论文总字数：28956字

摘 要

1. Introduction 1

2. Literature Review 3

2.1 Definition 3

2.2 Vocabulary and reading 4

3. Methodology 6

3.1 Research Questions 6

3.2 Participants 6

3.3 Materials 6

3.4 Procedure 7

3.5 Data Collection and Analysis 7

4. Results and Discussions 8

4.1 General vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension performance 8

4.2 Specific vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension performance 9

5. Conclusion 11

5.1 Implications 11

5.2 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research 12

References 13

Acknowledgments

I would like to take this opportunity to express my heartfelt gratitude to all those who helped me during my thesis writing, because without their assistance and support, it would be impossible for me to complete this thesis.

Firstly, my deepest gratitude should be given to my supervisor Professor Han Yawen, who offered me long-term support and consistent valuable suggestions in my academic studies. His inspiring instruction and constant encouragement helped me through the period of preparation, research and analysis during my thesis writing. His profound insights broadened my horizon in linguistic studies. Furthermore, it is my honor to benefit a lot from his personalities and diligence, which I will treasure in my future life.

Then, my thanks would go to my friends and my classmates who have given me their help and time in listening to me and helping me work out my problems during the difficult course of the paper. My heart will always be with you no matter where I am in the future.

In addition, my appreciation also goes to all participants from Nanjing Tech University, because without their participation and cooperation, this research would not have been made possible.

Last but not least, I would like to express my profound thanks to my family for their endless love, unwavering support and absolute confidence in my academic journey and even in my whole life.

Abstract

This study examined the impact of general and specific knowledge of vocabulary on Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension. Participants were 60 first-year non-English majors with the same English proficiency from intact classes in a Chinese University. The Reading Comprehension Test was measured by International English Language Testing System. All the students were divided into two groups, the experimental group (N=26) and the control group (N=28). In the first experiment, both of the two groups were given a reading comprehension test based on general vocabulary. In the second experiment, the treatment group were given a reading comprehension test accompanied by a glossary which contained the meaning of the specific vocabulary appearing in the reading comprehension test. The control group received the same test without the glossary. The analysis of the data revealed little difference between the two groups in both experiments.It indicates both of the general and specific vocabulary knowledge have no effect on Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension.

Key words: general vocabulary knowledge, specific vocabulary knowledge, reading comprehension

中文摘要

本研究旨在研究常用词汇知识和专业词汇知识对中国英语学习者阅读理解能力的影响。来自中国某大学自然班的54个非英语专业且英语水平相当的学生参与这个实验。实验选用雅思考试中的阅读理解试题作为测试题目。参与的学生被分成两组，实验组（26人）和对照组（28人）。在第一个实验中，两个组都完成了关于常用词汇的阅读理解测试。在第二个实验中，实验组的学生参考专业词汇的单词表来完成阅读理解测试；对照组的学生完成同样的阅读理解测试，但不能参考单词表。 数据分析显示两组学生的表现没有显著差异，表明英语学习者的常用词汇知识和专业词汇知识对其阅读理解的表现不产生任何影响。

关键词：常用词汇知识，专业词汇知识，阅读理解

1. Introduction

EFL learners’ reading comprehension plays an important role in the learning of second language. How to improve Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension ability is always a heated topic. Reading is believed to be one of the essential skills students acquire or learn. Whether learning to read in their first (L1) or second (L2) language, students go through a host of complicated processes in order to gain literacy in that language. Such processes are complicated simply because reading is a dynamic interaction between the reader and the text. According to Aebersold and Field (1997), in an attempt to understand a text, learners turn to a wide range of skills, strategies, first language knowledge as well as world knowledge, etc. In a similar vein, Egbert (2005) lists the main variables that come to affect students’ reading comprehension in L2 or foreign language (FL). In the list, vocabulary knowledge, first language, background and world knowledge, skills (i.e. top-down and bottom-up) and strategies are highlighted. Although these variables influence L2 reading comprehension collaboratively and interactively, this study deals largely with the role that vocabulary knowledge plays, which tries to figure out whether Chinese EFL learners’ specific and general knowledge of vocabulary make any difference to their reading comprehension performance. Virtually every scholar of language recognizes that vocabulary knowledge is the basis and precondition for studies in second language acquisition (Suping Wang, 2015). Vocabulary knowledge plays an essential role in reading comprehension because it is as important as background information. Vocabulary knowledge helps decoding and is fundamental to the understanding of the passage. In order to prove the significance of vocabulary knowledge in second language learning, numerous ideas have been put forward. Krashen (1989) insists the idea that there are many reasons for accelerating understanding of vocabulary knowledge. Firstly, vocabulary knowledge used to be a indicator of comprehension performance for learners tend to make use of dictionaries instead of grammar books. Wilkins explains that “ with out grammar, very little can be conveyed. Without vocabulary, nothing can be conveyed.” This means grasping a great number of vocabulary is actually favorable for it assists people to speak more and to have a positive influence on other people too. When it comes to the vocabulary knowledge, this paper mainly deals with the question whether Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension ability is affected by their familiarity with general vocabulary or specific vocabulary. The study on the role of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension for EFL learners is important to the practice of vocabulary teaching in EFL reading classes. This research will provide teachers and students with a better understanding about the relationship between vocabulary and reading, which can enhance their awareness about the importance of vocabulary and help improve their teaching and learning methods in terms of vocabulary.

