Home Lexical knowledge, memory and experience
Article
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Lexical knowledge, memory and experience

  • Ewa Dąbrowska EMAIL logo and Tan Arda Gedik
Published/Copyright: February 19, 2024

Abstract

Knowing a language involves knowing a large number of idiosyncratic units such as individual words and collocations which must be learned from the input. This study explores the role of implicit and explicit memory, as well as language experience, and specifically print exposure, with regard to adult native English speakers’ knowledge of vocabulary and collocations. Consistent with prior research, our findings reveal a strong correlation between print exposure and performance on both language tasks. However, contrary to predictions, there were no significant effects of either implicit or explicit memory on either task. We argue that this is most likely due to the fact that language learning relies primarily on memory for associations between form and meaning and between words rather than memory sequences of meaningless phonological forms.

References

Acheson, Daniel J., Justine B. Wells & Maryellen C. MacDonald. 2008. New and updated tests of print exposure and reading abilities in college students. Behavior Research Methods 40(1). 278–289. DOI: 10.3758/BRM.40.1.278.Search in Google Scholar

Bloom, Paul. 2000. How children learn the meanings of words. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.10.7551/mitpress/3577.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Brown, Jessica. 2021. Exploring the relationship between socioeconomic status, language exposure, and language processing in young adults. York: York St John University Doctoral Dissertation. https://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/5386.Search in Google Scholar

Carey, Susan & Elsa Bartlett. 1978. Acquiring a single new word. Papers and Reports on Child Language Development 15. 17–29.Search in Google Scholar

Chomsky, Noam. 1965. Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.10.21236/AD0616323Search in Google Scholar

Craik, Fergus I. M. & Endel Tulving. 1975. Depth of processing and the retention of words in episodic memory. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 104(3). 268–294. DOI: 10.1037/0096-3445.104.3.268.Search in Google Scholar

Cunningham, Anne E. & Keith E. Stanovich. 1998. What reading does for the mind. American Educator 22. 8–17.Search in Google Scholar

Dąbrowska, Ewa. 2009. Words as constructions. In Vyvyan Evans & Stéphanie Pourcel (eds.), New Directions in Cognitive Linguistics, 201–223. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.10.1075/hcp.24.16dabSearch in Google Scholar

Dąbrowska, Ewa. 2014a. Implicit lexical knowledge. Linguistics 52(1). 205–223. DOI: 10.1515/ling-2013-0060.Search in Google Scholar

Dąbrowska, Ewa. 2014b. Words that go together: Measuring individual differences in native speakers’ knowledge of collocations. The Mental Lexicon 9(3). 401–418. DOI: 10.1075/ml.9.3.02dabSearch in Google Scholar

Dąbrowska, Ewa. 2016. Cognitive linguistics’ seven deadly sins. Cognitive Linguistics 27(4). 479–491. DOI: 10.1515/cog-2016-0059.Search in Google Scholar

Dąbrowska, Ewa. 2018. Experience, aptitude and individual differences in native language ultimate attainment. Cognition 178. 222–235. DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2018.05.018.Search in Google Scholar

Dienes, Zoltán. 2007. Subjective measures of unconscious knowledge. Progress in Brain Research 168. 49–64.10.1016/S0079-6123(07)68005-4Search in Google Scholar

Eyckmans, June. 2009. Toward an assessment of learners’ receptive and productive syntagmatic knowledge. In Andy Barfield & Henrik Gyllstad (eds.), Researching Collocations in Another Language, 139–152. London: Palgrave Macmillan. DOI: 10.1057/9780230245327_11.Search in Google Scholar

Forsberg Lundell, Fanny & Maria Sandgren. 2013. High-level proficiency in late L2 acquisition: Relationships between collocational production, language aptitude and personality. In Gisela Granena & Mike Long (eds.), Sensitive periods, language aptitude, and ultimate L2 attainment (Language Learning & Language Teaching, 35), 231–256. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI: 10.1075/lllt.35.09forSearch in Google Scholar

Frost, Ram, Noam Siegelman, Alona Narkiss & Liron Afek. 2013. What predicts successful literacy acquisition in a second language? Psychological Science 24(7). 1243–1252. DOI: 10.1177/0956797612472207.Search in Google Scholar

