Examining Vocabulary Acquisition Through Incidental Reading and a Morphological Awareness Intervention
Date
2021-07-03
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Abstract
This project investigates multiple factors that contribute to adult vocabulary acquisition and how they work together. Word morphology and the number of exposures to words are examined, as well as the impact of varying affixes of words across exposures. Tests measuring participants’ depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge were administered prior to the reading exercises in this study, and these differences are explored along with the other variables. Finally, the project addresses the potentiality that adults can benefit from direct learning about word structure in the way that adolescents do in language classes. Half of participants engaged in a series of short activities that explicitly taught them about morphology, while half did not. Results revealed that accuracy was higher for words with one morpheme than words with multiple morphemes, and also higher for words with multiple exposures than words with only one exposure. In addition, participants who scored higher on the vocabulary depth and breadth measures also scored higher on the accuracy test. These results hold implications for ways that adults can best be aided in expanding their vocabularies.
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vocabulary, morphology, reading behavior