부산 경남 지역 대학생의 어휘적 언어 상요에 관한 연구

A Study on the Use of Lexical Collocation by University Students in Busan, Gyeongnam

The Purpose of the present study is to investigate Korean EFL learners' knowledge of English lexical collocations in its relation to their general English proficiency. Participants in the study were 227 university students of 6 different universities and were divided into three different groups based on their TOEIC test scores. The collocation test consisted of 25 items of 5 categories : verb+noun, noun+noun, adjective+noun, adverb+verb, adverb+adjective collocations. Data analyses were performed with SPPSS utilizing correlation, one-way ANOVA, and frequency. The result are as follows: First, the students' general English proficiency correlated significantly with their collocational competence. Also, there was a significant difference among the three groups in the performance of the collation test. Second, the most difficult type was adjective+adverb and the easiest one was adjective+noun for all proficiency group. Third, the average score of Likert scales was 2.72 in the students' problem-solving process(cognitive thinking process). That means most students solved the questions without any confidence. The findings show that Korean university students' collocational competence is very limited and teachers should encourage them to notice the importance of collocations. Above all, practical collocations should be explicitly taught to learners depending on their proficiency level.