LEXICAL CHOICE AMONG NEW STUDENTS VERSUS OLD STUDENTS IN UNIVERSITY CAMPUS

Abstract

Language is a living, social phenomenon, always changing and reflecting the identities, experiences and social interactions of the people who use it. In schools, especially in universities, students develop a style of language which distinguishes them from other social groupings. These language disparities are shaped by variables such as age, educational experience, peer interaction, exposure to social media, and the institutional culture. This research is concerned with linguistic traits of new and old university students and the influence of university life on language development.  The study is quantitative in nature. Data was collected by survey from 49 students of a public sector institution in Pakistan. The data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software. Frequency distributions were used to determine trends in linguistic variation. The study indicates that students are likely to employ informal language, slang, code switching and school specific jargon in their day to day interactions. The language elements used by the pupils were “bunking”, “ratta”, “burger”, “show-off” and “tight/brutal”. The data further show that over 85.7% of the respondents said that they experienced changes in their use of language after joining the institution. Peer groups were the primary factor in language adaptation.  The results of the research show that university students constitute a separate speech community with common linguistic traits and social identities. The results are in keeping with sociolinguistic ideas that language variety is a result of social interaction, group membership and communication demands. This study adds to a growing body of work on sociolinguistic and language variance in higher education environment.