The Influence of The Negative Transfer of Chinese on English Vocabulary Study 英语论文.doc

The Influence of The Negative Transfer of Chinese on English Vocabulary Study I. Introduction Second Language Acquisition (SLA) is a very complex process. The factors which influence the rate and level of achievement of the second language are various, such as age, motivation, personalities, language aptitude, cognitive process, etc. However, the mother tongue plays a very important part in it, for it always functions in the process of Second Language Acquisition, especially in non-naturalistic learning surroundings. In the elementary stage of Second Language Acquisition, language learners simply use the knowledge of the mother tongue for reference. As Rod Ellis (Ellis, 1999:37-38) has suggested, making use of the mother tongue embodies a common psychological process, that is, learners have to depend on what they have learnt in their mother tongue to help them understand the knowledge of a new language. The transfer of the mother tongue refers to the influence that the learner’s mother tongue exerts over the acquisition of the second language. The transfer theory believes that, if the habits of the mother tongue are supposed to help to form and develop the habits of the target language (the second language), or more concretely to say, if the mother tongue possesses certain similar or totally identical characteristics as the target language, the mother tongue will facilitate the learning of the target language. This effect is known as positive transfer. On the other hand, if the habits of the mother tongue are supposed to prevent the learner from learning the habits of the target language, that is, the learner has to totally depend on the language rules of the mother tongue to learn the target language, the problems of the negative transfer arises. In most of the western countries, language learners learn their second languages that have the same origin as their mother tongue. Similar cultural background and language characteristics make the positive transfer