A study on the confusion of “bian (变)”, “gaibian (改变)” and “bianhua (变化)” in Vietnamese students’ Chinese

Abstract

The three words “变”, “改变” and “变化” have quite similar meanings, but their usage has some differences. This article focuses on analyzing the phenomenon of confusion among Vietnamese students. The analysis results of the Vietnamese learners’ Chinese interlanguage corpus show that there is only confusion between “变” and “改变”, between “变” and “变化”, there is no confusion between “改变” and “变化”. The confusion between “变” and “改变” is one-sided confusion, which occurs when “变” directly takes the object. Confusion between “变” and “变化” is one-sided confusion, occurs when “变” is the subject, object, or verb predicate of the sentence, or occurs when “变化” takes object, modal complement, or resultant complement. The cause of the confusion is that the students do not clearly understand the difference between these three words in terms of syntax.