Journal of Advances in Education Research

Download PDF (337.8 KB) PP. 216 - 223 Pub. Date: October 15, 2018

DOI: 10.22606/jaer.2018.34003

• Qin Xu^*
  School of Foreign Language, Henan University of Technology, Zhengzhou 450001, China
• Lili Yan
  School of Foreign Language, Henan University of Technology, Zhengzhou 450001, China

Based on the Involvement Load Hypothesis and from the perspective of involvement load and task type of the task design, this study aims to investigate the effects of task-induced involvement and different task types on incidental vocabulary acquisition in senior high school students. In this study, three parallel classes of Grade 10 from a senior high school in Xin County are selected as participants and they are divided as three parallel treatment groups assigned with three different reading tasks respectively. The three tasks are multiple choice questions after reading comprehension, gap-filling after looking up target words in the dictionary, and answering related questions with original sentences. Upon finishing the tasks, an immediate vocabulary test and a delayed vocabulary test one week later are carried out. Both quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis are applied to analyze the data collected. Major research findings are presented below: (1) Reading tasks with higher involvement loads generally lead to better initial word gains and delayed word gains than tasks with lower involvement loads but both fail to bring about satisfying retention effect of vocabulary. (2) With the same involvement load, there is no significant difference between the effect of the interpretive task and the productive task on immediate word acquisition while as for the effect on word retention, the productive task appears much superior to the interpretive task. The results of the present experiment partially supported the Involvement Load Hypothesis. Meanwhile, some pedagogical implications were suggested to improve vocabulary teaching in senior high school.

Incidental vocabulary acquisition, reading task, involvement load

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