论文总字数：42291字

摘 要

作为二语词汇习得最有效的方式之一，阅读过程中基于单词的练习已经受到语言研究者的日益关注。前期关于二语习得的大量研究普遍基于投入量假设，而少有研究组句任务和造句任务在英语学习者二语词汇习得上的差异。本研究旨在回答以下问题：

组句任务和造句任务在英语学习者词汇附带习得中有差异吗？

南京工业大学英语专业54名大一学生参加本次试验，他们被随机分配到两个二语词汇习得任务组。第一组的受试使用目标词汇完成组句任务，第二组的受试使用目标词汇完成造句任务。组句任务和造句任务都包括两部分练习，第一部分的练习都是由一篇阅读理解组成，组句任务的第二部分练习要求受试根据目标词汇和其他乱序词汇组成10个完整的句子，而造句任务的第二部分要求受试用目标词造10个句子。控制二语词汇习得任务中的任务时间。

T检验分析的结果如下：

组句任务和造句任务对英语学习者词汇附带习得有显著主效应(p lt; .05)。即在英语学习者接受性词汇习得上，造句任务比组句任务更有效。本研究具有重要的理论和教学意义。理论上，论文的研究结果支持投入量假设。教学上，论文的研究结果对二语老师的词汇附带习得教学提出很好的参考意见。

关键词：任务类型； 二语词汇习得； 投入量假设

Chapter One

INTRODUCTION

This part includes three parts, namely the background of the research, the purposes of the research and the organization of the research.

• 1. Background of the research

Vocabulary learning plays a significant role throughout the whole process of EFL learning. The size of vocabulary directly influences EFL learners’ mastery and application of the five basic English skills—listening, speaking, reading, writing and translation. There may be no possible communication without enough vocabulary. Based on learned vocabulary, individuals can express what they are thinking about. However, a lot of difficulties in EFL vocabulary acquisition can be easily found such as word pronunciation, spelling and meaning.

As vocabulary in EFL learning became more and more important, it was urgent to put forward effective methods and strategies of vocabulary acquisition. There are two major instructional techniques--incidental vocabulary acquisition and intentional vocabulary acquisition. Incidental vocabulary learning refers to that EFL learners are asked to finish a word-based task while intentional vocabulary learning means to study words only. The most obvious distinction between incidental vocabulary acquisition and intentional vocabulary acquisition is whether a consequent memory test is given or not. In fact, these two techniques should not be treated separately, because it is not uneasy to conclude that reading with additional vocabulary tasks would lead to a better vocabulary acquisition than reading only with target words (Paribakht amp; Wesche, 1997; Min, 2008). Then Laufer amp; Hulstijn (2001) put forward the involvement load hypothesis that stressed the importance of task-based EFL incidental vocabulary acquisition, and EFL researchers have designed various vocabulary acquisition tasks to test the involvement load hypothesis and to find out the most effective methods of acquiring vocabulary (Kim, 2011; Bao Gui amp; Wang Juanjuan, 2013; Webb 2005; Keating 2008; Wu Xudong ). With the improvement of Laufer amp; Huistijn’s (2001) experimental design, some

research findings are same with the hypothesis, and some are not. What’s more, more and more other factors were involved to relieve the effect of involvement load in EFL incidental vocabulary acquisition in order to generalize the involvement load hypothesis like vocabulary size, language proficiency etc. ( Wu Jianshe et al., 2007; Wang Juanjuan, 2013).

There still remained lots of unsolved issues. Although the more and more improved experiments have been conducted, most of them were familiar with Laufer amp; Hulstijn’s (2001) design.

Provided the above limitations in the previous research, this present research would be beneficial to the EFL receptive vocabulary acquisition.

1.2 Purposes of the research

The motivations for this research included three levels. The first level, the most simple and direct, was to provide the differences between the sentence combining and sentence making in EFL learners’ vocabulary learning. In the second one, the significance would be provided that the result from this study can help learners acquire vocabulary more effectively and improve their English ability. The last one served as the teaching arrangement, which is most important and meaningful.

