Content uploaded by Batia Laufer
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Batia Laufer on Dec 05, 2014
Content may be subject to copyright.
Why are Some Words More Difficult than Others? Some Intralexical Factors that Affect the Learning of Words
Abstract
Dieser Artikel versucht auf der Grundlage von empirischen Untersuchungen einige Faktoren zu beschreiben, die dafür verantwortlich sind, daß ein neues Wort in einer Fremdsprache schwerer oder leichter erlernt wird. Die Faktoren, die dieser Artikel beschreibt, sind ‘intralexikalisch’, d.h. sie stammen aus dem betreffenden Wort selbst; z.B. Schwierigkeit der Aussprache oder morphologische Komplexität.
... It is widely held that vocabularies are considered the building blocks of coherent and cohesive (con)text, meaning and hence, language as a whole. If this is true, it follows that it is the more words an L2 learner has and the more he/she is able to access such an aspect of knowledge what makes such a learner effectively incorporate new concepts into existing conceptual schemata and hence, producing pieces of language 1 suitable for a particular context surpassing his/her peers (Hennings, 2000;Sonaiya, 1991;Llach, 2005, Shormani, 2012a, 2012b, 2013a2014;Zughoul, 1991;James, 1998;Khalil, 1985;Han, 2004;Daneman, 1988;McCarthy, 1990;Saville-Troike, 2006;Laufer, 1986Laufer, , 1990Laufer, , 1997Wang and Wen, 2002;Bahns, 1993, among others). This is true especially if communication impediment is to be taken into consideration for the fact that lexes and lexes alone are what results in such a problem. ...
... Several researchers and SLA scholars (Liu, 1999;Yuan & Lin, 2001;Lien, 2003;Shormani, 2012a;Shormani &Sohbani, 2012) argue that collocation knowledge helps L2 learners have a good command on communication and develop a native-like proficiency. However, lexical error studies are relative few compared to those done on other types of errors such as syntactic, phonological, morphological, etc. (Tomasello, 2007;James, 1998;Han, 2000, Cook, 2003Taylor, 1976;Gass&Selinker, 2008;Laufer, 1986Laufer, , 1990Laufer, , 1997, fewer are those studies tackling collocation errors (Shormani, 2012a, 2012b, Shormani &Sohbani, 2012Rababah, 2003;Zughoul, 1979;Mukattash, 1979Mukattash, , 1981Mahmoud, 2005Mahmoud, , 2011Wray, 2000;Taylor, 1986) and fewest, if any at all, are those deeply probing the sources of such errors and their consequences (Shormani &Sohbani, 2012;Mahmoud, 2005). This is due to two major reasons: the first is the fact that studying collocation errors and probing deeply their sources is much challenging and complicated for their nature and what information they involve in addition to the difficulty in assessing them. ...
An L2 learner is distinguished from another inasmuch as he/she has a good command on formulaic language like collocations which are deemed to be very specific to native speakers of a language being part of their competence and intuition. If this is true, it follows that English collocation, for instance, will be difficult for those learning it as an L2. Thus, this study is set to provide empirical evidence for collocabilty difficulties encountered by Yemeni Arabic-speaking advanced learners of English through investigating collocation errors deeply probing their sources, consequences and the cognitive strategies employed while acquiring such collocations. Sixty essays selected randomly from 107 given to Yemeni advanced learners majoring in English as home assignments. After identifying, classifying and tabulating errors, sources were classified into four categories, viz. L1-transfer, L2-influence, mutual and unrecognized.(30%) of the errors committed were ascribed to L1-transfer, (54%) to L2-influence, (13%) to mutual and (3%) to unrecognized. Based on such findings, I have proposed a UG-Model for learning collocations based on subcategorization and selectional restrictions. Though Yemeni learners are involved in this study, this model could be utilized for learning collocations in similar ES/FL contexts.
