The Effect of Collocational Competence on Translation Accuracy of Translation Trainees

Abstract

Although it is widely acknowledged that collocations play an important role in the field of second language acquisition, a number of previous studies have reported students’ lack of collocational competence and the difficulties they encounter in learning and using collocations. The present study examines the effect of the productive and receptive knowledge of lexical and grammatical collocations on the accuracy of the translation done by Iranian EFL learners studying translation course at university. Data for this study were collected from 60 participants studying at Azad university at BA level. The participants’ productive collocational knowledge was measured by three gap-filling tests: verb-noun and adjective-noun collocation tests where the initial letter of the collocant was provided and a verb-preposition collocation test where the meaning of the phrasal verb was supplied. Their receptive collocational knowledge was measured by an appropriateness judgment in which participants have to circle the number corresponding to the underlined part of a sentence that is judged unacceptable. Regarding the translation quality of the learners, a text including five paragraphs was given to them and then the accuracy of the translated work was measured by Khanmohammad and OsanloRubic (2009) model. Results of the study indicated that there is a significant relationship between the receptive knowledge and productive knowledge of lexical collocations and grammatical colligations and the accuracy of the translation.