L1 loanword frequency and vocabulary test item facility (original) (raw)
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Loanwords and Vocabulary Size Test Scores: A Case of Different Estimates for Different L1 Learners
Language Assessment Quarterly, 2016
The article investigated how the inclusion of loanwords in vocabulary size tests affected the test scores of two L1 groups of EFL learners: Hebrew and Japanese. New BNC-and COCA-based vocabulary size tests were constructed in three modalities: word form recall, word form recognition, and word meaning recall. Depending on the test modality, the tests measured the knowledge of 8,000 lemmas or word families through 80 randomly sampled items, 6 of which were loanwords in Hebrew and 13 in Japanese. Therefore, we added the same number of non-loanwords from corresponding frequencies and performed within-subject comparisons between the scores of the original tests with loanwords and their non-loanword versions in which non-loanwords replaced loanwords. The comparisons were done for each L1 group, at each test modality, and at three L2 proficiency levels, as defined by the total non-loanword test score. We also compared the two L1 groups on the degree of loanword effect. In both L1 groups, tests with loanwords yielded significantly higher scores in all test modalities and among most proficiency groups. Less able participants gained more from the presence of loanwords. However, loanwords differently influenced the size estimates of the two L1 groups. Implications are suggested for creating vocabulary size tests and making inferences from vocabulary test data.
Loanword proportion in vocabulary size tests
Approaches to learning, testing, and researching L2 vocabulary, 2018
We investigated the effect of English-Hebrew loanwords on English vocabulary test scores when the number of loanwords in the test is random and when it is representative of their proportion in the vocabulary lists from which the test items were taken. 303 EFL learners, speakers of Hebrew as L1, at three L2 proficiency levels, received tests with no loanwords, with a representative number of loanwords and with a random number of loanwords in four modalities: word form recall, word meaning recall, word form recognition, word meaning recognition. Though different effects were found for different modalities and different language proficiencies, the score increases from the representative loanword test version to the random loanword version were low and the effect sizes of the differences were very low. We suggest that the inclusion of loanwords in vocabulary tests may not inflate the true vocabulary knowledge score.
Estimating Word Difficulty : The Divergence From Frequency Levels
2007
This study attempts to clarify the difference between word frequency and word diMculty fbr Japanese EFL learners. The first experiment is designed to investigate l arners' vocabulary knowledge at each frequency-band based on JACET 8000, The subjects took a bilingual computerized vocabulary size test and their scores were analyzed according to the frequency bands firom Level 1 to Level 8, each level containing 1000 words. The results show that frequency bands can provide an implicational sc le fbr the diMculty of words up to Level 4. Beyond Level 5, however, the scores fbr each level remained the same, The secend experiment asked 40 English teachers about the difuculty of the tatget words used in the first study. The results showed that the number of the words judged as "dithcult" by more than three of the teachers increased gradually up to Level 4, but beyond this level the number of diMcult words in each level remained the sarne, However, when we took a differerrt da ...
An Analysis of the Features of Words That Influence Vocabulary Difficulty
Education Sciences, 2019
The two studies reported on in this paper examine the features of words that distinguish students’ performances on vocabulary assessments as a means of understanding what contributes to the ease or difficulty of vocabulary knowledge. The two studies differ in the type of assessment, the types of words that were studied, and the grade levels and population considered. In the first study, an assessment of words that can be expected to appear with at least moderate frequency at particular levels of text was administered to students in grades 2 through 12. The second study considered the responses of fourth- and fifth-grade students, including English learners, to words that teachers had identified as challenging for those grade levels. The effects of the same set of word features on students’ vocabulary knowledge were examined in both studies: predicted appearances of a word and its immediate morphological family members, number of letters and syllables, dispersion across content areas, polysemy, part of speech, age of acquisition, and concreteness. The data consisted of the proportion of students who answered an item correctly. In the first study, frequency of a word’s appearance in written English and age of acquisition predicted students’ performances. In the second study, age of acquisition was again critical but so too were word length, number of syllables, and concreteness. Word location (which was confounded by word frequency) also proved to be a predictor of performance. Findings are discussed in relation to how they can inform curriculum, instruction, and research.