... Over the past decades, research evidence has accumulated, supporting the influences of sublexical, lexical and contextual features on visual word recognition (for a review, see Balota, 1994). When it comes to vocabulary learning, such factors are supposed to Orthographic, Semantic, and Contextual Influences on Initial Processing and Learning of Novel Words During Reading: Evidence From Eye Movements moderate the level of difficulty for L2 learners (for a review, see Laufer, 1990). Vocabulary learning is a multi-faceted process. ...
... In the field of short-term memory research, word length effect-that is, serial recall for short words is better than that for long words-has been regarded as one of the benchmark findings (Baddeley et al., 1975). Many studies on L2 vocabulary learning have also revealed similar advantages of short words (for a review, see Laufer, 1990). Hiebert and colleagues (Hiebert et al., 2019) found that number of letters negatively impacted the performance of both L1 and L2 speakers of English in vocabulary knowledge tests. ...
This study investigated the impacts of orthographic, semantic and contextual variables—including word length, concreteness, and contextual support—on the processing and learning of novel L2 words when first encountered during reading. EFL students were recruited to read sentences for comprehension, embedded with unfamiliar L2 words that occurred once. Immediately after this, they received a form recognition test, a meaning recall test, and a meaning recognition test. Eye-movement data showed significant effects of word length on both early and late processing of novel words, along with effects of concreteness only on late-processing eye-tracking measures. Informative contexts were read slower than neutral contexts, yet contextual support did not show any direct influence on the processing of novel words. Interestingly, initial learning of abstract words was better than concrete words in terms of form and meaning recognition. Attentional processing of novel L2 words, operationalized by total reading time, positively predicted L2 learners’ recognition of new orthographic forms. Taken together, these results suggest: 1) orthographic, semantic and contextual factors play distinct roles for initial processing and learning of novel words; 2) online processing of novel words contributes to L2 learners’ initial knowledge of unfamiliar lexical items acquired from reading.
... The reasons might be that the two items were abstract. Abstract words tend to be more difficult to learn than concreate ones (Laufer, 1990;). Remembering abstract items may require some strategies, and repeated oral reading may not be helpful to retain abstract items for long. ...
Research has shown that second language (L2) learners generally lack multiword expression knowledge, and L2 researchers and practitioners have tried various techniques to assist L2 learners to acquire it more efficiently. This study adopted an under-researched technique—repeated oral reading—to enhance the retention of high-frequency multiword items by 62 EFL college students divided into experimental (n =38) and control (n =24) groups. Fifteen unfamiliar multiword items comprising only known individual words were selected through a pre-test based on a theme-based text. All students received a formal instruction first, followed by the experimental group orally reading the text six times under a time constraint. A two-week delayed post-test was used to test students’ retention of four dimensions of multiword knowledge: aural forms and aural meanings, and written meanings and use. Except for use, the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group in the other three dimensions. Four fixed factors (oral reading speed, prior vocabulary knowledge, dimensions of multiword knowledge, and the number of words per item) were analyzed via GLMM. Results showed three factors had significant effects on retaining multiword items except oral reading speed. Based on the results, pedagogical implications are discussed and suggestions are made.
... produce a positive cross-language transfer, but rather had a hindering effect. Previous studies suggest that this result may stem from a greater difference between learners' L1 and Chinese, which makes learners more likely to pay attention to the differences, facilitating acquisition (Yuan, 2004;Wu and Zhao, 2018); or it could be that a high degree of cross-language similarity makes learners more likely to ignore differences, making acquisition more difficult (Laufer, 1990;Ellis, 1999). This result can only occur when language features' similarity interference effects are significantly stronger than language differences' facilitation effects, and significantly stronger than L1 transfer effects. ...
