3) (4) 11 (11) (3) 17 (15) (3) (8) (6) (6) (3) (4) (4) 18 (11) (5) (4) (9) (3)  Appendix II Collocation make a distinction take drugs get an education have an effect make an effort put an end to sth come to an end set an example give an example (an) exercise come into existence have an experience make an experience a favour give sb a feeling have a feeling make friends make fun of sb have fun catch a glimpse of sth sb good sb harm shake one’s head get hold of sb./sth homework have an idea get an impression have an influence give information get information give instructions have (no) intention have an/no interest a job find a job get a job have a job Number of occurrences (& number of learners) (3) (3) (3) (6) (4) (4) (3) (5) (5) (3) (3) (6) (5) (3) (5) (7) (5) (3) (5) (3) (3) (8) (3) (3) (3) (5) 14 (14) (4) (4) (5) (3) (3) (3) (7) (4) (3) (4) Appendix II  Collocation lose one’s job pass judgement on speak a language live a life lead a life lose one’s life make a living have a look at take a look at take measures come (in)to (one’s) mind keep (sth.) in mind make money train one’s muscles make noise dial a number have an opinion offer opportunities have an opportunity play a part take a picture come to a point reach a point have a possibility put pressure on sb solve a problem have a problem ask a question raise a question answer a question have a reason meet a requirement have a right take a risk run a risk play a role take a seat make sense have sex the shopping Number of occurrences (& number of learners) (3) (3) (3) 11 (8) (6) (3) (3) 14 (14) (6) (3) 10 (10) (6) (3) (3) (4) (3) (3) (5) (4) (5) (3) (5) (4) (4) (4) 25 (20) 11 (10) (7) (4) 12 (10) (5) (3) 19 (14) (3) (6) (8) (4) (8) (3) (8)  Appendix II Collocation find a solution take a step sport tell a story give (sb.) support (to sth.) take time have time follow a trend make use of sth the washing find a/one’s way fulfil sb.’ s wishes work Number of occurrences (& number of learners) (8) (3) (4) (6) (3) (3) 17 (16) (3) (5) (3) (8) (3) 15 (14) Note  Expressions are considered instances of the same collocation if they share the verb and the noun; differences in non-lexical elements (such as determiners, noun complementation etc.) are disregarded Index A acceptability 39, 49–53, 69 acceptable 31, 39, 49–53, 69 affinity 30 Aisenstadt 9, 15–17, 22, 23, 27, 28, 36 B Bahns 3–5, 8–10, 15, 18, 81, 92, 180, 224–226, 235, 252–255, 268 base 17, 18, 22 Benson 9, 15–18, 22, 23 Burgschmidt and Perkins 7–9, 70, 72, 75, 77, 78, 85, 90–93, 95, 96, 99, 102–104, 108, 110, 113, 117, 129, 135, 136, 138–140, 142–144, 176, 179, 265, 271 C casual collocations 12 Chi Man-lai 6, 43, 70, 71, 77, 78, 90, 91, 211, 213, 254, 261 collocate 12 collocational deviation 123, 124, 126, 128, 208, 268, 269 collocator 18, 22, 23, 29, 35, 36, 42, 71, 72 combinability 16, 27–29, 35, 36, 54, 55, see also commutability commutability 14, 16, 17, 21, 23–29, 31, 32, see also combinability composites 14 concordancing 269 congruence 221–229, 238, 253, 261, 270, 271, 279, 301 congruent 221–229, 238, 259–261, 271 Coseriu 19, 29–31 Cowie 2, 3, 9, 12, 14–17, 22, 24–29, 33, 36, 55, 160, 229 D data-driven learning 269 degree of disruption 256, 258, 259, 261–263 degree of restriction 28, 35, 157, 201, 205, 228, 229, 238, 261 deviant 39, 70–72 deviation 39, 72 deviation, collocational see collocational deviation dictionary use 230–233 difficulty 39, 255–261 difficulty, absolute 256–259, 261, 263 difficulty, relative 256–258, 260, 261 E EFL 37, 38 ELF 37, 38 elicitation studies 4, 5, 7, 8, see also elicitation tests elicitation tests 4, 7, 41–43, 280, see also elicitation studies English as a foreign language see EFL English as a Lingua Franca see ELF English as a second language see ESL eNP 96, 100, 101, 288 error 39–41 error analysis 40, 41 ESL 37 expanded predicate 20, see also stretched verb constructions extended noun phrase see eNP  Index F figurative idioms 15, 26, 33, 55 Firth 12, 13 formulae 14, 120, 140, 141, 293 free combinations 14–17, 20, 25–33, 55, 61, 63, 93, 123, 124, 130–132, 151, 156, 200, 204–211, 239, 240, 251, 268 frequency-based approach 12–14, 17, 18, 276, 277 G GeCLE 45, 46 Granger 3, 4, 6–8, 11, 40, 41, 70, 71, 180, 211, 247, 249 H Hausmann 12, 15–17, 22, 28, 252, 253, 269, 270 high-frequency verbs 77, 78, 89, 90, 212, 239 Howarth 2, 3, 7–9, 22–24, 26, 28, 36, 55, 70, 72, 78, 90, 91, 142, 150, 171, 174, 176, 197, 202, 211, 212, 235, 252, 254, 255, 265 I ICLE 9, 11, 44–46, 281, 285, 290 idioms 