This survey is about the thought that reading is good for you. The impression seems noncontroversial ; most people would hold that reading is a utile acquisition experience. Surely, the teacherly statements are familiar: Reading takes us beyond ourselves ; we broaden our positions, learn new facts and come to a better apprehension of the universe and our topographic point in it. Furthermore, so the statement goes, there is an of import periphery benefit: reading increases our vocabulary cognition. Texts introduce us to new words, and in many instances, we can infer their significances from the written context. Presumably, we remember some of these new significance associations, particularly if we continue to read and run into the new points in context once more. It seems sensible to presume that this good byproduct of reading is besides available to scholars reading in a 2nd linguistic communication. Indeed, it has been claimed that reading in an L2 is one of the chief ways linguistic communication scholars get new vocabulary cognition ( Krashen, 1989 ) .

But in malice of its common-sense entreaty, good experimental grounds for the position that L2 reading has vocabulary larning benefits has been hard to come by. Most of the available surveies report merely bantam additions in vocabulary cognition as a consequence of L2 reading.

In our position, the slender grounds these surveies provide is unsatisfactory on at least two counts. First, the little additions seem at odds with the strong claims made for the power of reading to leave new vocabulary cognition. This incompatibility raises the undermentioned inquiry: Have the claims for the impact of reading in an L2 been overdone, or have experiments failed to capture larning effects adequately? A chief end of the thesis is to carry on a series of experiments that we believe will supply a more convincing reply to the inquiry of how much vocabulary cognition a scholar can be expected to get in a reading event. With a clearer reply to this inquiry than has been available so far, we can get at a better sense of the power of the procedure.

A 2nd job is that most of the available surveies offer small in the manner of account of the vocabulary acquisition that occurs as a byproduct of reading. Much as we might anticipate, they indicate that scholars do so pick up some cognition of new vocabulary points from reading a text, but the surveies have small to state about how or why the words are learned. A figure of of import inquiries remain unreciprocated: How much does a scholar know about a word after run intoing it in context? How long does the cognition last, and what characteristics of the text contribute to larning? So, in add-on to replying inquiries about the merchandises of reading, the thesis besides seeks to reply these inquiries about the procedure of larning vocabulary through reading. A better apprehension of how vocabulary learning returns can supply instructors and readers utile information about the types and sums of reading that lead to optimal vocabulary acquisition consequences.

So although the basic inquiry of whether reading is good for vocabulary acquisition has already been answered in the affirmatory, it is clear that some inquiries about larning through reading have non been answered satisfactorily and others have non been answered at all. It is our belief that the chief key to deriving better penetrations is better experimental methodological analysis. In the literature reappraisal in Chapter 3, we will reason that experimental design defects and the usage of insensitve steps are at least partially to fault for the thin grounds and weak explanatory power of old probes. Then, in our ain experiments we will try overcome these methodological jobs. So, to the extent that a thesis has a secret plan, our narrative is one of consecutive methodological betterments. Design inventions in one experiment conveying new penetrations but besides new jobs which must be addressed in the following.

But before we turn to surveies of L2 readers and the merchandises and procedures of vocabulary acquisition, we will take a closer expression at our original common sense proposition, the impression that people learn new words through reading even when they are under no duty to larn them. The following subdivisions outline the logical footing for this premise and follow the development of what has come to be known as the incidental vocabulary acquisition hypothesis ( Nagy, Herman and Anderson, 1985 ) .

1.2 Background

1.2.1 The default place: explaining L1 vocabulary acquisition

The belief that significances can be acquired from written contexts without the aid of instructors has been documented as far back as St. Augustine ( Nagy, et al. , 1985 ) . The logic underpinning this widely held position is as follows: Most people can non remember being taught really many words of their first linguistic communication either at place or at school, yet they know 1000s. This cognition must hold come from someplace, and this “ someplace ” can merely be the ambient linguistic communication environment. In the instance of really immature kids larning their first linguistic communication, this environment consists of spoken linguistic communication, but in our grownup experience we are cognizant of cognizing words that we have ne’er heard anyone say, and that we can hold encountered merely in our reading.

Reading appears to play an of import function in the L1 vocabulary development of school age kids. The sum of vocabulary growing kids achieve during their school old ages is dramatic. Harmonizing to a conservative estimation based on figures by Goulden, Nation and Read ( 1990 ) , talkers of English know approximately 20,000 word households by the clip they reach university age, which suggests an mean growing in vocabulary size of around 1000 per twelvemonth. Nagy, Anderson and Herman ( 1987 ) presume a much higher figure of every bit many as 3000 words per twelvemonth between the 3rd and 12th twelvemonth of schooling. But the figure that could perchance be taught in category in a given twelvemonth is in the order of 100s, non 1000s of words. Beck, McKeown and Omanson ( 1987 ) reckon that the figure of English words that could be taught efficaciously in a twelvemonth of schooling sums to 400 at most. Even with really approximative figures and dissension among research workers about how to number word units, the overall image is clear: Peoples know many more words than they could perchance hold been taught. Therefore, for privation of a better account, the tremendous addition in L1 vocabulary cognition during the school old ages must be due to incidental acquisition through reading. This line of statement is known as the “ default ” account of vocabulary acquisition.

