This document discusses the role of native language in second language acquisition. It describes language transfer as when prior learning influences new learning. Transfer can be positive (facilitation) or negative (interference). Language transfer specifically refers to applying rules from one's native language to a second language. The Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis aimed to compare languages to predict learning difficulties but made many incorrect predictions. Error Analysis then focused on analyzing learner errors compared to the target language rather than the native language. Early errors tend to be from interlingual transfer while later errors involve intralingual transfer within the target language system. The influence of native language is complex with factors like avoidance and overproduction also playing a role in second language acquisition.

1. The Role of Native Language
• Does one’s native language influence L2
acquisition?

2. Transfer: It is a term that was used extensively in the
first half of the twentieth century and refers to the
psychological process where by prior learning is carried
over into a new learning situation. The learning of task
A will affect the subsequent learning of task B.
Examples:
Tennis and table tennis.
School mathematics and statistical computation.
Roller skate and ice skating.
Typewriter and keyboard.

3.  Positive transfer (facilitation) +: This
emphasizes the beneficial effects of prior experience on
current thinking, action, and learning.
 Negative transfer (interference) - : The
interference of previous learning in the process of
learning something new, such as as when a U.S. tourist
in England learns to drive on the left side of the road.

4. Language transfer (also known as L1 interference,
linguistic interference, and crossmeaning) refers to
speakers or writers applying knowledge from their
native language to a second language.
When the L2 and the L1 of the learners have common
rules, it is called positive transfer. On the other hand,
negative transfer occurs when the rules of L2 and L1
of the learners are in conflict with each other. This is
the cause of numerous mistakes that the L2 learners
may encounter.

5. Language transfer example: According to the initial
view of language transfer, if speakers of a particular
language (in this case, Italian) form questions by
saying:
• Mangia bene il bambino?
• Eats well the baby
• ‘does the baby eat well?’
Then those same (Italian) speakers learning English
would be expected to say
• Eats well the baby?

6. Background
• Underlying much work in the 1950s and 1960s
was the notion of language as habit. Second
language learning was seen as the
development of a new set of habits. The role of
the native language, then, took on great
significance, because it was the major cause for
lack of success in learning the L2.

7. • Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis
CAH is a way of comparing languages in
order to determine potential errors for
the ultimate purpose of isolating what
needs to be learned and what does not
need to be learned in a second language
situation. As Lado detailed, one does a
structure–by-structure comparison of the
sound system, morphological system,
syntactic system, and even the cultural
system of two languages for the purpose
of discovering similarities and differences.
The ultimate goal is to predict areas that
will be either easy or difficult for learners.

8. Views of CAH
1. A priori view (strong version): One
could make predictions about
learning and hence about the
success of language-teaching
materials based on a comparison
between two languages.
2. A posteriori view (weak version):
The weak version starts with what
learners do and attempts to
account for those errors on the
basis of NL-TL differences.

9. • Downfall of CAH
1. Decline of Behaviorism
2. Predictions put forward by CAH were mostly wrong.
Ex: In French, object pronouns precede the verb.
-Je les vois
-I them see
-‘I see them’
In English, object pronouns follow the verb. However, the
following facts emerge in learner data:
By French learners of English
-I see them (produced)
*I them see. (not produced).

10. • Error Analysis
Why errors are important when we want to learn
something?
• Errors and L2
Why are they important?
Second language errors are not to be viewed
solely as a product of imperfect learning; hence,
they are not something for teachers to throw
their hands up in the air about. Rather, they are
to be viewed as indications of a learner’s
attempt to figure out some system.

11. • Mistake and error
-Mistakes are only one time events such as slips of
tongue. The speaker who makes a mistake can
recognize it and self-correct it. An error on the
other hand is systematic. It occurs repeatedly and
is not recognized by the learner.

12. • What is error analysis?
• It is a type of linguistic analysis that focuses on
the errors learners make.
• The comparison is made between the errors a
learner makes in producing the TL and the TL
form itself.
• How does it differ from the weak version of
CA?
• In CA the comparison is made with the native
language, whereas in error analysis it is made
with the TL.

13. • Steps of EA
1. Data need to be collected.
2. Identify errors
3. Classify errors
4. Quantify errors
5. Analysis of source
6. Remediation

14. • There are two main error types within an error
analysis framework:
1. Interlingual
2. Intralingual (determine-examine)
• Researchers have found that early stages of
language learning are characterized by a
predominance of interference (interlingual
transfer), but once learners have begun to
acquire parts of the new system, more and
more intralingual transfer is manifested.

15. Errors in Error Analysis
• «There is a danger in too much attention to learners’ errors.
While errors indeed reveal a system at work, the classroom
teachers can become so preoccupied with noticing errors that
the correct utterances in the second language go unnoticed.
While the diminishing of errors is an important criterion for
increasing language proficicency, the ultimate goal of second
language learning is the attainment of communicative fluency
(Douglas Brown).»
• Another shortcoming in error analysis is an overemphasis on
production data. Comprehension data is equally important in
developing an understanding of the process of SLA.
• Error analysis fails to account for the strategy of avoidance. Ex:
Native Japanese speakers were largely avoiding to use relative
clauses and thus not manifesting nearly as many errors as
some native Persian speakers.

16. New trends on the role of previously known
languages
Morpheme order studies: These studies argue that
there is a natural order of the acquisition of English
morphemes no matter what the one’s native language
is. Thus, there appeared to be evidence for the lack of
importance of native language influence (these
studies were based on mentalist view).
Problems: 1. The tests were biased.
2. Problematic data structure
3. Differantial learning rates and paths
revealed by other research.

17. • Avoidance: If a learner finds some particular construction in the target
language difficult to understand it is likely that he/she tries to avoid using or
producing it.
• Schachter (1974) showed that knowledge of the difference between L1 and L2
did make a difference to learners’ L2 production. But greater differences did
not imply greater errors. Instead, learners chose to avoid using the more
difficult structure.
• When speaking or writing an L2, the learner is often found to try to avoid
using difficult words or structures, and use some simpler words or structures
instead. This phenomenon in L2 learning/acquisition is termed 'avoidance
behaviour' first brought to light by Schachter (1974).
• What problems can avoidance cause?

18. Overproduction: learner produces a given L2
structure with much greater frequency than
natives of L2 do.

19. Interlanguage Transfer
What is interlanguage: An interlanguage is the term
for a dynamic linguistic system that has been
developed by a learner of a second language who
has not become fully proficient yet but is
approximating the target language: preserving
some features of their first language or
overgeneralizing target language rules in speaking
or writing the target language and creating
innovations.
Interlanguage transfer: The influence of L2 on third
or fourth languages.