1.3 Organization of the research

This thesis could be divided into five parts. The first chapter served as the general introduction, in which research background, research purposes and the organization of the research were stated. Chapter two was an overview of the literature, including the definitions of EFL vocabulary acquisition, the theory of the involvement load and empirical studies on the effect of task inducing involvement load on EFL vocabulary acquisition. In chapter three, methodology was adopted in this research, including research questions, experimental design, subjects, variables and operational definitions, instruments and scoring EFL vocabulary acquisition. Chapter four reported the key findings based on the analysis of the research data. It included the independent samples T-test statistics of EFL vocabulary knowledge and a detailed discussions of the major findings. This thesis ended with the summary of the major findings, the theoretical and implications, and limitations and suggestions for the future research in Chapter Five.

Chapter Two

LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter begins with a review of EFL incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading, followed by the theory in terms of vocabulary acquisition and ends with empirical studies on the effect of task inducing involvement load on EFL vocabulary acquisition.

2.1 EFL incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading

As is well-known, reading is a main source of vocabulary acquisition in the process of EFL learning. Therefore, EFL learners make every effort to get the effective ways to acquire words while they are reading. The most common example of EFL incidental vocabulary acquisition is by-product of reading comprehension.

In this research, the term “incidental vocabulary acquisition” was adopted. The subjects in this study were asked to read one passage and then finished the related comprehension questions in terms of the general idea of the passages and word-based exercises involving some unfamiliar words in the passage. The questions of reading comprehension were designed to transfer attention of the subjects from the target words. Under this condition, acquisition of the target words is incidental.

2.2 The involvement load hypothesis

In accord to Craik and Lockhart’s (1972) theory of processing depth, Hulstijn amp; Laufer (2001) put forward the involvement load hypothesis, which claimed that retention of unfamiliar words is dependent upon the amount of involvement while processing these words. Involvement is considered to be motivational-cognitive construct, which has three elements: need, search, and evaluation. In this case, EFL learners’ performance in the retention of unknown words could be obviously explained and predicted. Need is the motivational, non-cognitive dimension of

involvement and it is also a drive to finish a given task. On the one hand, need is considered moderate when it is imposed by an external agent and is high when learners are internally motivated. Search and evaluation are referred to as the cognitive aspects of involvement; both of them require focusing on word forms and meanings. Search is referred to as the attempt to identify the meaning of an unknown word in a dictionary or by consulting a teacher. Search is absent when this attempt is not required, such as when an unknown word’s definition is glossed. Evaluation is regarded as moderate when a task requires learners to combine the target word and word strings into a proper sentence in a given context (e.g. sentence combining task) and high when a task requires learners to make a new sentence with a target word in the original context (e.g. sentence making task).

Not all tasks require learners to need, search, and evaluate the meaning of unknown words. A task in which these elements are stronger has a higher level of involvement load. Language learners who are engaged in a task with a higher involvement load are possible to perform better in EFL vocabulary acquisition.

2.3 Empirical studies on the effect of task inducing involvement load on EFL vocabulary acquisition

As vocabulary acquisition has attracted considerably increasing attention in the second language acquisition field, numerous relevant researches have ranged from studies on theories to empirical studies.

Firstly, in order to prove whether incidental vocabulary retention is dependent on the amount of task-induced involvement or not, Hulstijn amp; Laufer (2001) conducted two similar experiments in two different countries--Netherlands and Israel. In this case, three groups of advanced English learners in each country were respectively arranged to one of the three tasks with different amounts of involvement. After that, a test was given to the participants immediately unexpectedly to testify their storage of the target words, then a same test were given again to testify their retention of the target words in one or two weeks.

The results of the experiment showed that a task inducing higher involvement load would produce a better result of vocabulary acquisition, which was sufficiently consistent with Hulstijn amp; Laufer (2001)’s involvement load hypothesis that a task inducing higher involvement load. However, because of some uncontrolled details Hulstijn amp; Laufer’ (2001) findings may be not absolutely correct. The first detail is that the time on task was not controlled since the third task of the higher involvement load cost the most task time, which may lead to the uncertainty of the result. That EFL learners from intact classes were arranged randomly to one of the word-based exercises in order to reduce the inference of other factors was the second detail. Thirdly, the results gained from the receptive vocabulary knowledge may be not applicable to the productive vocabulary knowledge for the multi-dimensional vocabulary knowledge.

