Unveiling the subtle distinctions between change and alter: A corpus-based investigation of the English synonyms

Abstract

This corpus-based study examines the subtle similarities and differences between change and alter. Drawing on the Corpus of Contemporary American English, the findings show that these verbs tend to co-occur with overlapping noun and adverb collocates, confirming the existence of a robust semantic similarity. With respect to the semantic preference, the noun collocates of these verbs were distributed similarly in all the discourse domains, which again accentuated the appreciable semantic similarity between these two verbs. However, the specificities in their collocational and semantic preference make their interchangeability in all contexts impossible. The findings are of value for EFL teachers and learners as they uncover clear distinctions between these two verbs.