Second Language Interference

In terms of language learning, a popular viewpoint is under the heated debate that interference, also regarded as negative transfer (Odlin 2003), from first language (L1) yield a major number of mistakes when people are learning their second language (L2) and it is believed rectifying such mistakes as soon as possible is beneficial to averting the emergence of bad habits. With regard to the first bit of the idea above, contrastive analysis hypothesis (CAH) argues a similar opinion supporting it that errors are the outcome, to which transfer from L1 of learners leads (Lightbown and Spada 2013). Then, as to the latter part of the statement, teachers hold the responsibility to help students improve the second language learning in the means of

Also, Selinker (1972), cited by Lightbown and Spada (2013), names it interlanguage. In terms of the nature of interlanguage, it cannot be wholly explained by the target input nor by L1 (Ortega 2009). One of the four significant interlanguage processes is the overgeneralization, which is applying a form or a rule not only to contexts where it is suitable for but also to other contexts where it is inappropriate for (Ortega, 2009). To be more specific, a good case in point is overuse of the English simple past suffix-ed, which is an ordinary error made by L2 learners so as to ‘make irregular forms fit regular patterns’ (Ortega 2009, p.117). Since learning that applying -ed to a verb as the form of a simple past tense is a general rule, L2 learners then overregularize the past tense of irregular verbs as well that adding -ed to the end of the verb. For instance, they apply runed instead of ran, demonstrating clear evidence of progress in that it illustrates the learner has already mastered a target language rule. What is more, as the developmental solution appearing in second language acquisition (SLA), it is attested that such solution also exists in the duration when young children are learning their mother tongue. Apart from it, it is argued that learners appear to make the identical