How linguistic distance affects second language acquisition is a major concern in cross-language transfer research. However, no study has explored how systematic differences between Chinese and learners’ native language (L1) influences Chinese character, vocabulary, and grammar acquisition, or how these influences change as Chinese proficiency improves. To address this, we employed the World Atlas of Language Structures (WALS) index method to multidimensionally quantify the linguistic distance between Chinese and L1, and examined the effect of systematic linguistic distance on acquisition of Chinese character (Quasi-Experiment 1), vocabulary (Quasi-Experiment 2), and grammatical knowledge (Quasi-Experiment 3) in Chinese as a second language (CSL) learners with elementary, intermediate, and advanced Chinese proficiency levels. We examined a random sample of 58,240 CSL learners’ test scores from 24 different L1 backgrounds, and analyzed 2,250 CSL learners’ Chinese character, vocabulary, and grammar scores in each of the three quasi-experiments. We found that closer linguistic distance facilitated more favorable Chinese character and vocabulary acquisition at elementary, intermediate, and advanced Chinese proficiency levels, and that the influence of linguistic distance on CSL learners’ vocabulary acquisition tended to decrease as Chinese proficiency increased. Finally, linguistic difference did not significantly affect CSL learners’ grammar acquisition at elementary proficiency, but as Chinese proficiency improved, an L1 interference effect occurred among CSL learners with a short linguistic distance from Chinese, which hindered grammar acquisition. These results suggest that linguistic distance has differential proficiency-dependent effects on Chinese character, vocabulary, and grammar acquisition.
... Concerning the first matter we focused on, an important issue in vocabulary learning is the part of speech of a given word. Certain word classes seem to be more difficult to acquire compared to others, with nouns being the easiest word class, verbs and adjectives being somewhere in the middle of the continuum, and adverbs being the hardest class (as it is summarised by (Laufer 1990)). Concerning nouns and verbs, the word classes we focus on in this paper, empirical evidence from studies employing a picture naming task in bilectal children has shown better performance in object naming compared to action naming (Kambanaros et al. 2013). ...
The aim of the present study is to investigate vocabulary teaching in children with refugee backgrounds. The effectiveness of three vocabulary interventions—flashcards, pantomime, and use of contextual cues—is examined within the context of formal primary education in Greece. The improvement of the children’s vocabulary is also assessed in association with factors related to the students’ background as well as factors related to the words taught. Thirty-three pupils from the second to the sixth primary school grade attended the teaching interventions. Their first languages are Arabic, Farsi, and Kurdish. According to the results, flashcards and pantomime significantly improve children’s second language vocabulary skills, while this finding does not apply to the intervention involving contextual cues. Age is found to play a role only in the latter intervention, while the effectiveness of no intervention was influenced by word category.
... Vocabulary is recognized as the most important component of a language (Al-Jarf, 2007;Gass & Selinker, 2001). According to Laufer (1990), vocabulary is considered central to both native and non-native language acquisition and a solid knowledge of vocabulary is essential in all stages of second language acquisition, without which learners cannot use the language to communicate properly. McCarthy (1991) similarly holds that learners will not be able to communicate meaningfully if they cannot use a wide range of vocabulary, regardless of how well they know the grammar and phonology of the language. ...
Top-down and bottom-up reading processes have attracted attention from researchers in ESL/EFL teaching/learning. However, the role of these processes and their combination in L2 vocabulary learning and retention still needs further research. Given this, this study sought to consider their role in L2 vocabulary learning and retention by Iranian EFL learners. To this end, 100 intermediate participants were chosen from among a convenience sample of 180 EFL learners. They were then assigned to four random groups (Top-down, Bottom-up, Combined and Control). Finally, target vocabulary learning and retention were assessed by an immediate (learning) and delayed (retention) post-test. ANOVA results revealed that the bottom-up group outperformed the control group. The combined group also did better than the top-down and control groups on the post-test. However, the difference between the top-down and control group did not prove significant. In addition, the combined group surpassed the other groups in terms of the gain in mean scores. As for retention, both the bottom-up and combined processes resulted in the retention of the target vocabulary, with the former being even more effective. It can be suggested that these processes can be regarded as complementary factors in L2 vocabulary learning and retention.