Although some words must besides be learned from brushs with spoken linguistic communication, analyses of principal indicate that spoken linguistic communication is non peculiarly rich in low frequence vocabulary ( e.g. Meara, Lightbown & A ; Halter, 1995 ; Ure, 1971 ; West & A ; Stanovich, 1991 ) . Common words and their many senses may be learned from address but written text, which contains far more low frequence points, must needfully be the beginning for the acquisition of the many less common points that the mean individual knows. The importance of written input can be gauged from a survey by West and Stanovich ( 1991 ) . In this probe, American university pupils were tested on their ability to acknowledge names of magazines and writers ( an index of exposure to print ) and names of Television famous persons ( an index of exposure to unwritten input ) . Consequences indicated that exposure to unwritten input facilitated far less vocabulary acquisition than reading did. High degrees of magazine and writer acknowledgment were associated with strong public presentation on a trial of vocabulary size.

The default place for L1 vocabulary acquisition through reading has been neatly summarized in paper by Landauer and Dumais ( 1997 ) as follows:

A typical American 7th grader knows the significances of 10-15 words today that she did n’t cognize yesterday. She must hold acquired most of them as a consequence of reading, because: a ) the bulk of English words are used merely in print, B ) she already knew good about all of the words she would hold encountered in address, and degree Celsius ) she learned less than one word by direct direction. ( p. 211 )

1.2.2 The default place and L2 vocabulary acquisition

Even though scholars may hold trouble reading in an L2, it is widely assumed that L2 scholars will see the word larning benefits of reading much as L1 readers do. Current linguistic communication learning methodological analysis appears to back the impression ; for case, a recent manual for developing instructors of English asks prospective instructors to measure the undermentioned statement: “ Reading widely is one of the best ways to larn another linguistic communication ” ( Willis, 1996, p. 8 ) . In the treatment that follows, it is clear that readers are expected to hold with the statement ( though the writer cautiousnesss against larning merely from reading ) . The vocabulary larning benefits of L2 reading are assumed to be considerable:

Many successful scholars find that reading is an first-class manner of widening vocabulary, larning new phrases and consolidating grammar. Like extended hearing, reading provides rich exposure to linguistic communication in usage. ( p. 8 )

The premise that 2nd linguistic communication vocabulary will be learned by the way is besides apparent in stuffs designed for linguistic communication scholars. Raptis ( 1997 ) observes that activities designed to develop the accomplishment of deducing significances of unfamiliar words from context characteristic conspicuously and repeatedly in text editions for scholars of English. The message to the scholar – either stated or inexplicit – is that there are more words to larn than can be taught in a linguistic communication class or looked up in a dictionary, and hence scholars themselves must go responsible for their vocabulary growing. Rather than trying to learn all the words, the premiss is that developing pupils how to work out the significances of unfamiliar words from context will assist them to get vocabulary by the way as they read in the new linguistic communication.

The fact that some L2 scholars win in going really adept in their 2nd linguistic communication and cognize many more words than could be taught in a class of instructed linguistic communication survey provides support for the default account of L2 vocabulary acquisition A survey by Milton and Meara ( 1995 ) found that the English vocabulary size of scholars in a survey exchange plan increased dramatically during a stay in the United Kingdom. The average addition was 1326 words in six months, or about 2500 words per twelvemonth. Since the participants needed to hold a good cognition of English to measure up for the plan, they likely already knew most of the common words used in spoken interaction when they arrived. Therefore, we can presume that most of the points they learned after geting in the UK were less common words likely to be encountered in reading.

1.2.3 Empirical grounds for geting L1 vocabulary through reading

Although the default place offers a sensible account for how we come to cognize many more words than we have heard in address or learned at school, it is no more than a logical illation. In the mid 1980s, a figure of research workers set out to see whether schoolroom reading undertakings resulted in incontrovertible vocabulary cognition additions. This research ( Jenkins, Stein & A ; Wysocki, 1984 ; Nagy, Anderson & A ; Herman, 1987 ; Nagy, Herman & A ; Anderson, 1985 ) succeeded in supplying convincing grounds of a nexus between existent reading events and the acquisition of new words. The probes are discussed in item in the literature reappraisal in Chapter 3. Here, for the intents of our historical overview, we will sketch them briefly and highlight the chief issues they raise.

