Kontrastiivisia

Kontrastiivisia is a term used in linguistics, particularly in the context of second language acquisition and language teaching. It refers to the contrastive analysis hypothesis, a theory that suggests that errors made by language learners are due to the interference of their native language. The hypothesis proposes that by comparing the structure of the learner's native language with that of the target language, one can predict potential areas of difficulty and error. This involves identifying similarities and differences between the two languages in terms of phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon.

The core idea behind contrastive analysis is that where the two languages are similar, learning should be relatively easy, and where they differ, learning will be more difficult, leading to errors. For example, a speaker of a language with no grammatical gender might struggle with gender agreement in a language that does have it. Similarly, differences in word order between the native and target language can lead to syntactic errors.

While influential, the contrastive analysis hypothesis has been subject to criticism. Critics argue that it oversimplifies the learning process, as it doesn't account for other factors that influence language acquisition, such as cognitive processes, learning strategies, and the developmental stage of the learner. Furthermore, not all predicted errors actually occur, and some errors are not predicted by contrastive analysis but arise from universal learning tendencies. Despite these limitations, contrastive analysis remains a useful tool for identifying potential learning challenges and informing pedagogical approaches.