... The empirical studies (Burner, 2016;Chen, Kettle, Klenowski, & May, 2013;Hwang & Chang, 2011;Ng, 2014) conclude that formative assessment if used correctly has a positive impact on student learning and formative assessment was especially helpful for students who had not performed well in the study. But formative assessment is rarely used in studies on vocabulary learning (Allen, 2002;Coady & Huckin, 2001;Nation, 2004;O'Malley & Chamot, 2001;Schmitt, 2000) (Coady & Huckin, 2001), vocabulary teaching and learning (Schmitt, 2000;Nation, 2004), techniques in vocabulary teaching (Allen, 2002), influential factors in vocabulary learning (Laufer, 1990) and mental lexicon (Jiang, 2000). Nation (2001) also put forward three processes of learners' remembering words. ...
As critical reading is a process of active reader involvement, learners interact with the
author’s exposition and potentially construct conceptual understanding of its content,
a process for which Thinking Maps®
is a potential catalyst. This study examines the
potential effect of an instructional program based on Thinking Maps® on Jordanian
EFL tenth-grade students’ critical reading skills. It further probes the perceived
effectiveness of Thinking Maps® in developing their critical reading skills. Both
quantitative and qualitative data were sought by means of a pre-/post-test and a semi-structured interview. The findings reveal statistically significant differences in the
students’ critical reading skills in favor of the experimental group. The qualitative
analysis of the interview reveals that the participants perceived Thinking Maps® as
highly effective. Some implications and recommendations for EFL practitioners and
future researchers are put forth.
... Words vary with respect to visual, phonological, orthographic, semantic, and syntactic characteristics, which can make vocabulary learning more or less difficult (Schmitt, 2019). Laufer (1990) listed a number of intralexical factors that may moderate the difficulty of L2 vocabulary learning, including pronounceability, length, part of speech, inflectional/derivational complexity, abstractness, specificity, idiomaticity, register restriction, and number of meanings. More recently, Peters (2020) added additional factors to this list, such as cognateness and synforms (i.e., words with similar sound/spelling/meaning, originally put forward by Laufer, 1988). ...
Using eye tracking, this study examined L2 learners’ real-time processing of novel compounds across repeated exposures during reading. Sixty-one L2 speakers of Chinese read 12 stories over two days. Unbeknown to them, 12 novel compounds were embedded, each occurring six times. Growth curve analyses showed that semantic transparency, working memory capacity and morphological awareness had no impact on fixation durations for the novel compounds. However, participants with a larger L2 vocabulary size processed novel opaque compounds significantly faster than those with a smaller L2 vocabulary size. For both transparent and opaque compounds, first fixation durations did not change across exposures, yet similar curvilinear decreasing patterns were found in gaze duration and total reading time, with the rates of decrease moderated by L2 vocabulary size and working memory capacity, respectively. Taken together, such findings provide converging evidence supporting the incidental nature of vocabulary learning through natural reading.
本研究基于Nation的多维词汇知识框架设计了多维词汇知识测试,从拼写、词义、句法搭配、语法功能、语义联系5个维度考察有无同义词的词表和例句学习对目标词多维词汇知识习得的影响。实验结果表明,有已知高频同义词的目标词在拼写接受性词汇知识、语义联系产出性词汇知识和句法搭配接受性词汇知识上的得分显著高于无已知同义词的目标词。由此,已知同义词能够促进未知同义新词的习得。
There are varieties of language use in a society influenced by some factors. One that factors is
socioeconomic background of a particular group of people. Different groups of people with different
socioeconomic background in a society have different language styles characterize the groups. This
little research is trying to answer how difference of socioeconomic background influences the
language used to accommodate that differences. This little research makes use of two different
newspapers, with two considerable price difference, but that published by the same publisher to
observe the influence of different socioeconomic background of the readers to the language of the
different newspapers. Wardaugh’s theory of accommodation is used to explore how a particular
language is used by addresser to accommodate the addressees’ socioeconomic background. The
language features included as the factors that distinguish the different styles are the structure and the
word choice. This research is conducted using document analysis method. Through the research there
is a conclusion that socioeconomic background affects the language variety used by particular groups.