The surveies investigated the vocabulary additions of school age English speech production topics reading short texts in their native linguistic communication. In the 1985 survey by Nagy et al. , eighth-grade participants read one of two 1000-word texts each incorporating 15 unfamiliar words. After reading the text, they were tested on their cognition of 30 words, 15 from the text they had read and 15 from the other text which they had non read. Comparisons of the reading and non-reading conditions indicated that participants picked up cognition of new word significances as a consequence of exposure to the experimental texts. Average additions were really little, on the order of two or three words, but were found to be statistically important.

Generalizing from these findings, Nagy and his co-workers determined that the chance that a topic will be able to bring forth a full definition of a word that he or she has encountered one time in a reading transition sums to 10 per centum. They calculated that the opportunities of being able to acknowledge a right definition in a multiple-choice format are 15 per centum. In other words, approximately every ten percent brush with an unfamiliar word in a reading text can be said to ensue in a learning event. Nagy and his co-workers go on to see what this might intend in Numberss of words acquired in a twelvemonth. They estimate that the typical school age kid reads about 1 million words per twelvemonth. By using their chances to this estimate and estimations of how frequently unknown words would happen, they arrive at growing figures of 3125 to 4875 words per twelvemonth ( Nagy et al. , 1985, p. 250 ) . These figures coincide instead neatly with anterior estimations based on what would hold to be achieved on a annual footing in order to get at an adult-sized vocabulary. Therefore, their vocabulary acquisition consequences appear to give substance to the claims of the default place.

On the footing of this survey, Nagy et Al. proposed the incidental acquisition hypothesis which posits that kids learn the huge bulk of the words they finally come to cognize in their native linguistic communication through exposure to them in meaningful contexts. The term incidental describes the word acquisition that occurs as a byproduct while readers are really giving most of their attending to groking the information content of a text. Incidental acquisition is defined in the cognitive psychological science literature ( Anderson, 1990 ) as acquisition activities that persons engage in when they are non captive on retaining the presented stuff ( e.g. in readying for a trial ) .

To confirm the claims of the incidental vocabulary acquisition hypothesis, Nagy and his co-workers conducted farther surveies of child vocabulary acquisition. In add-on to sing a wider scope of ages and reading abilities, a 1987 survey improved on the earlier one by affecting more participants, more reading transitions, more mark points, and a longer hold between reading and proving. Under these stiffer conditions, consequences still confirmed the determination of a little but important sum of word growing ( two or three words ) that could be ascribed merely to reading the texts. Growth occurred across ability and age groups.

Extra verification for the incidental vocabulary acquisition hypothesis through reading comes from a survey by Jenkins, Stein and Wysocki ( 1984 ) that investigated school-age native talkers of English utilizing a methodological analysis similar to that of Nagy and his co-workers. They excessively found little but important additions, on the order of one or two words. However, these consequences are less convincing because Jenkins et Al. had their topics read transitions that were specially constructed to supply full support for mark words so that significances could be worked out easy. Therefore it can be argued that these findings would non use to reading natural texts, which can non be depended on to ever supply full significance support.

An earlier survey by Saragi, Nation and Meister ( 1978 ) besides provides grounds of topics geting new vocabulary through reading, but like the survey by Jenkins et al. , it makes usage of an untypical text. In this survey, native talkers of English read a whole novel, Anthony Burgess ‘s A Clockwork Orange, which contains a big figure of Russian-based “ nadsat ” words devised by the writer. Scores on a surprise posttest showed that participants were able to right place the significances of most of the nadsat points. The average figure of words acquired was 68.4, amounting to about three quarters of the 90 words tested. Some of these words occurred more than 100 times in the text and frequence of happening was found to be a factor in the ample additions topics made. Again, findings based on reading a particular text may non generalise to acquisition that might happen reading a more “ normal ” one. But even though this survey and the one by Jenkins et Al. ( 1984 ) may hold offered remarkably favourable chances for incidental vocabulary acquisition, there is small uncertainty that subjects learned new words from reading the text. These surveies, along with the punctilious work done by Nagy and his co-workers, offer converting grounds that scholars do get vocabulary cognition as they read.

1.2.4 Empirical grounds for geting L2 vocabulary through reading

L2 probes modeled on the L1 research discussed above began to look in the late eightiess. The first published paper ( Pitts, White and Krashen, 1989 ) was a reproduction of Saragi, Nation and Meister ‘s 1978 survey. In this experiment, scholars of English read a transition from A Clockwork Orange for an hr and so took a multiple-choice trial on 30 nadsat points. Comparisons to tonss of examinees who had non read the text indicated average additions of approximately two points. An earlier unpublished survey by Ferris ( 1988 ) used the same read-and-test methodological analysis but a longer, book-length reading intervention. She found that the difference in average additions between readers and non-readers amounted to about seven words. Other experiments with shorter texts ( e.g. Day, Omura & A ; Hiramatsu, 1991 ; Hulstijn, 1992 ) study additions of merely one, two or three words. Dupuy and Krashen ( 1993 ) describe a larger addition of about seven words, but the text was supplemented with a picture and input beginnings were non distinguished in this survey. Generally, the surveies confirm what we would anticipate: Learners can and make get new word cognition by the way through comprehension-focused reading in a 2nd linguistic communication.

