4. Explanation of errors
Explanation of errors involves determining their sources in order to know why the errors were made. From the point of SLA research, this is the most
important stage in an Error Analysis. According to Corder 1974: 282, this stage of Error Analysis is different
from the earlier stage. Earlier stage is related to linguistic activities, this stage comes under the scope of psycholinguistics. Therefore, our concern will be with
the psycholinguistics sources of error, means those relating to the processing mechanism involved in L2 use and to the nature of the L2 knowledge system.
To analyze students errors, it is necessary to determine the sources of errors. Two main sources are mentioned by Brown 2000:226. They are: inter-
lingual transfer and intra-lingual transfer. 1.
Inter-lingual transfer Inter-lingual transfer is the result of mother tongue influences. In this
situation, the learners may transfer concepts from the mother tongue into the target language, so when the learners feel they could express in the equivalent
way, they make some errors dealing with this matter. For example:
This bag is different with that bag . It should be “This bag is
different from that bag”. The errors occur due to the interference of the first language in this case
Indonesian Language. The Indonesian usually says “berbeda dengan”
My father wears his favorite skin jacket. Skin jacke t” here means
“leather jacket.
In Indonesian language there is no difference between leather and skin, because the Indonesian uses one word,
“kulit”. 2.
Intra-lingual transfer Intra-lingual transfer comes from the target language itself. When a learner
has already known some grammar rules about that language, some knowledge learned earlier will have certain effects on his further study.
My sister couldn‟t come to the party because rain. It should be “because of rain.
The errors occur due to the lack of knowledge of the grammar of L2. Richards 1974: 174 says that the intra-lingual errors are divided into 4
terms: 1
Over-generalization Over-generalization happens when a learner uses a certain structure that is
over-generalized in the target language. It is caused by the learners’ basic
experience of certain structure. Generally, overgeneralization is the creation of one deviant structure in place of two regular structures. For example: He can
swims . This sentence should be “He can swim”. There is an over form of a
structure verb swim become swims. The learner generalizes the pattern of the verb in all situations.
2 Ignore of rule restriction
Ignore of rule restriction is failure to observe the restriction of existing structures. That is the application of rules to context where they do not apply. For
example: She is the girl who I met yesterday.
This sentence should be “She is the girl whom I met yesterday
”. 3
Incomplete application of rules Incomplete application of rules means errors are due to the occurrence of
structures whose deviancy represents the degree of development of rules required to produce acceptable utterance. The learners fail to produce a correct sentence
according to the standards rules. For example when a teacher asked a student:
“What does she tell him?” then the student answered “She tell him to study hard”.
4 False Concepts Hypothesized
False concepts hypothesized means basically errors are the result from faulty comprehension of distinction in the target language
.
D. Definition of Writing
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