Assessing the roles of depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension of Chinese EFL learners

• Main Author: Li, Ning
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2007
• Subjects: English languages—Study and teaching; Vocabulary > Study and teaching; Second language acquisition; English language > Study and teaching > Chinese speakers > Social aspects; Language and Literacy Education
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_masteral/3513; https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/context/etd_masteral/article/10351/viewcontent/CDTG004307_P.pdf
• Institution: De La Salle University

The purpose of this study is to explore the role of depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge in reading comprehension among Chinese tertiary EFL learners. The participants were 60 Chinese EFL sophomores. A learners English learning background questionnaire was used to obtain the participants English learning background. Three paper-and-pencil language tests were used to elicit the data of the three variables, the breadth of vocabulary knowledge (BVK), depth of vocabulary knowledge (DVK) and reading comprehension (RC). Two statistical tests, one-tailed Pearson Product-Moment correlation and multiple regression, were used to compute for the correlations of the participants scores from these three language tests. The results of the present study show that 1) there are positive correlations between BVK and RC; 2) there was no significant correlation between the DVK and RC; and 3) for EFL learners whose vocabulary size is around or below 3,000 word level, BVK is a better predictor of reading comprehension performance than DVK. The findings from this study suggest unbalanced progress in the Chinese EFL learners different aspects of vocabulary knowledge. Some pedagogical implications and recommendations are then given to address this.