The Collocations of Adjective Effective and Efficient in the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA): A Corpus-Based Analysis

Abstract

This corpus-based study examines two adjectives often considered synonymous, effective and efficient, using COCA (Corpus of Contemporary American English) as an analytical tool. This study aims to identify the types of collocations in these two adjectives and analyze their similarities and differences in terms of degree of formality to understand their contextual usage in sentences. The research employs a qualitative content analysis method, focusing on textual data recorded in COCA. Data were collected through documentation by extracting 400 concordance lines from COCA, consisting of 200 lines for effective and 200 lines for efficient. The data analysis followed five steps: selecting content for analysis, determining components and categories, developing coding rules, coding texts according to established rules, and analyzing the results to conclude. Additionally, the analysis involved identifying collocations based on structures such as (adjective + preposition), (adjective + to-infinitive), (adjective + that-clause), (adverb + adjective), and (adjective + noun), while also comparing the distribution of both adjectives across different genres to determine their levels of formality. The findings indicate that effective frequently collocates with nouns related to results and impact, such as date, way, and means, and is more commonly used in formal contexts, particularly in academic writing. Meanwhile, efficient often collocates with nouns associated with processes and optimization, such as way, use, and solutions, and is more flexible across different contexts, including blogs and magazines. In terms of grammatical collocations, effective frequently appears with the prepositions in and at, while efficient shows greater variation, collocating with in, with, and on. Moreover, efficient is more frequently used in to-infinitive constructions and that clauses compared to effective, indicating its role in discourse related to how things work and the steps that need to be taken.