14–16, 25–27, 32, 33, 54, 55, 169, 180, 202, 206, 207 idioms, figurative see figurative idioms implication 30 inappropriate 39 information overcharge 160, see also verbosity International Corpus of Learner English see ICLE K keyword 17, 18, 22 L L1 influence 5, 8, 179–187, 189–192, 194, 195, 197, 198, 241, 242, 297, see also transfer L1 influence, negative 185, 191, 242 L1 influence, positive 187 L3 influence 196 learner profile 44, 45 lexical functions 18, 22, 23, 36, 91, 267 lexical items 13, 15, 17 lexical solidarities 19, 20, 29 lexical teddy bears 69, 149, 247 light verbs 21, 77, 78, 87, 90, 91, 124, 139, 198, 211, 212, 244, 254 Lombard 6, 8, 9, 70, 72, 77, 90, 91, 93, 102, 103, 175, 176, 180, 181, 197, 254 M Mel’ˇcuk 12, 16, 17, 22, 28, 32, 36, 39 mental lexicon 247–250 mistake 39 N N-of-N combinations 48, 100, 101, 166, 183, 190, 288 node 12 non-collocational deviations 124, 125 non-congruence 222–229 non-congruent 221–224, 227–229, 238, 259–261, 271 O opacity 16, 25–27, 277 open collocations 15, 21, 25, see also free combinations P partial non-congruence 225 phraseological approach 12, 14, 15, 17, 18 pragmatic chunks 141, see also formulae pragmatic formulae 120, 140, 293, see also formulae prefabricated units 1–3, 229, 247, 248, 275 prefabs 1–3, 275, see also prefabricated units prepositional verbs type I see type I prepositional verbs Index prepositional verbs type II see type II prepositional verbs pseudo-RC1 collocations 131 Q questionable 39, 51–53, 69 R RC1 collocations 35, 36, 56, 58–62, 199–204, 225, 228, 229, 260, 261, 271, 280 RC2 collocations 35, 36, 58–60, 62, 63, 199–204, 228, 229, 260, 261, 266, 270, 271 ready-to-use lexical teddy bears 149, 294, see also lexical teddy bears restricted collocations 14–16, 25 restricted collocations type see RC1 collocations restricted collocations type see RC2 collocations restriction arbitrary 27, 31–33, 55, 199 degree of see degree of restriction semantic 31–33 roots 15, 17 S S-GeCLE 205–210, 321 scale of acceptability 39, 69 selection 30 selectional restrictions 19 significant collocations 12 Sinclair 1, 3, 12, 13, 15, 18, 269 span 12 stretched verb constructions 20, 21, 35, 112–114, 211–214 substitutability 14, 15, see also commutability support verb constructions 20, 211, see also stretched verb constructions SVCs see stretched verb constructions T teaching-induced deviations 196 three-dimensional model 257, 261, 272 timed 44, 229–231, 302 transfer 7, 179–182, 187, 197, 226, 247, 250–252, see also L1 influence transfer, negative 179, 250 transfer, positive 179, 250 translation equivalents 88, 191–194, 221, 225, 227 transparency 14, 16, 17, 251 type I prepositional verbs 81–85, 166, 218, 241 type II prepositional verbs 81–85, 166, 241 U unacceptable 39, 51–53, 69 untimed 44, 229–233, 302 V value 17, 18, 23 verbosity 160, 183, 241, 249, 303 W wordiness 249, see also verbosity  In the series Studies in Corpus Linguistics (SCL) the following titles have been published thus far or are scheduled for publication: 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 PEARSON, Jennifer: Terms in Context 1998 xii, 246 pp PARTINGTON, Alan: Patterns and Meanings Using corpora for English language research and teaching 1998 x, 158 pp BOTLEY, Simon and Tony McENERY (eds.): Corpus-based and Computational Approaches to Discourse Anaphora 2000 vi, 258 pp HUNSTON, Susan and Gill FRANCIS: Pattern Grammar A corpus-driven approach to the lexical grammar of English 2000 xiv, 288 pp GHADESSY, Mohsen, Alex HENRY and Robert L ROSEBERRY (eds.): Small Corpus Studies and ELT Theory and practice 2001 xxiv, 420 pp TOGNINI-BONELLI, Elena: Corpus Linguistics at Work 2001 xii, 224 pp ALTENBERG, Bengt and Sylviane GRANGER (eds.): Lexis in Contrast Corpus-based approaches 2002 x, 339 pp STENSTRÖM, Anna-Brita, Gisle ANDERSEN and Ingrid Kristine HASUND: Trends in Teenage Talk Corpus compilation, analysis and findings 2002 xii, 229 pp REPPEN, Randi, Susan M FITZMAURICE and Douglas BIBER (eds.): Using Corpora to Explore Linguistic Variation 2002 xii, 275 pp AIJMER, Karin: English Discourse Particles Evidence from a corpus 2002 xvi, 299 pp BARNBROOK, Geoff: Defining Language A local grammar of definition sentences 2002 xvi, 281 pp SINCLAIR, John McH (ed.): How to Use Corpora in Language Teaching 2004 viii, 308 pp LINDQUIST, Hans and Christian MAIR (eds.): Corpus Approaches to Grammaticalization in English 2004 xiv, 265 pp NESSELHAUF, Nadja: Collocations in a Learner Corpus 2005 xii, 331 pp CRESTI, Emanuela and Massimo MONEGLIA (eds.): C-ORAL-ROM Integrated Reference Corpora for Spoken Romance Languages xvii, 299 pp + index (incl DVD) Expected Winter 04-05 CONNOR, Ulla and Thomas A UPTON (eds.): Discourse in the Professions Perspectives from corpus linguistics 2004 vi, 334 pp ASTON, Guy, Silvia BERNARDINI and Dominic STEWART (eds.): Corpora and Language Learners 2004 vi, 312 pp [...]