Native and Non-Native Speaker Teachers' Perceptions of Errors

Abstract

This study investigates the perception of error gravity by native and non-native teachers of English in a Tunisian context. Based on the data collected from a questionnaire, the native vs. non-native dichotomy was found to be relevant to the Tunisian context since NSTs were more flexible when dealing with EFL students’ deviant utterances as long as they do not impede understanding, in contrast to the NNSTs who were harsher and insisted on the correctness of the messages. However, it is very simplistic to disfavour a particular teaching approach. Instead, it is advisable to adopt an eclectic approach ensuring a balance between accuracy and fluency by integrating grammar and correctional feedback within communicative tasks.

Keywords: Native speakers - Non-native speakers - Errors – Error Correction- Contrastive Analysis - Error Analysis

DOI: 10.7176/JEP/16-11-09

Publication date: October 30th 2025