Relationship Between Knowledge on English Grammar and Vocabulary and the Ability to Translate Texts

Abstract

The purpose of this research was to investigate 1) the relationship between the knowledge of grammatical structures and translation ability, 2) the relationship between the knowledge of vocabulary and translation ability, and 3) the relationship between the knowledge of grammatical structures and vocabulary, and the translation ability of Master of Arts students in the Program of Translation for Education and Business at King Mongkut’s University of Technology North Bangkok. The samples, selected using purposive sampling, were ten students in the aforementioned program in the Faculty of Applied Arts, in academic year 2015. The research instruments were multiple-choice grammar, multiple-choice vocabulary, and written translation tests. The statistical analyses employed were frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, Pearson’s correlation coefficient, and simple and multiple regression analyses. The results showed that 1) the students’ knowledge of grammar had a positive relationship with their translation ability and could be used for the prediction of translation ability at 30.80 percent; 2) their knowledge of vocabulary had a positive relationship with translation ability and could be used for predicting their ability to translate at 24.70 percent; and 3) together, the students’ knowledge of grammar and vocabulary had a positive relationship with their translation ability and could be used to predict their ability to translate English texts at 29.10 percent. It was found that the score for the students’ knowledge of grammar was a more effective predictive score for their translation ability than their vocabulary score. However, there was only a slight difference between the ability to predict translation ability when using the students’ knowledge of grammar score alone and when using the scores for both grammatical and vocabulary knowledge together.