Examining incidental vocabulary acquisition from captioned video

Abstract

Previous comparisons of vocabulary uptake from captioned and uncaptioned audio-visual materials have almost consistently furnished evidence in favour of captioned materials. However, it is possible that many such comparative studies gave an advantage to the captioned input conditions by virtue of their use of written word prompts in the tests. The present study therefore examines whether aurally presented test prompts yield equally compelling evidence for the superiority of captioned over uncaptioned video. Intermediate EFL learners watched a ten-minute TED Talks video either with or without captions and were subsequently given a word recognition and a word meaning test, with half of the test prompts presented in print and the other half presented aurally. While the results of the word recognition test were inconclusive, the word meaning test yielded significantly better scores by the group that watched the captioned video. However, this was due entirely to their superior scores on the printed word prompts, not the aural ones. This suggests that evaluations of the benefits of captions for vocabulary acquisitions should take input-modality – test-modality congruency into account.

The Effect of Imagery and On‐Screen Text on Foreign Language Vocabulary Learning From Audiovisual Input

“…The positive effects of captions compared to no on‐screen text support the work of other studies (e.g., Mohd Jelani & Boers, ; Montero Perez et al, ; Sydorenko, ; Winke et al, ). Eye‐tracking research has shown that foreign language learners’ use of captions is high (Winke et al, ) and that captions are perceived as helpful for form–meaning mapping (Montero Perez et al, ; Winke et al, ).…”

“…Although both the written and spoken form were provided in the tests, learners in the captions group might have relied mostly on the written form. Previous research (Mohd Jelani & Boers, ; Sydorenko, ) has shown that the benefits of captions might be due to written prompts. Future research should investigate to what extent captions promote the learning of the written or the spoken word form.…”

“…Because the L1 subtitles and control group were exposed to spoken input only and the captions group to both spoken and written input, the test items were provided in their written and spoken form in order not to favor any group. Previous research has shown that providing only the written form in tests might favor learners assigned to the captions group as a result of test‐modality congruency (Mohd Jelani & Boers, ; Sydorenko, ).…”

“…Taken together, these studies have all found beneficial effects of captioned TV viewing for word learning, even though its effect might depend on the word knowledge aspect tested (Montero Perez et al, , ) or the orthography of the foreign language (Winke et al, ). Although the beneficial effects of captions have often been explained in terms of their potential to help learners segment the speech stream (Montero Perez, Van Den Noortgate, & Desmet, ; Winke et al, ), it should at the same time be noted that some of the positive effects found might also be attributed to test–modality congruency whereby the captioned viewing group is favored because of the written presentation of the target items in the posttests (Mohd Jelani & Boers, ; Sydorenko, ). For instance, Mohd Jelani and Boers () found that learners who had watched TV with captions scored better on a word meaning test than learners who had watched TV without captions, but the difference between the two groups was mainly due to the written word prompts in the test and not the aural ones.…”

The effect of input modes and number of exposures on the learning of L2 binomials

“…The lack of a clear advantage for reading-while-listening in the current study may imply that its advantages are limited to tasks involving aural input. There is evidence suggesting a test-modality congruency effect (Sydorenko, 2010;Jelani & Boers, 2018). Sydorenko (2010) found that a video with audio group performed better on an aural than on a written recognition test, and the reverse pattern was found for a video with caption group.…”