Then much research on the involvement load hypothesis has been conducted, which produced different results. Some researches testified that tasks of higher involvement load lead to greater vocabulary retention (Keating, 2008). Some researches partially verified the involvement load hypothesis and were found that there was no significant difference between different tasks (Huang Yan, 2004; Wu Jianshe et al., 2007; Kim, 2008). Some researches even objected involvement load hypothesis (Wu Xudong, 2010; Folse, 2006). What is said above, involvement load hypothesis was only partially testified and more research needed to be conducted to explore the reasons inducing the conflicting results.

Then some improved researches have been conducted to explore whether there are other factors influencing the effects of involvement load on EFL vocabulary acquisition like language proficiency. YouJin Kim (2008) conducted two experiments similar to Hulstijn amp; Laufer’s (2001) research to investigate how learners’ EFL proficiency and task-induced involvement load affected vocabulary acquisition. 64 EFL learners from 27 different countries at two different proficiency levels respectively were arranged to one of three tasks of task-induced involvement load--the Composition group, the Gap-filling group and the Reading group. The results of experiment 1 partially correspond with the predictions of involvement load hypothesis. The immediate post-tests showed the best performance in the Composition groups that performance in the Composition groups and successively followed by the other two groups. And the delayed post-tests indicated that the performance in the Composition group was highest, followed by that in the Gap-filling groups and that in the Reading groups. Experiment 2 applied the same data of Composition task from Experiment 1 and chose 20 students--10 undergraduate students and 10 students from the two Intensive English Programs who didn’t participate in the sentence writing task of former experiment. The results indicated that there was no significant effect for task type, proficiency level and task type × language proficiency both in the immediate and delayed post-tests, which absolutely supported the involvement load hypothesis.

What’s more, some researchers included other factors, such as EFL vocabulary acquisition strategies (Gu Qiyi amp; Song Mingzhu, 2010), the input and output task (Haratmeh, 2012; Wang Juanjuan, 2013), and frequency that target word occurs (Hulstijin amp; Hollander amp; Greidanus, 1996; Eckerth amp; Tavakoli, 2012; Yue Yinlai, 2012) etc. The purpose was to investigate how those factors affect the effectiveness of task-induced involvement load on EFL vocabulary acquisition and to testify the validity of involvement load hypothesis.

Chapter Three

METHODOLOGY

This chapter shows the methodological approach adopted in this research. It begins with the research questions. Then it continues with the experimental design, a description of subjects, variables and operational definitions, instruments and general procedures. It ends with scoring L2 vocabulary acquisition.

3.1 Research questions

The present study aimed to investigate the differences between sentence making and sentence combining in EFL learners’ receptive vocabulary acquisition. Specifically, it addressed the following research question:

Is there any difference between sentence combining and sentence making in EFL learners’ receptive vocabulary acquisition?

3.2 Experimental design

This research adopted a independent samples T-test design. The independent variables were task types—sentence combining and sentence making, and the dependent variable was EFL receptive vocabulary acquisition. The EFL vocabulary acquisition was measured by the Vocabulary Knowledge Scale (VKS) and the time was controlled. The subjects’ scores of the experiment were submitted to SPSS 17.0.

3.3 Subjects

54 freshmen of non-English major from different classes in Nanjing Tech University participated in this experiment and they were all native speakers of Chinese and learned English as a second language for about ten years, treated as intermediate EFL learners.

In this case, the participants were randomly arranged to one of the two groups of equal size in order to guarantee the same opportunity of each subject to be in any one of the groups. Then it must be controlled that all of the subjects were unfamiliar with all the target words. Finally, a comprehensive English test was conducted and the results showed that there was large significant difference in EFL learners’ receptive vocabulary acquisition.

3.4 Variables and operational definitions

Based on the previous research questions, the independent variables of this study were task types-sentence combining and sentence making. The dependent variable of this study is EFL receptive vocabulary acquisition.

3.4.1 Task types as the independent variable

In the current research, sentence combining and sentence making were output tasks. Both sentence combining task and sentence making task had the same part one involving one reading passage, followed by five multiple choice questions for reading comprehension in order to measure the participants’ comprehensive understanding of the whole passage. Part two for the sentence combining group was composed of 10 exercises, each of which consisted of several word strings. In each exercise, one word string involved a target word and other word strings involved no target word. The subjects were required to combine these word strings in each exercise into a proper sentence. And part two for the sentence making group consisted of the same 10 target words, with each of which a new and original sentence should be made.

3.4.2 EFL vocabulary acquisition as the dependent variable

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