The Role of Context in the Performance of Iranian EFL Learners in Vocabulary Tests
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| Title | The Role of Context in the Performance of Iranian EFL Learners in Vocabulary Tests |
| Authors | |
| Abstract | This study investigated the role of context in the performance of Iranian EFL learners in vocabulary tests. The study involved both qualitative and quantitative methods of research. Four intact classes at intermediate level were selected. Participants were given the vocabulary section of an institutional TOEFL to make sure they are appropriately placed. Outliers were omitted and 60 students were selected. Four vocabulary tests each providing varying degrees of context were constructed and used to assess the participants’ lexical knowledge. These tests included word definition matching test with no context, limited context test with unconnected sentences, reduced context test with cohesive but not coherent sentences and a cloze test providing the whole context. Following the tests, students were given a questionnaire to write their comments on these tests. The application of One-way repeated measures ANOVA to quantitative data suggested that context affected the performance of test-takers in vocabulary tests with various contextual conditions. All the participants performed significantly better in reduced context test (sentential context condition) and had the weakest performance in the matching test (no context condition). Data coming from the questionnaire supported other findings: The majority of the participants agreed that reduced context test was the best for assessing their vocabulary knowledge. Further findings and implications are discussed in the paper. |
| Publisher | ACADEMY PUBLISHER |
| Date | 2012-06-01 |
| Source | Theory and Practice in Language Studies Vol 2, No 6 (2012) |
| Rights | Copyright © ACADEMY PUBLISHER - All Rights Reserved.To request permission, please check out URL: http://www.academypublisher.com/copyrightpermission.html. |