A Multi-dimensional Model Of Error Analysis In FLT

In the late 1950's and early 1960's, the theories of structural linguistics andbehaviourism were disregarded on account of the development of transfOrmational-generative grammatical fOrmat. Researchers found, in their experiments, that ContrastiveAnalysis (CA) relying itself on such theoretical basis can barel}' predict errors and that Llinterference was not the prime cause of learner's errors. They lost their interest in CA andCA, fOr the obsolescence of its psychological and linguistic fOundations, has its fall-down,thus the development of Error Analysis (EA).EA saw its resurgence in the l960's and got prosperous in the l970's. Different from~ CA, EA pays more attention to the learner itself rather than the surface linguistic fOrms. Itexplores the learning procedures and the strategies the learl1er processes in his learningprocesses. As is Anown, learning language is a psycl1ological procedure where the learnerutilizes the language knowIedge he has learned and tl1e strategies he possesses. Non-eriorphenomenon may express what is learnt but can not explain hou' it is learnt. Only byanalyzing errors occurring in the process of L1sing language cal1 t'e explore the leamingprocedures and learning strategies. Error is therefore shifted tYom vvhat should be avoidedand corrected to 1he crucial approach to the exploration of the lear11er's cognitive process.However, EA is, to a great extent, constrained by its lil11itations, especially in error7ii A Multi-dimensional MOdel Of El'I'ol' AI7al}sis in FLTdefinition, identification and classification. Error is defined as the linguistic devianceoccurring where the leamer fails to fOllow a certain language rule, but it is difficult toidentify the context and inappropriacy (i.e. covert error) or decide in which occasionsavoidance hinders errors. Moreover, a unified criterion for error classification can hard1ybe decided. There are not adequate unified criteria for error classification. In spite of manyestablished categories of leamer's errors, such as "interlingual" and "intralingual" errorsby Richards (l974) and "error" and "mistake" by Corder (l967), difficulties still exist inactual operation. The prime problem the present dissertation fOcuses on is that EA paysmuch attention to the superficial ill-formedness while neglects the pragmatic failurederiving from the intercultural unawareness. -In lights of the above-mentioned limitations, we attempt, in this dissertation, toestablish a multi-dimensional model to expound, flom the different angles of language -fOrm and use, the natural relation between elror and pragn1atic thilure, and their mutualeffects on the communicative force. The present dissertation sets forth that the multi-dimensional model for EA can make a comprehensive explanation of the cognitive processof erring, at the parts of linguistic rules, pragmatic situation, CulturaI transference, leamingstrategies, cognitive psychology and learner personality, thus the adequate data availablefOr the research of FLTThis multi-dimensional model makes EA no longer limit its fLnction to linguisticdeviance and leamers' language incompetence, but broadens well enough to the study ofthe extra-linguistic situation and the learners' communicative incompetence. It expoundsthe nature of error as follows.l. Error's effect on the communicative intelligibility is not so great as learners believe.The gravity of error may change with diverse situations. -2. The effects on the intelligibility are decided not only by the nature of the error, butalso by the fact that to which extent the linguistic situation promotes the hearer's ~interpretation of what the speaker intended3. Globa1 error, compared with local one, has greater influence on communication.4. The reason why the learners who often use communicative strategies morefrequently make themselves misunderstood is not n1ainly because the learners have usedwrong strategies but because the particu...