Incidental Vocabulary Learning And Recall By Intermediate Foreign Language Students: The Influence Of Marginal Glosses, Dictionary Use, And Summary Writing

Abstract

This study is an attempt to compare the effect of four reading conditions on incidental vocabulary learning and recall of intermediate EFL learners. A sample population of 120 Iranian intermediate students read two short passages in one of four reading conditions: 1) L1 Marginal Glosses (MG1 – provision of L1 translations of unknown words), 2) L2 Marginal Glosses (MG2 – provision of L2 meanings of unknown words), 3) Dictionary Use (DU – opportunity to use a dictionary), or 4) Summary Writing (SW – writing a little summary of both texts using new words). After reading, students were tested for their recall of 30 words that had appeared once to six times in the texts. Two weeks later, they were tested again to check long-term retention of words. Support was found for the hypothesis that the four vocabulary learning conditions and the time interval between the two tests have a meaningful influence on the retention of the meaning of unfamiliar target words. The other hypothesis assumed that the retention of the meaning of the words is the highest in SW group, and it lowers in DU group, MG1group and MG2 group respectively. All of the four reading conditions had a significant effect on incidental learning and recall of the words, but neither the immediate nor the delayed tests revealed significant differences among the four types.