Garibyan, Armine. 2022. Processing collocations cross-linguistically: A psycholinguistic and neurolinguistic study. Erlangen & Nuremberg: Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg Doctoral Dissertation. urn:nbn:de:bvb:29-opus4-211773Search in Google Scholar

Goldberg, Adele E. 2006. Constructions at work: The nature of generalization in language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199268511.001.0001Search in Google Scholar

Golinkoff, Roberta M., Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Leslie M. Bailey & Neill R. Wenger. 1992. Young children and adults use lexical principles to learn new nouns. Developmental Psychology 28(1). 99–108. DOI: 10.1037/0012-1649.28.1.99.Search in Google Scholar

Grömping, Ulrike. 2007. Estimators of relative importance in linear regression based on variance decomposition. The American Statistician 61(2). 139–147. DOI: 10.1198/000313007X188252.Search in Google Scholar

Hamrick, Phillip, Jarrad A. G. Lum & Michael T. Ullman. 2018. Child first language and adult second language are both tied to general-purpose learning systems. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 115(7). 1487–1492. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1713975115.Search in Google Scholar

Herbst, Thomas. 2014. Idiosyncrasies and generalizations: Argument structure, semantic roles and the valency realization principle. Yearbook of the German Cognitive Linguistics Association 2(1). 253–289. DOI: 10.1515/gcla-2014-0015.Search in Google Scholar

Hulme, Charles, Steven Roodenrys, Gordon Brown & Robin Mercer. 1995. The role of long-term memory mechanisms in memory span. British Journal of Psychology 86(4). 527–536. DOI: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1995.tb02570.x.Search in Google Scholar

Hulstijn, Jan H. 1997. Mnemonic methods in foreign language vocabulary learning: Theoretical considerations and pedagogical implications. In James Coady & Thomas Huckin (eds.), Second language vocabulary acquisition: A rationale for pedagogy, 203–224. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139524643.015Search in Google Scholar

James, Ariel N., Scott H. Fraundorf, Eun-Kyung Lee & Duane G. Watson. 2018. Individual differences in syntactic processing: Is there evidence for reader-text interactions? Journal of Memory and Language 102. 155–181. DOI: 10.1016/j.jml.2018.05.Search in Google Scholar

Jensen, Arthur R. 2001. Vocabulary and general intelligence. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 24(6). 1109–1110. DOI: 10.1017/S0140525X01280133.Search in Google Scholar

Kachergis, George, Chen Yu & Richard Shiffrin. 2010. Cross-situational statistical learning: Implicit or intentional? In Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society 32. 2362–2367.Search in Google Scholar

Kidd, Evan & Joanne Arciuli. 2016. Individual differences in statistical learning predict children’s comprehension of syntax. Child Development 87(1). 184–193. DOI: 10.1111/cdev.12461.Search in Google Scholar

Lakoff, George. 1991. Cognitive vs generative linguistics: How commitments influence results. Language & Communication 11(1–2). 53–62. DOI: 10.1016/0271-5309(91)90018-Q.Search in Google Scholar

Langacker, Ronald W. 1987. Foundations of cognitive grammar. Vol. 1, Theoretical Prerequisites. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Search in Google Scholar

Llompart, Miguel & Ewa Dąbrowska. 2020. Explicit but not implicit memory predicts ultimate attainment in the native language. Frontiers in Psychology 11. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2020.569586.Search in Google Scholar

Lum, Jarrad A. G. & Gina Conti-Ramsden. 2013. Long-term memory: A review and meta-analysis of studies of declarative and procedural memory in specific language impairment. Topics in Language Disorders 33(4). 282–297. DOI: 10.1097/01.TLD.0000437939.01237.6a.Search in Google Scholar

Mol, Suzanne E. & Adriana G. Bus. 2011. To read or not to read: A meta-analysis of print exposure from infancy to early adulthood. Psychological Bulletin 137(2). 267–296. DOI: 10.1037/a0021890.Search in Google Scholar