... observe that reading only slightly improves learners’ knowledge of collocations Farghal and Obiedat (1995) and Hasselgren (1994), finally, go a bit further in their analysis by investigating the collocations actually provided by the learners Farghal and Obiedat find that in their sample of advanced Arabic-speaking learners, non-native-like collocations are based on transfer in about a tenth of the cases... production data have almost exclusively investigated written learner language.11 Two types of study can be distinguished: those in which all collocations (often of a certain grammatical type) are extracted manually from a given corpus and those in which a predefined set of collocations is extracted (semi-)automatically So far, studies using automatic analysis have only dealt with adverb-adjective combinations... many types of prefabs, including collocations, are still not treated adequately in English language teaching today Although collocations have received increasing attention in language teaching in recent years (Granger 1998c: 159; Howarth 199 8a: 30), we are still far from the development of a coherent methodology and even further from a wide-spread and systematic treatment of collocations in language... native and non-native speaker language . The role of collocations in language and language teaching Collocations, i.e arbitrarily restricted lexeme combinations such as make a decision or fully aware, are one type of a group of expressions whose importance in language has been increasingly recognized in recent years This group of expressions has been variously called prefabricated units, prefabs, phraseological... that advanced learners with L1 Chinese have more difficulties than speakers of European languages The result of a cloze test by Herbst (1996) is that (advanced) non-native speakers vary considerably more in their answers than native speakers Bahns and Eldaw (1993), examining advanced German learners’ knowledge of verb-noun collocations, observe that the translation of verbs that are part of collocations. .. in native speaker corpora are compared to corpora of different groups of learners: Polish and Spanish intermediate learners and Polish and French advanced learners of English Kaszubski finds that in general learners produce fewer collocations (i.e tokens), but that they greatly overuse a small number of them (i.e types), in particular those that are frequent in English and/or similar to an L1 combination... mistakes Another finding is that learners are often insecure in the use of collocations, which can be seen in frequent ‘corrections’ by the learners, in which incorrect collocations are often replaced by other incorrect ones Howarth (1996) is one of the most thorough investigations of collocations in learner language to date, although his database is comparatively small He manually investigates verb-noun... advantages and limitations of learner corpus analysis as compared to other types of learner language analysis are discussed The final section of this chapter, 2.4, outlines what data and procedures have been used for the study Information is provided on the learner corpus the analysis is based on and the precise syntactic patterns of the collocations that have been considered The section also gives a. .. combination The production of adverb-adjective combinations is analysed in Granger (1998c) and Lorenz (1999) Granger restricts her analysis to combinations with -ly adverbs and compares advanced learner data (250,000 words, L1 French) with native speaker data Corresponding to the results for verb-noun combinations obtained by Kaszubski, her analysis reveals a general underuse of collocations by learners... has been referred to as the ‘significance oriented approach’ (Herbst 1996: 380) or the ‘phraseological approach’ (Nesselhauf 200 4a) .2 The frequency-based approach goes back to J R Firth and has been developed further in particular by M A K Halliday and J Sinclair It is often adopted by researchers who are involved in the computational analysis of syntagmatic relations The phraseological approach has