Words in the Mind : Exploring the relationship between word association and lexical development

要旨

Vocabulary acquisition in both L1 and L2 has long relied on the principle of associative language learning to help understand and explain the process of lexical acquisition in the mind of the language learner.To date, L2 studies in this area have however delivered somewhat contentious findings.This study seeks to revisit some of the relevant issues and gain some insight into how words are held in the mind -or, more precisely, to understand the relationship between lexical development and the process of word association (WA).To better understand the relationship between lexical semantics and the mental lexicon, this investigation explores and compares the word associations of a group of Japanese English speakers and a group of English native speakers.It attempts to understand how mental links are made between lexical items in the mental lexicon, a process commonly believed to partially support vocabulary acquisition.Initial findings support general trends in this research area, namely that the word-associations of native and foreign speakers differ in some respects.These however, do not occur to the extent that they may constitute a pattern that may distinguish native from foreign speakers.Findings further highlight the importance of lexical semantics and phonological aspects during word learning, while the importance of developing a robust methodology for the analysis of word association are briefly addressed.To conclude, implications for WA research, the mental lexicon and L2 language learning and teaching are discussed.

主題