Abstract

Collocational competence largely contributes to vocabulary knowledge and hence to language proficiency. The present study examines the collocational competence of Arab undergraduate students who study English in a foreign language (EFL) environment. Focusing on lexical collocations, the study addresses four questions; (1) What is the learners’ level of collocational competence?, (2) How does their collocational competence develop with increased language exposure?, (3) Does their collocational competence vary based on the word class of the collocates?, and (4) What are the types of collocational errors they produce?  Using a specially designed test, the collocational competence of 90 Arab undergraduate learners at three academic levels in a private Saudi university was assessed. Findings showed that the collocational competence of learners was notably unsatisfactory despite the fact that English is the medium of instruction at the University. It was also found that collocational competence improves with increased language exposure but at a slow rate, and that learners were more confident in their use of verb + noun collocations than adjective + noun collocations. The study also revealed that learners produce more intralingual than interlingual errors of collocations. The findings are discussed in relation to the literature on collocational competence and pedagogical implications are presented.

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