1. Literature Review

This chapter gives a detailed introduction of previous studies in the field with which this study is closely linked. It starts with definitions and concepts of some important terms related to vocabulary knowledge. After that, previous researches on vocabulary and reading comprehension are introduced. At the end of this part, the research gap is discussed.

2.1 Definitions

Many people define vocabulary in many ways, it is generally accepted that knowing a word is not limited to its dictionary definition or what it looks or sounds like. From a theoretical perspective vocabulary knowledge is a multidimensional and multifaceted construct (Read, 2000). Three dimensions within the construct are accepted by and large,which can be defined as: vocabulary breadth (or vocabulary size), vocabulary depth and vocabulary fluency (Daller et al., 2007; Milton, 2013). According to Saeed Mehrpour and Mohammad Rahimi(2010), general knowledge of vocabulary is the most frequently used words in English, as for the specific knowledge of vocabulary, which means knowledge of less frequently used words or the words related to technology, social issues and unfamiliar words appearing in a passage. For Nagy and Scott (2000), word knowledge is incremental and multidimensional. Due to the fact that the knowledge of a given word interrelates with other words, word knowledge is connected. All this led scholars such as Beck and McKeown (1991) and Nagy and Scott (2000) to argue that to know a word is a matter of degrees and not an all-or-nothing question.Word schema is also considered as yet another element of word knowledge. Word schema is defined as a network of knowledge related to a given word (Nagy amp; Scott, 1990). It consists of both linguistic (e.g. knowledge of roots) and semantic knowledge. Finally, Johnson, Johnson, and Schlicting (2004) argue that knowing a word requires the ability on the part of L2 students to appreciate its connotations.

2.2 Vocabulary and reading

The correlation between vocabulary and reading is worth studying. The research on L1 reading proves that vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension have intimate connection (Stahl, 1990). Of course, this relationship is not uni-directional. Vocabulary knowledge can help reading, and reading can result in the increase of vocabulary at the same time (Chall, 1987). While reading comprehension can be affected by textually relevant background knowledge and the application of general reading strategies, such as predicting the content of the passage, guessing the meaning of the key words in context, making inferences, recognizing the type of text and text structure, and grasping the main idea of the article. To some extend, adopting some tactics of task types and realizing the central meaning of the passage would, in a sense, compensate for the lack of sufficient knowledge of lexical items in a particular text, but the comprehension would be partial. Many researches have been conducted to investigate the contribution of vocabulary to reading comprehension. Grabe (1991), for instance, considered vocabulary knowledge as the prime predictor of reading ability. In the same way, Coady et al. (1993) indicated that increasing proficiency in frequently used vocabulary can lead to an increase in reading comprehension proficiency through two experiments. There are also numerous studies that provide empirical estimation of the number of words learners need to know in order to effectively handle the text and comprehend it. For example, Grabe (1991), as cited in Butler-Pascoe amp; Wiburg (2003) argues that, “…fluent L2/FL readers need to know about 2,000 to 7,000 words and sometimes even more if they want to reach native-like fluency”. Constantinescu (2007, p.2) holds that L2/FL readers need to recognize approximately 95 per cent of the words in a given text in order to comprehend its meaning and they need to know the different meanings of words according to context, as well as words' grammatical properties. It has been consistently demonstrated that reading comprehension is closely correlated with vocabulary knowledge, more closely compared with other factors including the background knowledge of the passages and understanding of the grammar. Alderson

and Freebody (1981) studied many researches which indicated that vocabulary item as a variable is more highly predictive of comprehension compared with the sentence variable (i.e., the grammatical complexity of a sentence), the inferencing ability and the ability to grasp main idea. Becket al.(1982); Kameenuietal. (1982); and Stahl (1983) declared that an improvement in reading comprehension can sometimes lead to an great increase in vocabulary knowledge. According to Saeed Mehrpour and Mohammad Rahimi(2010), who experimented on Iranian EFL learners, revealed that knowledge of specific vocabulary is much important than knowledge of general vocabulary.

