towards an analysis of errors made by university students ... - DSpace

IOS' .
test of proportion to the number of wbt and i rg errors, made by
the Nursing students, in the specific texts; that result did
not represent an alarming discrepancy to the point of invalidating
our assumption mentioned above. It shows that Nursing students'
knowledge of the subjects discussed in the specific texts may
have been a factor which facilitated the interpretation of ngps
and, therefore, the rendition of a statistically
significant
number of wbt and irg errors was avoided. However, a different
result was obtained in the interpretation of ngps, inserted in
the non-specific texts, applied to the same group of students;
the number of wbt and i rg errors was statistically
significant.
This result makes us assume that their knowledge of the subjects,
introduced in the non-specific texts, was not a decisive factor
in avoiding the influence of the sequence of the structural
elements on the students' interpretation of ngps. This same
conclusion has been drawn from the results produced by the
application of the test of proportion
to the number of wbt and
irg errors, made by the Physics students, in both types of
texts.
Their knowledge of the subjects discussed in those texts was
presumably limited, since they were not able to avoid the
influence ,of the sequence of the structural elements in English
ngps on their equivalents in Portuguese.
If we compare the individual performance of the members
of both groups of students, with the types of texts
applied
(specific and non-specific ones) we see that the average of error
rates per student, in each ngp, was equal
in both types of texts.
That is to say, the factor 'knowledge of the subject' was not
sufficient to avoid the production
of wbt and i rg errors by
students, individually, irrespective of the fact that some texts