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Investigating acquisition of formulaic language and vocabulary from extensive input : a psycholinguistic and corpus study
Author
Ludwig, Christopher Eric
Supervisor
Green, Clarence
Abstract
It is widely agreed that extensive input is a core component of language acquisition for both native speakers and second language learners (Coady, 1996; Elley, 1991; Ellis, 2005; Gass et al., 1998; Krashen, 1989; Nation, 2007; Pigada & Schmitt, 2006; Waring & Nation, 2004; Webb & Chang, 2015). While there is widespread agreement on extensive input facilitating language acquisition, there are still questions on the rate and strength of acquisition. For example, rough estimates on the number of encounters needed to learn vocabulary in an extensive setting have been put forward by looking at experiments where participants were exposed to unknown vocabulary in various contexts and frequencies. However, these experiments often do not hew closely to the actual conditions of an extensive input course. This is primarily due to experiments featuring a very small number of treatments, often times only 1, and all participants being given identical input. In reality, extensive input programs are carried out over the course of months or even years and participants are expected to choose different material according to their individual reading levels and interests. To date, there has been no study attempting to fully capture the differentiated input found in an extensive reading program over numerous treatments. Additionally, there are questions within the research community on the effectiveness of L2 acquisition of formulaic sequences from extensive input with some arguing that formulaic language is acquired in a fundamentally different manner than individual vocabulary. By collecting a corpus of 58 graded readers and monitoring learner reading choices via reading logs, this study was able to quantify and group encounters of target vocabulary and formulaic sequences. Lexical items were grouped by three different encounter bands: high, medium, and low. Participants were then assessed via a lexical decision task with reaction time and accuracy recorded.
Despite earlier research estimates of 12 encounters being sufficient to attain the meaning of a word, participants showed only marginal improvements in accuracy in vocabulary and formulaic language; though a ceiling effect was noticed. In contrast, participants demonstrated sizeable advantages in reaction time in both vocabulary and formulaic sequences. For vocabulary, a statistically significant effect was found for the number of encounters and time. For formulaic sequences, there was a statistically significant effect with time. Frequency and the interaction between time and the number of encounters failed to achieve statistical significance; however, this is in large part due to solid improvements in the reaction time for the low encounter band. Gains in efficiency were noticeably higher in the high encounter band. This contrasted with individual vocabulary where the mid-encounter band saw the biggest gains. While learners saw gains at all encounter bands for formulaic language, they may receive greater benefits from greater numbers of repetition than individual vocabulary. This could have pedagogical implications in the way that extensive input programs are structured as well as teaching strategies for formulaic language acquisition. For example, educators may want to strive for a greater amount of repetition for target formulaic language than individual lexical items. Likewise, extensive material should be critically assessed to see how well it represents the formulaic language educators want leaners to encounter. Graded readers were found as not being particularly representative of the most frequent formulaic language as measured by Martinez and Schmitt (2012) or crucial categories of formulaic language like cohesive devices.
Despite earlier research estimates of 12 encounters being sufficient to attain the meaning of a word, participants showed only marginal improvements in accuracy in vocabulary and formulaic language; though a ceiling effect was noticed. In contrast, participants demonstrated sizeable advantages in reaction time in both vocabulary and formulaic sequences. For vocabulary, a statistically significant effect was found for the number of encounters and time. For formulaic sequences, there was a statistically significant effect with time. Frequency and the interaction between time and the number of encounters failed to achieve statistical significance; however, this is in large part due to solid improvements in the reaction time for the low encounter band. Gains in efficiency were noticeably higher in the high encounter band. This contrasted with individual vocabulary where the mid-encounter band saw the biggest gains. While learners saw gains at all encounter bands for formulaic language, they may receive greater benefits from greater numbers of repetition than individual vocabulary. This could have pedagogical implications in the way that extensive input programs are structured as well as teaching strategies for formulaic language acquisition. For example, educators may want to strive for a greater amount of repetition for target formulaic language than individual lexical items. Likewise, extensive material should be critically assessed to see how well it represents the formulaic language educators want leaners to encounter. Graded readers were found as not being particularly representative of the most frequent formulaic language as measured by Martinez and Schmitt (2012) or crucial categories of formulaic language like cohesive devices.
Date Issued
2018
Call Number
P118 Lud
Date Submitted
2018