However, none of the L2 surveies we are cognizant of follow Nagy et Al. ( 1985 ) in describing incidental vocabulary additions in footings of chances. That is, they do non pull on findings to get at decisions about the opportunities of new words being picked up by the way by L2 readers. But it is possible to utilize the Numberss of words tested in the surveies and the mean additions reported to cipher the chance of tried word being picked up by the way. Probabilities can so be expressed as pick-up rates. We analyzed five experiments following this process ; the consequences are shown in Table 1.1 with approximative pick-up rates looking in the last column. The rates range from 1 word right identified per 5 tested to 1 per 17. Taken together, the incidental word acquisition additions reported in these surveies suggest that grownup L2 scholars pick up approximately 1 new word in 8. Therefore, the L2 pick-up rate appears to be loosely consistent with the 1-in-10 rate ( Nagy et al. , 1985 ) established for L1 scholars.

Table 1.1

Word larning consequences in surveies of incidental acquisition of L2 reading

Survey

No. & A ; type of point tested

Average no. of words learned

Probability of choice up

Approximate pick-up rate

Ferris ( 1988 )

50

English

7.4

.15

1 in 7

Pitts, White & A ; Krashen ( 1989 )

30 nadsat

1.8

.06

1 in 17

Day, Omura & A ; Hiramatsu ( 1991 )

17 English

1.1

.06

1 in 17

Hulstijn ( 1992 ) exp. 1

12 Dutch

.9

.08

1 in 13

Dupuy & A ; Krashen ( 1993 )

30 Gallic

6.6

twenty-two

1 in 5

Clearly these figure must be treated with cautiousness. Our meta-analysis of L2 reading experiments is unsmooth at best ; in taking surveies together, the analysis ignores differences in trial types, reading interventions, linguistic communications and participants. Besides, as we will see in Chapter 3, the rates are derived from experiments with serious methodological failings. But despite these jobs, we can safely reason that the chance of larning a new L2 word from a individual reading brush is low. This raises the disturbing inquiry of what L2 scholars can realistically anticipate to derive from extended reading.

2. Are significant benefits possible?

In the surveies of L2 incidental vocabulary acquisition discussed above, word acquisition consequences are based on reasonably little sums of reading. In some of the experiments, participants read merely a page or two of text. Therefore it is non surprising that the Numberss of words the L2 readers learned were little. Far more worrisome is the fact that the chances derived from these surveies appear to be really low. With a pick-up rate of merely 1 new word in 8, geting cognition of a significant figure of words depends on making a really great trade of L2 reading. Nagy et Al ( 1985 ) determined that at the acquisition rate of 1 new word in 10, L1 scholars could larn the big figure of words most big native talkers know if they read one million words each twelvemonth of their simple instruction. Nagy and his co-workers claim that the million per annum figure is a sensible estimation of the figure of words school kids typically encounter in a twelvemonth.

Although we may oppugn whether kid scholars really carry through this sum of reading in a twelvemonth, it is clear that what may be a ambitious end for L1 readers sums to a genuinely dashing undertaking for L2 readers. Language scholars are extremely improbable to read a million words a twelvemonth in their L2, particularly in the beginning phases when reading big sums of text is difficult work ( Meara, 1988 ) . A speedy count based on multiplying words per page by Numberss of pages in three novels on my shelf suggests that a reader would necessitate to read 10 full length novels in order to meet a million words, barely a realistic end for any but the most advanced L2 scholars. Many scholars have months instead than old ages to give to geting an L2. It is clear that most will be hard pressed to read in the volume required for significant incidental vocabulary larning benefits to accrue.

2. Decision

But is the image truly every bit blue as this? We believe that there are at least two grounds for hope. First, the treatment of chances has focused on the opportunities of retaining a word ‘s significance in a individual reading brush, but possibly a 2nd or 3rd reading brush enhances the chance of keeping dramatically. This may sound like optimistic guess, but it is besides a testable claim that a systematic geographic expedition of the effects of multiple reading brushs could verify. Second, it is besides possible that methodologically flawed experiments have underestimated the power of reading brushs with new words. For case, run intoing an unfamiliar L2 word in context may lend to a considerable sum of acquisition of a type that merely does non register as a right response on a word-knowledge trial. This possibility can be explored by developing more sensitive steps than have been used in old probes. In brief, carefully designed experiments should be able to supply a clearer image of the vocabulary larning benefits of reading in a 2nd linguistic communication than has been available so far.