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Patterns of Vocabulary Development in Foreign-Language Learners1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 November 2008

Rolf Palmberg
Rolf Palmberg
Affiliation:
Department of Teacher Education, Åbo Akademi
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Abstract

After an introductory discussion of the concepts of vocabulary knowledge continua and foreign-language learners' mental lexicons, the paper presents the results of a longitudinal pilot study whose aim was to make preliminary insights into vocabulary development as it takes place in an ordinary foreign-language classroom setting involving elementary-level Swedish-speaking learners of English. The results are discussed in terms of vocabulary growth in general, the learners' accessibility to words under time pressure, the relationship between “old,” well-known words and newly learned words, and finally, the stability of the learners' immediate access to words.

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Type
Articles
Information
Studies in Second Language Acquisition , Volume 9 , Issue 2 , June 1987, pp. 201 - 219
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

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References

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