The studies mentioned before mainly discuss the great impact of vocabulary on reading comprehension, which indicates knowing the specific vocabulary helps people understand the text well. While Alderson (2000) raised a doubt if reading is a problem of language or a problem of reading. He pointed out that in the early stage of language learning, language played an important role in the comprehension. How about the Chinese EFL learners who have studied English for 8years? This paper attempts to find out the impact of general and specific vocabulary knowledge on Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension.

3.Methodology

3.1 Research questions

This study intends to figure out the impact of specific and general knowledge of vocabulary on Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension by addressing the following questions:

1. Does Chinese EFL learners’ knowledge of general vocabulary affect their performance on reading comprehension?

2. Can providing Chinese EFL learners with the meaning of specific words of the reading passage affect their performance on reading comprehension?

3.2 Participants

The participants of the study comprised 54 students from two intact classes in a Chinese University, which were assigned to the treatment group (N=26) and the control group (N=28). All the students were first-year non-English majors ranging in age from 20 to 22, and they were chosen mainly due to their availability. The participants had studied English at school for about 8 years and they had no experiments of studying abroad.

3.3 Materials

Two reading comprehension tests were used as the instruments of the study. The grades of CET4 was administered to make sure that the participants were of the same level of proficiency. The first instrument was a reading comprehension test based on students’ knowledge of general vocabulary, which chosen from reading comprehension parts in IELTS. Second reading comprehension test based on specific vocabulary knowledge was given to investigate the impact of providing learners with the meaning of specific words of the texts on the students’ performance. Care was taken to choose the texts that were related to specific scientific and social issues so that one could figure out whether students’ understanding of specific vocabulary of the reading texts could have any influence on the participants’ performance on reading comprehension

tests. The two reading comprehension tests used in this study consisted of 4 passages ranging from 900 to 1100 words in length and the amount of time allotted to complete each test was 25 minutes .

3.4 Procedure

To begin the study, in order to ensure that the two groups were similar in terms of their general proficiency level, they were asked to provide their grades of the reading comprehension parts in CET4. The results indicated that there was no significant difference between the two groups with respect to their level of proficiency. Next, all the students received the reading comprehension test based on general vocabulary knowledge. According to the independent t-test, there was no significant difference between the control group and experimental group. In the next step of the study, subjects in the treatment group were given the reading comprehension test based on specific vocabulary knowledge. They were given a word list that covered the English definitions of the specific vocabulary in the reading passages before the test. The students had 10 minutes to have a look at the word list before they started the test; they were also allowed to look at the word list during the test. In the control group, the subjects did the same reading comprehension test, but they did not have access to the work list.

3.5 Data collection and analysis

The General Reading Comprehension Test consists of 2 passages followed by 4 multiple-choice items and 10 True or False questions. The Specific Reading Comprehension Test consists of 2 passages with 2 multiple-choice items and 11 True or False questions. Participants had 25 minutes to complete each test. The answer sheet were collected after the test. The participants got two points if they answered a question correctly, and they got no point if they answered the question wrong. To carry out the statistical analysis, Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), version 22.0, was used to run statistical analysis of the instrument.

4. Results and Discussion

In this section the research questions are reiterated and the results related to each question are discussed in order.

4.1 General vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension performance

Table 1 shows the analysis of ANOVA for the effect of general vocabulary knowledge on reading comprehension.

As the results show, the mean of the control group is 15.43, which is 0.3 higher than the experimental group (15.15). The result indicates little difference between the average score of the two groups. As can be shown in the table1, F[1, 55]=0.06, P=0.80 gt;0.05, which reveals that there is no significant difference between the control group and the experimental group. In the same way, the knowledge of general vocabulary of the two groups had no significant difference. The knowledge of general vocabulary had no great effect on students’ reading comprehension performance. The results indicate that the two groups of Chinese EFL learners have intermediate language proficiency. The knowledge of general vocabulary has little influence on choosing a right answer in reading comprehension. The results is different from Saeed Mehrpour and Mohammad Rahimi(2010). A likely explanation can be based on the the condition that these Chinese students had similar proficiency and they acquire the basic knowledge of vocabulary as well as the reading skills which are fundamental in the reading comprehension test.

