I analyzed the mental organizations of two sets of fuzzy lexical items by 70 native speakers (NSs) of English and 185 learners of English as a second language (ESL). They provided pair‐wise comparisons of a set of degree adverbs and a set offrequency terms, respectively. I subjected their judgments to unidimensional scaling and circular triad analysis, which indicated that: (a) despite their apparent familiarity with the items, ESL learners' semantic organizations deviated from the NSs' model; (b) the location and extent of semantic mismatch can be identified at different levels of ESL proficiency; (c) consistent approximation to the target model improved as ESL proficiency improves; (d) the structural stability of an individual's private semantic model is not readily generalizable between sets of lexical items or levels of proficiency; and (el consensus among ESL learners improves as proficiency increases. The findings suggest that a discernible approximative pattern exists in the acquisition of ESL semantics, with the differentiation of certain words acquired before the differentiation of others.

An experimental study was conducted to investigate the effects of cognitive complexity upon the written production of learners of English as a second language (ESL). Sixty-three intermediate ESL learners provided written responses to questions at high and low cognitive levels. Their performances at the two cognitive levels were rated for total number of words produced, syntactic complexity, and linguistic accuracy. It was found that a higher order of cognition increased both the amount and the order of syntactic complexity of written English responses. But across the two cognitive levels, the degree of inaccuracy remained stable. It was also found that an increase in cognitive complexity increased variability in terms of total amount of production and syntactic complexity but reduced the dispersion in error incidence. Comparisons between standard deviations and standard errors of estimate pointed to substantial inaccuracy of prediction if generalizations were to be made about ESL performance at a high cognitive level from a knowledge of performance at a low level. Learning Vol. 37, No. 4 cognitive operations as analysis, synthesis, abstraction, ratiocination, conjecture or evaluation are at higher levels. Guilford (1956) also hypothesizes that the structure of intellect follows a hierarchical pattern. Presumably, questions requiring different mental operations can be rank-ordered in terms of cognitive complexity. I Bloom's and Guilford's theories have focused much attention on the important pedagogical issue of whether an increased use of high-level questions in classroom instruction would facilitate student achievement. Major findings in the area have been summarized and critiqued by Gall (1970), Winne (1979), and Redfield and Rousseau (1981). Gall (1970) and Redfield and Rousseau (1981) maintain that teacher questioning is a crucial input feature fostering the intellectual development of the student. They claim that high-level cognitive questions have proved to be more conducive to learning than low-level cognitive questions. However, their view is not shared by Winne (1979) who, after examining the validity of a considerable amount of the empirical research reported, argues that no sufficiently convincing evidence has yet been found to confirm a significant positive correlation between the cognitive factor and student achievement. Despite the controversy, many teachers and authors of books or articles on teaching methodology (Carin and Sund 1971; Cunningham 1971;Hoover 1976; Hunkins 1968;Lowrey 1973;Ruddel 1974) believe that enough empirical evidence has accumulated in favor of the utilization of high-level questions in classroom instruction. LanguageMore recently, these research findings have given impetus to similar inquiries in second language acquisition. ESL researchers are particularly interested in experimental studies in the teaching of English as a first language, such as those reported by Cole and Williams (1973) and Smith (1978), which clearly point to a pedagogical potential that has yet to be ...