Interference between First and Second Languages

I have found in this article where the autor  Beardsmore (1982) suggests that many of the difficulties a second language learner has with the phonology, vocabulary and grammar of Language 2 are due to the interference of habits from Language 1.

According to the formal elements of L1 are used within the context of L2, resulting in errors in L2, as the structures of the languages, L1 and L2 are different.

The relationship between the two languages must then be considered. Albert and Obler (1978) claim that people show more lexical interference on similar items. So it may follow that languages with more similar structures (eg English and French) are more susceptible to mutual interference than languages with fewer similar features (eg English and Japanese).

On the other hand, a good deal of researchers confirms that the linguistic and cognitive processes of second language learning in young children are in general similar to first language processes.

Most of them concluded that there are similar strategies and linguistic faetures and the same are present in first and second language in the case of children.

But Dulay and Burt went among their investigation and found that 86 percent of more tan 500 errors made by spanish-spaeaking children learning English reflected normal developmental characteristics and at the end, not interference between errors from the first language.

Ellis (1997) raises the need to distinguish between errors and mistakes and makes an important distinction between the two. He says that errors reflect gaps in the learner’s knowledge; they occur because the learner does not know what is correct. Mistakes reflect occasional lapses in performance; they occur because, in a particular instance, the learner is unable to perform what he or she knows.

Carroll (1964) argues that the circumstances of learning a second language are like those of a mother tongue. Sometimes there are interferences and occasionally responses from one language system will intrude into speech in the other language.