LET' S DISCUSS ON ELT

CAH AND “HE GOED!”

Introduction

In this writing, negative aspects of CAH, standing for Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis, will be revealed depending on analysis of the sentence “He goed.” As a matter of course, I appreciate some basis of CAH; however, why I want to stress its drawbacks here is because I find CAH mostly too strict.

CAH is ultimately a way of comparing languages when analyzing the difficulties learners face with in second- language- learning situation. It bases their problems in learning on similarities and differences between languages.

Let’s disclaim some problematic tenets of CAH depending on the sentence “He goed.”

1. Main source of error in the production of L2 is the native language (Grass, Selinker: 2008)

This statement is not acceptable in general. Three studies made by three linguists reported that nearly 30 % of errors deemed to be due to L1. This percentage exactly indicates the innocent potential of L1 in L2 errors.

When we look at the sentence “He goed”, it is a bit nonsense to explain this error with relation to L1. The learner imposed regularity on an irregular verb and possibly thought in this way “to create past tense form, we should add -ed to the verb”. That is, the learner made an overgeneralization in rules of L2.

2. Errors can be predicted by CAH depending on the similarities and differences between languages

Let’s think a language that has irregular verb forms like English: German language. Would CAH expect a German guy to create the sentence “He goed”. It would not because both languages have irregular verb forms which means a similarity between them. What if a German guy learning English makes such a mistake, what is the explanation? Whatever the hypothesis says, it is an error transferred from L2 not from L1. And it is a developmental error made possibly in the early stages of learning.

3. Differences signify difficulty and similarities signify ease

Difficulty in this view was equated with errors. If a learner produced an error, or errors, this was a signal that the learner was having difficulty with a particular structure or sound. Spelling errors of foreign students whose native language employed a Roman alphabet were compared with spelling errors of foreign students whose native language had little or no relation with such an alphabet by Oller and Ziahosseiny (1970). CAH predicted that the former group would be more successful. What was the result? The former group made more spelling errors, because they ignored the minute differences. But for the second group it was easier to perceive and learn the differences.

4. Language is habit and learning that language involves the establishment of new sets of habit

The example “He goed” suggests that the language can be seen in terms of structured rules instead of habits. Learner bases the language to rules. And, it is highly possible that learners make such an error in the early stages of learning.

5. One can account for errors by considering differences between L1 and L2

As other points, this is also problematic. Can you explain this error with relation to difference between any language and English? There is almost no way to relate this error to native language because the source of error is L2 itself, specifically a negative transfer from L2. That is, what is learnt in L2 disturbs the learner’s L2 performance negatively.

Conclusion

There may be some errors explained by inference of L1. But seeing L1 as main source of difficulty to learn a language and focusing mostly on similarities and differences between languages is too superficial. Some scholars realize that there are many kinds of errors that can neither be predicted nor explained by CAH. This case shows how CAH underestimates some points such as effect of L2, age of learner, proficiency of learner, motivation of learner, other languages known, principles of the language etc.