mapping deviation from the norm: a corpus-driven analysis of phrasal verb creativity in iranian efl writing

Recent developments in corpus analysis have inspired studies that examined both how often linguistic structures occur and their unique, learner-specific qualities in second language acquisition. this corpus-based study investigated creativity and (un)naturalness in phrasal verb usage in writings by iranian efl learners at ielts and pre-ielts levels. the corpus comprised 500 writing samples collected from candidates enrolled in ielts preparation courses at two institutions in shiraz. wordsmith software (v.4.0) was used to locate all particle elements. each instance preceded by a lexical verb was identified and, employing the zar test of initialization, phrasal verbs were classified and quantified. their combinations, particles, and contexts were then analyzed using the oxford dictionary of phrasal verbs as a reference. using the british national corpus (bnc) as a benchmark for natural usage, learner deviations were identified. results revealed a significant under-use of phrasal verbs alongside prevalent grammatical deviations in their application.