4.2 Specific vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension performance

Table 2 presents the descriptive statistics as well as the independent t-test results for mean scores of the experimental and control groups on the Specific Reading Test.

As can be shown in Table 2 , the experimental group has a larger mean with regard to the specific reading comprehension test compared with the control group (14.69 and 13.79). The standard deviation for the control group, on the other hand, is also larger than the experimental group (4.30 and 3.75), indicating a higher dispersion among the scores of the control group. It means that the knowledge of the specific vocabulary items leads to the experimental group to perform a little bit better on the Specific Reading Comprehension Test. According to the result of the independent t-test, the difference between the mean scores of the two groups on the reading test is not significant (p gt; 0.01). This indicates that providing students with the meaning of specific vocabulary in the reading passages has little influence on students’ performance. So it is easy for us to come to the conclusion that specific vocabulary is not very helpful to the participants’ reading comprehension performance on the test. While, test method features including understanding the background knowledge of the topics, and familiarity with the test format could have affected the performance of some of the participants (Bachman, 1990). However, these factors cannot usually be controlled. The results obtained from the present study are different from Saeed Mehrpour and Mohammad Rahimi (2010), which underlined the significant role of specific vocabulary knowledge in understanding reading texts in L2.

A common belief among some students is that when they are given a reading comprehension tests that contains specific vocabulary items, their comprehension ability is affected negatively yielding to a lower score. When students’ comprehension of a text is measured with questions asking for inference-making, specific words and vocabulary items seem to play a role. But if comprehension questions tap literal and reinterpretation levels, the existence of specific words seem not to exert the negative effects students assume they do (Maragheh University). As can be shown the knowledge of key words does not play a very significant role in providing the correct answer. The results demonstrate why knowing the specific words which appear in the reading test did not have a great effect on the participants’ performance on the reading comprehension test. All the discussion about the impact of specific vocabulary knowledge on Chinese EFL learners’ reading comprehension ability should not result in an misunderstanding that knowledge of vocabulary is not important in comprehend a text. The truth is that a basic level of vocabulary knowledge is absolutely fundamental for comprehending a passage.

1. Conclusion

5.1 Implications

The present study aimed at investigating the effect of L2 learners’ general vocabulary knowledge and the influence of their increasing proficiency of the specific vocabulary items in the reading passages on their reading comprehension performance. The results of this research indicated that knowledge of both specific vocabulary and general vocabulary had little influence on students’ performance on the reading comprehension test with regard to the students who are equipped with a large number of vocabulary and 8 years learning experience. All the students participated in this experiment were familiar with different kinds of reading strategies and had a good understanding of the general vocabulary in the reading passages. Chinese EFL learners have equipped with different kinds of reading strategies through 8 years’ learning. Though vocabulary is a important factor on reading comprehension, other factors, except for what is expected, may have a much more important influence on reading comprehension ability.

Regarding pedagogical implications of the present study, the findings suggested that specific attention should be paid to teaching and learning vocabulary as well as other factors. In fact, the more general vocabulary one learns, the higher probability of covering words that would appear in future passages. While teaching specific vocabulary through subject, article, and discipline can not only increase the general vocabulary knowledge of the learners but also help them comprehend the articles more effectively. The reading comprehension abilities not only based on vocabulary, but also related to the knowledge of the topic, reading strategies, reading speed and also the different kinds of questions followed by the passage. How to improve Chinese EFL learner’s reading comprehension abilities is a comprehensive process. When it comes to pedagogical implication, further attention should be focused on the association of teaching methods and reading tasks. If the learners are familiar with the types of tests, it will be easy for them to improve the accuracy.

5.2 Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research

This study has figured out some new findings on the effect of vocabulary knowledge on EFL learners’ reading comprehension. Still some limitations exist. Here these deficiencies are listed below in order to provide some suggestions and insights for further studies.

1. All the subjects in this study were selected from a Chinese University, and most of the subjects were female, so they may not be typical Chinese EFL learners. In the future research, data should cover samples produced by greater variety of EFL learners, of different grades, schools, genders and majors, so as to reach a more general conclusion.

2.The sample size in this study was not big enough to represent all the Chinese students. Only 54 students participated in this experiment, further studies can include more students. The same experiment can be profitably replicated with larger sample size in order to acquire a more accurate and reliable result.

3. All the students participated in this study have learned English for about 8 years, which is a long time. While many Chinese EFL learners may have less time to learn English.

3. The reading comprehension material was chose from IELTS and it was a bit difficult for the students. Students were not familiar with the task types. Future researches can choose the suitable materials, which can indicate the true reading comprehension ability of the students’.

References

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