A consideration of the knowledge that is assumed by lexical competence is offered as a frame of reference for assessing vocabulary teaching. Linguistic, psycholinguistic, and sociolinguistic aspects of word knowledge are examined. These include word frequency, vocabulary growth in native speakers, collocation, register, case relations, underlying forms, word association, and semantic structure. Vocabulary techniques are discussed according to the way that they attempt to build up these aspects of vocabulary knowledge.
Most second language acquisition research has been concerned with grammar or phonology and has failed to discuss lexical acquisition. The main reason for this neglect has been the lack of vocabulary study by linguists. However, recent concern with semantic theory has brought new impetus to work on lexical acquisition. Useful research on lexical acquisition is dependent upon a number of fundamental theoretical issues. Among these are: (1) whether the processes whereby second language vocabulary is acquired parallel those by which first language vocabulary is acquired, (2) what individual personality characteristics affect the learning and use of vocabulary, (3) the stages by which the lexical stock of a second language learner grow and expand and the factors which influence this growth and expansion, (4) the relationship between active/productive and passive/receptive knowledge of vocabulary, and (5) the kinds of research in lexical acquisition further required. Factors that affect the growth and expansion of second language vocabulary include phonological, morphological, syntactic, and semantic features of the learner's first language, second language, and other Languages with which s/he is acquainted. In addition, the personality, motivation, and knowledge of the learner and the situation in which the learning takes place affect lexical acquisition. (JK)
The retention of English equivalents of Latin words and phrases by 30 seventh-grade pupils has been tested immediately, after one day, one, three and eight weeks. It is concluded that the forgetting curve for English equivalents is less abrupt than that for nonsense syllables, and similar to that for poetry. After two months only one-half of the meanings were retained. The materials used stand in the following order with respect to per cent of recall: (1) identical words; (2) associative words; (3) idioms and phrases; (4) non-associative words. Immediate and delayed recalls correlate highly, especially at the extremes; and both immediate and delayed recalls correlate to a fairly high degree with intelligence. Silent reading ability correlates with both recalls, while word knowledge does not. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
This paper focuses on the acquisition of new word formation devices in the target language as an indication of near-native competence at the advanced level of second language acquisition. The study reported here is based on data collected via written questionnaires consisting of three parts: (a) a production task requiring respondents to suggest innovations for nouns that have not been named in the existing lexicon; (b) an evaluation task requiring respondents to select the most appropriate innovation; (c) an interpretation task requiring respondents to interpret innovative blends. The questionnaires were administered to native speakers of Hebrew (the target language) and to two groups of learners, one advanced and the other intermediate. The findings show that the advanced group has reached a level of target language competence that enables them to produce and evaluate innovations in ways that approximate native speakers' responses, whereas the intermediate students deviate considerably from target level competence. The acquisition of word formation devices in the target language is presented as a gradual acquisition process.
Our main aim in this paper is to explore the interlanguage pragmatics of learners of Hebrew and English. We focus on the use of pragmatic indicators, both lexical (please/bevaqaŝa; perhaps/ulay) and grammatical (e.g., the difference between could I borrow and could you lend), with particular reference to deviations from native-speaker norms in the speech of non-native speakers. The analysis follows the analytical framework developed for the Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP). Data from two sets are analyzed: (a) native and non-native Hebrew, and (b) native and non-native English (with occasional reference to other CCSARP data sets). The results suggest that non-native speakers' misuse of pragmatic indicators can have serious interactional consequences, ranging from inappropriateness to pragmatic failure.