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Replication Studies
1.
Introduction
Research has indicated that L1 words can be learned incidentally through reading (e.g. Jenkins, Stein & Wysocki 1984; Nagy, Herman & Anderson 1985) and listening (Elley 1989; Robbins & Ehri 1994). Motivation for this research has been the hypothesis that the vast majority of L1 words are learned incidentally. Studies of incidental vocabulary learning through reading provide support for this as they have consistently shown that words are learned gradually through repeated encounters in context. Research has also shown that L2 vocabulary is also learned incidentally through reading (e.g. Pitts, White & Krashen 1989; Day, Omura & Hiramatsu 1991; Horst, Cobb & Meara 1998) and listening (Brown, Waring & Donkaewbua 2008), and that gains are a function of frequency (e.g. Horst, Cobb & Meara 1998; Webb 2007). However, a lack of L2 input may limit the extent of L2 incidental vocabulary learning to the high frequency words (Cobb 2007), leading some researchers to argue that a large proportion of L2 words may be learned through instruction rather than incidentally (Laufer 2001, 2003; Webb 2008a).
Although there is an abundance of research that has investigated incidental vocabulary learning through reading, there have been few studies that have looked at the potential for learning L1 and L2 words through listening. The best known study of incidental vocabulary learning through listening was conducted by Elley (1989). Elley's research was innovative in that it was the first study to show that vocabulary could be learned incidentally through listening, and that teacher explanations of word meanings during story telling may increase the size of these gains. One reason why research on vocabulary learning through listening is lacking may be that it is more difficult to learn words through listening than through reading (Brown, Waring & Donkaewbua 2008). Thus, perhaps the lack of research in this area may be due to an absence of statistically significant findings indicating that vocabulary is consistently learned through listening.
Listening plays an important role in vocabulary growth; between 5,000 and 6,000 word families are learned through listening by pre-reading children (Goulden, Nation & Read 1990; Biemiller 2005). Because of the significance of Elley's 1989 study, and the paucity of research in this area, the best place to start with new studies...