Abstract
ABSTRACT Learning foreign or second languages requires the acquisition of many thousands of words. Direct vocabulary instruction cannot account for the large amount of words that highly advanced ESL/EFL learners acquire. It is believed that the major way of acquiring vocabulary is through processing L2 information, a situation in which learners have no intention to commit the words appearing in the information to memory. This type of vocabulary learning is referred to as incidental vocabulary learning. Research on incidental vocabulary learning is of a large variety, and various factors conducive to effective incidental vocabulary learning have been found. Laufer and Hulstijn (2001) proposed Involvement Load Hypothesis (2001) to evaluate the factors, but there is only one empirical research on this hypothesis. Therefore, this study aimed to examine this hypothesis by investigating the effect of Involvement Load on English vocabulary acquisition in an incidental learning situation. Four tasks differing in their involvement load were designed and conducted. In terms of the involvement load, Task 4 was designed to induce the highest load, Task 3 the second highest, Task 2 the third highest, and Task 1 the lowest. The participants were given an unexpected vocabulary retention test upon completing the tasks, and were given another unexpected delayed posttest one week later. It was hypothesized that the vocabulary retention scores would be highest in Task 4, second highest in Task 3, third highest in Task 2, and lowest in Task 1. It was also hypothesized that consulting dictionary would have a better impact than reading glosses on vocabulary retention. Lastly, it was hypothesized that the text-based activity gap-filling would be beneficial to vocabulary learning. The results of analysis of variance (ANOVA) and the results of the multiple-range Duncan test showed that on the immediate posttest in the first experiment Task 2 and Task 4 were the most effective tasks, Task 3 was the second best, and Task 1 was the least effective one. On the delayed posttest, Task 4 and Task 1 became the best tasks, Task 1 and Task 3 were the second best tasks, and Task 3 and Task 2 were the least effective tasks. On the immediate posttest of the second experiment, Task 4 and Task 1 were the best tasks, Task 1 and Task 3 were the second best tasks, and Task 2 was the least task. In the delayed posttest, Task 1 was the best task, whereas the remaining three tasks—Task 4, 3, and 2—were the second best ones. In sum, the first two hypotheses in this study were not supported. However, the third and fourth hypotheses were partially supported. The partial support for the third and the fourth hypotheses suggests that if there is only one exposure to words, there is no significant difference between consulting the dictionary and reading L1 glosses. Moreover, looking up words in the dictionary and also doing one extra text-based vocabulary activity are likely to result in better retention than reading L1 glosses and doing the same text-based vocabulary activity. The negative results of the research hypotheses raise questions about the validity of the Involvement Load Hypothesis. However, this study was restricted by several confounding variables, such as the design of the novel task (Task 4), time on each task, participants’ English level, the teacher factor, participants’ guessing behaviors, and participants’ exposure to L2. These confounding variables might have prevented the study from getting valid results. Future research should take them into account, and try to reduce their effects to a minimum. This study provides directions for modification of the Involvement Load Hypothesis. For future research on establishing theoretical constructs explaining the effectiveness of vocabulary-learning tasks, this study has provided preliminary suggestions and offered another empirical testing for the present theoretical construct.