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Lexical inferencing is an important vocabulary learning strategy. Unfortunately, almost all research on this issue has been carried out in the reading context. This study is the first to directly measure lexical inferencing success in listening, by both native (N ¼ 47) and nonnative (N ¼ 30) speakers of English. It analysed the effects of contextual clue types, background knowledge, and L2 vocabulary knowledge on inferencing success. Results showed inferencing success rates of 59.6% (natives) and 35.6% (nonnatives), with success being significantly affected by the three variables. The study also measured L2 listeners' ability to notice unknown vocabulary in speech. This revealed limited noticing ability, indicating that a lack of noticing is likely to limit learners' inferencing opportunities and success.

This entry looks at the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and listening from two perspectives. First, it explains how learners' vocabulary knowledge can serve as a predictor of their listening success and discusses how much word knowledge is required for adequate listening comprehension. It also explains how to assess whether learners' vocabulary knowledge is sufficient for them to comprehend particular passages. Second, the entry focuses on incidental vocabulary learning from listening. It discusses several factors that contribute to learning from listening, such as target words' frequency of occurrence and salience in the input. A number of techniques that can stimulate learning from listening are outlined.

This paper discusses four studies from a recently completed Ph.D. thesis (van Zeeland, 2014a) on L2 listening and vocabulary knowledge. Two studies focused on the recognition of spoken vocabulary knowledge in isolation and in context, as well as the assessment of it, and two studies explored lexical inferencing and incidental vocabulary acquisition from listening. This paper summarises the main findings and discusses implications for future research. Together, the studies emphasise the need for more research attention to spoken vocabulary knowledge, especially in continuous speech. They also show how listening could contribute to expanding vocabulary knowledge, and emphasise several factors that future research on this topic should take into account.