A Corpus-based Study Of Behavioral Profiles Of English Synonyms

Given the paucity of fine-grained research on the semantics and usage differences of nominal synonyms,this study aims to explore the behavioral profiling of a set of English synonymous nouns(blunder,error,fault and mistake),particularly focusing on collostructional strengths,hierarchical clustering of usage patterns and register differences based on the Corpus of Contemporary American English(COCA).The major findings of the study are presented as follows:(1)All of the English synonymous nouns co-occur with activity verbs,communication verbs,mental verbs and verbs of existence or relationship.However,blunder,error and mistake are more synonymous than fault in terms of verbal collocates.(2)These English synonyms collocate with size/quantity/extent adjectives,evaluative/emotive adjectives,miscellaneous descriptive adjectives and topical/other adjectives.Generally,blunder,fault and mistake are more synonymous than error in co-occurring with adjectives.(3)Moreover,there also exist morphological,syntactic and semantic distinctions in behavioral profiles.Specifically,blunder and mistake share the most similarities among these synonyms,both of which have subtle differences with error.Fault shows some striking differences in this set of synonyms.(4)These nouns display register differences.The cline of the four nouns in terms of formality(from lowest to highest)is: mistake < fault < blunder <error.The results of this study have made some significant headway in differentiating English synonyms in general and nominal synonyms in particular in a systematic fashion.Furthermore,this study has validated the effectiveness and applicability of behavioral profile approach to the study of English synonymy.It is of some practical significance for teaching and learning English synonyms.