Abstract
Based on noticing hypothesis (Schmidt, 1990) and comprehensible input (Schmidt & Frota,1986), the study aims to explore the influence of the order of subtitles on L2 learners’ vocabulary learning and whether participants’ proficiency level is a factor in affecting their vocabulary acquisition. Fifty-five college freshmen of Taiwan participated in the study. Based on an English proficiency test, participants were divided into high proficiency group (N= 28) and low proficiency group (N= 27). An 8-12 minute video clip from each of four films in DVD format will be presented to all participants. All participants watched the first and third videos with L1 subtitles first and then with L2 captions. The second and fourth videos were watched first with captions and then with subtitles. After viewing each video, they completed an immediate vocabulary test. A self-designed questionnaire was also distributed during the final week of the experiment.A major finding is that high language proficiency participants outperformed the low language proficiency participants significantly in the two conditions where the order of subtitles was presented differently; however, no significant result was found showing that participants from the two groups differed from each other in terms of viewing videos with different order of subtitles. Nevertheless, it was found that participants performed significantly better in the subsequent vocabulary tests after watching non-romantic types of movies. The results indicate that participants’ English proficiency as well as the genre of movies, instead of the order of subtitles, could be the potential reasons that affect participants’ vocabulary acquisition.