읽기를 통한 반복과 입력 강화가 부수적 어휘 습득에 미치는 영향

Abstract

The present study investigated the effects of repetition and input enhancement on incidental vocabulary learning from reading a graded reader. It also examined whether simplified texts such as graded readers are more helpful in acquiring certain aspects of vocabulary knowledge, namely, word-form recognition or meaning recognition. To ascertain whether words of different frequency of occurrence rate were more likely to be learned and retained, 12 target words with three different frequency of occurrence (2, 4, 6) were selected. Each frequency involved four different words, and two words among them appeared in the text at a relatively short distance from each other, while the other two words were a relatively long distance apart. Twelve nonsense words were used in the task to ensure that the subject had no prior knowledge of the target vocabulary. Four measures of vocabulary knowledge - word-form recognition, word-category selection, meaning recognition and meaning recall tests - were administered to assess the degree of acquisition of vocabulary knowledge. In the experiment, 86 college students were randomly assigned to read either an enhanced or an unenhanced text that contained the target vocabulary. Soon after the task, four types of vocabulary test were conducted and a delayed test took place two weeks later. The result of the repeated measures of variance analysis showed that word-form recognition learned the most and the meaning recall the least. Both of the immediate and delayed tests revealed a significant positive effect on vocabulary learning. When all the tests were categorized into two groups in accordance with their characteristics of form-recognition and meaning-recognition, the mean scores showed that form-recognition was much higher than meaning recognition. The repeated measures of variance analysis were taken to identify statistical differences. As a result, the simplified text was determined to be better at acquiring word-form recognition than meaning recognition, and it led to a statistical difference. More repeated encounters generally lead to more vocabulary learning. However, the effects of repetition were not observed consistently in this study. More frequent words were not more likely to be learned except when the meaning recall was statistically significant. Consistency was also not observed in the effects of the repetition interval of the target vocabulary. In order to determine the reason unexpected patterns of acquisition occurred, the correct answer rate of each word was examined. This proved to be over 70% in the word-form recognition, which means participants answered correctly 8 out of 12 questions. In contrast, a correct answer rate of 15% or lower was shown in the meaning recall in both the immediate and delayed tests. Four repeated exposure words were shown to be more informative contextually in the text. The effects of contextual information rather led to more vocabulary learning in the study. In most vocabulary tests, the retention rate was quite high. More than 90 percent of word-form recognition and meaning recognition remained in the subjects’ memory, and approximately 80 percent were remembered in word-category selection, while only 60 percent of the acquired words were remembered in the meaning recall test. The mean scores of the input enhancement group were higher in meaning recognition and meaning recall in the immediate test, and higher in all vocabulary knowledge tests, except for word-form recognition, in the delayed test. However, input enhancement had significantly positive effects only on the delayed meaning recall test. The result revealed that input enhancement had a partially positive effect on the meaning recognition, and not on the acquisition of word-form recognition. The implication of the research findings are discussed, and directions for future studies are suggested.