Vocabulary Learning in a Second Language: Familiar Answers to New Questions

Abstract

Words and multi-word units are the building blocks of linguistic communication. Lexical errors are tolerated to a lesser degree than other types of errors by both native and non-native speakers, and vocabulary knowledge plays a critical role in text comprehension, in Ll or L2 (Hu and Nation 2000; Nation 2006). Over the last two decades, L2 vocabulary research has grown significantly across a range of topics, from teaching and learning vocabulary to measuring vocabulary knowledge, from research on acquisition of individual words to organisational and functional aspects of the bilingual lexicon (Dijkstra and Van Heuven 2002; N. Ellis 1994; Hulstijn 2002; Kroll and De Groot 2005; Nation 2001; Read 2000; Schmitt 2000; Wesche and Paribakht 1996). The complexity of the field is also reflected in the multidisciplinary nature of these investigations, with researchers from the fields of linguistics, psychology, education, pragmatics and computer science contributing to our knowledge about L2 vocabulary acquisition and use.