Rethinking Vocabulary Size Tests: Frequency Versus Item Difficulty
2016
Rethinking Vocabulary Size Test Design: Frequency Versus Item Difficulty Brett James Hashimoto Department of Linguistics and English Language, BYU Master of Arts For decades, vocabulary size tests have been built upon the idea that if a test-taker knows enough words at a given level of frequency based on a list from corpus, they will also know other words of that approximate frequency as well as all words that are more frequent. However, many vocabulary size tests are based on corpora that are as out-of-date as 70 years old and that may be ill-suited for these tests. Based on these potentially problematic areas, the following research questions were asked. First, to what degree would a vocabulary size test based on a large, contemporary corpus be reliable and valid? Second, would it be more reliable and valid than previously designed vocabulary size tests? Third, do words across, 1,000-word frequency bands vary in their item difficulty? In order to answer these research questions, 4...
2009
This study invcstis,ated the relatiQnship among word frequency, learner perfbmiance, and teacher intuition about difficult words. It was expected that gaining deeper insights into such relationship would demonstrate the frequency of words reflected on the difficulty of them. Firstly, by employing a vQcabulary size test that takes learner confiden ¢ e into account, 180 university learners' vocabulary size was measured. The results of thc test confirmed that the sceres corrected by the degree ofconfidcnce "'ere more sensitive to frequency levels than the raw scores, Secondly, when the distribution of difficult words judged by tcachers xny,ere investigated across frequency levels, thc nuniber of difficult words were in accordance with the i}equency levels, LastlM the relat'ionship betw,een learner performance in vocabulary size test and teacher intuition about word ditficulty was investigated. As a result, a strong correlation was revealed. The result is intcrpreted to show that the teachers were in fact capable o £ ' predicting diiiElcult words. Combining all the results together, this study confirmed a close relationship betw'een the frequency ofwords and their dit]ficulty.
Effects of Test Format in Assessing L2 Vocabulary Knowledge and Skills
2021
In this paper, we present preliminary results of a study in which we examined the relative contribution of English learners' vocabulary to predicting their reading and grammar knowledge, by employing two different formats of vocabulary tests that require active and passive recognition, respectively. We administered a series of English tests to over 820 university students, including TOEFL ITP, a reading test, a grammar test, and a vocabulary test with 80 items of two different formats. The target 80 vocabulary items were selected from Level 2 to Level 6 of JACET 8000. We analyzed the test data using statistical techniques in order to observe the relationships between the vocabulary levels and the language skills, and between the test format, the vocabulary level, and the language skills. We also examined the relative contribution of the vocabulary estimated in different item formats to predicting students' performance on other skills tests. The findings suggest that there was a very strong trait effect, dominating both methods when they are presented together with the vocabulary trait on the common factor structure. Also, the contributions of each method to predicting skills' performance were not consistent across the traits of grammar and reading.
A reassessment of frequency and vocabulary size in L2 vocabulary teaching
Language Teaching, 2012
The high-frequency vocabulary of English has traditionally been thought to consist of the 2,000 most frequent word families, and low-frequency vocabulary as that beyond the 10,000 frequency level. This paper argues that these boundaries should be reassessed on pedagogic grounds. Based on a number of perspectives (including frequency and acquisition studies, the amount of vocabulary necessary for English usage, the range of graded readers, and dictionary defining vocabulary), we argue that high-frequency English vocabulary should include the most frequent 3,000 word families. We also propose that the low-frequency vocabulary boundary should be lowered to the 9,000 level, on the basis that 8–9,000 word families are sufficient to provide the lexical resources necessary to be able to read a wide range of authentic texts (Nation 2006). We label the vocabulary between high-frequency (3,000) and low-frequency (9,000+) as mid-frequency vocabulary. We illustrate the necessity of mid-frequenc...