Exploring the relationships between various dimensions of receptive vocabulary knowledge and L2 listening and reading comprehension

Abstract

The article presents an empirical study that investigates the single- and cross-modality relationships between different dimensions of receptive vocabulary knowledge and language skills, as well as the importance of academic vocabulary knowledge in academic listening and reading comprehension. An Updated Vocabulary Levels Test (UVLT), a Vietnamese version of the Listening Vocabulary Levels Test (LVLT), an International English Language Testing System (IELTS) listening test and an academic IELTS reading test were administered to 234 tertiary level Vietnamese learners of English as a foreign language (EFL). Research findings showed that (1) orthographic and aural vocabulary knowledge were strongly correlated (r = .88) and of equal significance to L2 listening and reading comprehension, (2) receptive vocabulary knowledge was a very powerful and reliable predictor of learners’ receptive language proficiency, (3) knowledge of academic vocabulary strongly correlated with academic listening (r = .65) and reading (r = .60) comprehension and the mastery of the Academic Word List (AWL) could suggest a band score 6.0 in both the IELTS listening and academic reading tests.

Vocabulary Demands of Informal Spoken English Revisited: What Does It Take to Understand Movies, TV Programs, and Soap Operas?

“…For decades, vocabulary linguists have documented a strong link between receptive vocabulary knowledge and listening comprehension ( van Zeeland and Schmitt, 2013 ; Cheng and Matthews, 2018 ; Lange and Matthews, 2020 ; Ha, 2021b ). One of the most interesting findings was the concept of lexical demand and lexical coverage .…”

“…Attempts have been made to fill in the methodological gaps ( Hsu, 2018 ; Yang and Coxhead, 2020 ; Nurmukhamedov and Sharakhimov, 2021 ), however, they are few, and certain areas of the field, including scripted and unscripted spoken discourses, remained uncovered. As a result, research on the relationship between phonological vocabulary knowledge and listening comprehension ( Cheng and Matthews, 2018 ; Lange and Matthews, 2020 ; Ha, 2021b ) still had to rely on the findings of Webb and Rodgers (2009a , b) , which are more than 10 years old and ripe for being updated. In response to the dire need for methodologically updated findings, the present study was conducted to revisit the vocabulary demands of informal spoken English.…”

Lexical Profile of Newspapers Revisited: A Corpus-Based Analysis

“…Vocabulary is the most important aspect in language and plays a fundamental role in most if not all language abilities or skills ( Laufer and Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010 ; Schmitt et al, 2011 ; van Zeeland and Schmitt, 2013 ; Cheng and Matthews, 2018 ; Lange and Matthews, 2020 ; Qian and Lin, 2020 ; Ha, 2021b ). In fact, the lexical resource of learners has been proven to be of even greater importance to their comprehension compared to the knowledge of grammatical structures and subject matters ( Lewis, 2002 ; Barcroft, 2007 ; Guo and Roehrig, 2011 ; Zhang, 2012 ; Zhang and Koda, 2013 ).…”

“…The rationale for using WF6 was based on the assumption of learning burden, that was, when a learner knew a family member, he or she could understand or recognize the rest of the family with little or zero effort ( Nation, 2013 ; Laufer and Cobb, 2020 ; Laufer, 2021 ; Laufer et al, 2021 ). It is worth noting that the WF6 have served as a basis for most aspects of vocabulary researches including assessment ( McLean and Kramer, 2015 ; McLean et al, 2015 ; Webb et al, 2017 ; Ha, 2021a ) and other psycholinguistic areas ( Laufer and Ravenhorst-Kalovski, 2010 ; Lange and Matthews, 2020 ; Qian and Lin, 2020 ; Ha, 2021b ).…”

Vocabulary Demands of the IELTS Listening Test: An In-Depth Analysis

“…Among several factors affecting listening comprehension, vocabulary knowledge could be deemed as the decisive element (Nation, 2013;Newton & Nation, 2021). Over decades, lots of efforts have been put into the investigation of the correlation between vocabulary and listening comprehension, and for most of the time, all discussions came down to the same conclusion that larger vocabulary know ledge generally leads to better listening comprehension (Ha, 2021b;Lange & Matthews, 2020;Cheng & Matthews, 2018;Staehr, 2008Staehr, , 2009Van Zeeland & Schmitt, 2013). Researchers have also spent years to examine the number of words needed to understand various types of spoken texts (Nation, 2006;Nurmukhamedov, 2017;Nurmukhamedov & Sharakhimov, 2021;Webb & Rodgers, 2009a, 2009b.…”