Acquiring Foreign Language Vocabulary Through Meaningful Linguistic Context: Where is the Limit to Vocabulary Learning?

J Psycholinguist Res (2017) 46:395413

DOI 10.1007/s10936-016-9444-0

Published online: 30 June 2016 Springer Science+Business Media New York 2016

Abstract The present studies examined the effects of varying degrees of unfamiliar vocabulary within written discourse on individuals abilities to use linguistic context for the purposes of translation and comprehension (i.e., lexical inferencing). Prose varied in the number of foreign words introduced into each sentence (e.g., 0 through 7 content words per sentence). Furthermore, Krashens Input Hypothesis and the Evaluation component of the Involvement Load Hypothesis were tested to determine the degree at which non-comprehensible input hinders the ability of a learner to successfully use linguistic context for translation and comprehension. Results indicated that, as the number of foreign words per sentence, i.e., non-comprehensible input, increased the ability to successfully translate foreign words and create situational models for comprehension begins to decrease especially beyond ve unfamiliar words per sentence. This result suggests that there is an optimal level of effectiveness in the use of a linguistic context strategy for learning foreign language vocabulary, but also that there is a limit to the strategys effectiveness. Implications and applications to the eld of foreign language learning are discussed.

Keywords Linguistic inferencing Context learning Vocabulary learning

Introduction

How does one best acquire vocabulary of a new language? Although, this is possibly one of the most frequently asked questions by foreign language learners, many individuals overlook the fact that, to learn a language, one clearly needs to learn the appropriate vocabulary of that language. To acquire this rst step, learners are continuously faced with, or have the option of choosing, a variety of language learning techniques. To better facilitate the vocabulary

B Bernardo de la Garza

[email protected] Our Lady of the Lake University, 505 N. Villarreal St., P.O. Box 420, La Feria, TX 78559, USA2 Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, USA

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Bernardo de la Garza1 Richard Jackson Harris2

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396 J Psycholinguist Res (2017) 46:395413

acquisition process, foreign language learners may frequently implement numerous techniques in the hope of acquiring the new vocabulary; yet, many leaners are quick to abandon a technique, or worse, leave attempting to learn...