Nation, Paul & David Beglar. 2007. A vocabulary size test. The Language Teacher 31(7). 9–13.Search in Google Scholar

Nicolson, Roderick I., Angela J. Fawcett, Rebecca. L. Brookes & Jamie Needle. 2010. Procedural learning and dyslexia. Dyslexia 16(3). 194–212. DOI: 10.1002/dys.408.Search in Google Scholar

Pereira, Alfredo F., Linda B. Smith & Chen Yu. 2013. A bottom-up view of toddler word learning. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 21(1). 178–185.10.3758/s13423-013-0466-4Search in Google Scholar

Petersson, Karl-Magnus, Vasiliki Folia & Peter Hagoort. 2012. What artificial grammar learning reveals about the neurobiology of syntax. Brain and Language 120(2). 83–95. DOI: 10.1016/j.bandl.2010.08.003.Search in Google Scholar

R Core Team. 2023. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. Vienna: R Foundation for Statistical Computing. https://www.r-project.org/.Search in Google Scholar

Reber, Arthur S. 1967. Implicit learning of artificial grammars. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 6(6). 855–863. DOI: 10.1016/S0022-5371(67)80149-X.Search in Google Scholar

Sachs, Jacqueline Strunk. 1967. Recognition memory for syntactic and semantic aspects of connected discourse. Perception & Psychophysics 2(9). 437–442. DOI: 10.3758/BF03208784.Search in Google Scholar

Siegelman, Noam, Louisa Bogaerts & Ram Frost. 2017. Measuring individual differences in statistical learning: Current pitfalls and possible solutions. Behavior Research Methods 49(2). 418–432. DOI: 10.3758/s13428-016-0719-z.Search in Google Scholar

Smith, Kenny, Andrew D. M. Smith & Richard A. Blythe. 2011. Cross-situational learning: An experimental study of word-learning mechanisms. Cognitive Science 35(3). 480–498. DOI: 10.1111/j.1551-6709.2010.01158.x.Search in Google Scholar

Smith, Linda & Chen Yu. 2008. Infants rapidly learn word-referent mappings via cross-situational statistics. Cognition 106(3). 1558–1568. DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2007.06.010.Search in Google Scholar

Stanovich, Keith E. & Anne E. Cunningham. 1992. Studying the consequences of literacy within a literate society: The cognitive correlates of print exposure. Memory & Cognition 20(1). 51–68. DOI: 10.3758/BF03208254.Search in Google Scholar

Sternberg, Robert J. 1987. Most vocabulary is learned from context. In Margaret G. McKeown & Mary E. Curtis (eds.), The nature of vocabulary acquisition, 89–106. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Search in Google Scholar

Swinney, David A. 1979. Lexical access during sentence comprehension: (Re)consideration of context effects. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 18(6). 645–659. DOI: 10.1016/S0022-5371(79)90355-4.Search in Google Scholar

Ullman, Michael T. 2004. Contributions of memory circuits to language: The declarative/procedural model. Cognition 92(1–2). 231–270. DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2003.10.008.Search in Google Scholar

Ullman, Michael T. 2016. The declarative/procedural model. In Gregory Hickok & Steven L. Small (eds.), Neurobiology of language, 953–968. Amsterdam: Elsevier. DOI: 10.1016/B978-0-12-407794-2.00076-6.Search in Google Scholar

Vlach, Haley A. & Scott P. Johnson. 2013. Memory constraints on infants’ cross-situational statistical learning. Cognition 127(3). 375–382. DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2013.02.015.Search in Google Scholar

Wei, Zheng. 2015. Does teaching mnemonics for vocabulary learning make a difference? Putting the keyword method and the word part technique to the test. Language Teaching Research 19(1). 43–69. DOI: 10.1177/1362168814541734.Search in Google Scholar

Yi, Wei. 2018. Statistical sensitivity, cognitive aptitudes, and processing of collocations. Studies in Second Language Acquisition 40(4). 831–856. DOI: 10.1017/S0272263118000141.Search in Google Scholar

Published Online: 2024-02-19
Published in Print: 2023-12-15

©2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Downloaded on 29.10.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/gcla-2023-0004/html
Scroll to top button