This study investigated the relative contributions of English morphological and vocabulary knowledge to second language (L2) reading comprehension among 100 adult Japanese English as a foreign language (EFL) learners. The study also investigated the extent to which the roles of morphological and vocabulary knowledge in L2 reading comprehension…

The current study investigates whether vocabulary breadth, vocabulary depth, and vocabulary fluency contribute differentially to L2 reading and listening comprehension. One hundred and thirty-eight EFL learners first took three vocabulary knowledge tests that measured vocabulary fluency, vocabulary breadth, and vocabulary depth. Subsequently, they…

Morphological knowledge is a complex construct integral to vocabulary breadth and reading comprehension. To understand its complexity, researchers examine its dimensionality. First, this study contributes to this broad topic by investigating whether morphological awareness and affix knowledge, related concepts with a long history of investigation…

Ensuring classroom reading materials align with learners' lexical knowledge is crucial, often requiring teachers to infer vocabulary knowledge from vocabulary test performance. However, the best approach to match learners with lexically appropriate texts based on vocabulary test scores remains unclear. This study compared two methods:…

Few studies aimed to disentangle different aspects of vocabulary depth (VD) knowledge and examine their contribution to second-language (L2) reading comprehension. To fill this gap, this study distinguished between two VD aspects, that is, semantic network knowledge and polysemous knowledge; and tested how they, together with vocabulary size (VS),…

Graded readers are a great asset to learners acquiring the vocabulary of another language. Homonyms, on the other hand, are a recognized source of trouble for students with that same goal. Publishers of graded readers control the presentation of old and new words, but does this control extend to homonyms? Are only the word forms controlled for--in…

This study examines how the perceptions that twelve teachers of Japanese as a second language (L2) had of extensive reading (ER) changed following 10 months of online English ER. Interviews provided much of the study data, supported by pre-project and post-project questionnaires. The participants' pre-project and post-project vocabulary sizes and…

Metacognitive knowledge is essential to vocabulary learning and reading. However, there have been few longitudinal studies investigating how the breadth of vocabulary knowledge mediates the relationship between metacognitive knowledge and reading over time in a foreign language context. This study involved 361 primary school students, who were…

We are encouraged by Cobb's (2022) description of changes to the Morpholex profiling tool (https://www.lextutor.ca/cgi-bin/morpho/lex/) resulting in more accurate word classifications. This addresses one point in our recent commentary on Morpholex and on Laufer and Cobb's (2020) study using Morpholex (McLean & Stoeckel, 2021). However, Cobb…

Using a mixed method explanatory sequential design, this study investigates intensive English program (IEP) instructors' perceptions of the impact of COVID-19 emergency remote teaching on reading instruction. Forty-four IEP instructors completed an online survey, and seven of them participated in follow-up interviews. Both quantitative and…

In the late 1980s Batia Laufer worked with teachers who believed that to understand a text it was enough to understand 80% of the text's word tokens. In response, Laufer set out to calculate the minimal text coverage, i.e., percentage of running words in a text the reader should understand to comprehend it reasonably well. In 1992, she explored…

This study explored the lexical coverage of corpus-based vocabulary lists (general, academic, and content-specific) across several million tokens gathered from digital science resources (DSR) for middle school (6-8 grade) students in the United States. The goal was to estimate the extent to which a combination of well-known word lists, mostly…

In response to McLean (2021), Laufer (2021) makes three claims which are either not supported by research or are based on studies with important limitations. First is that a vocabulary size, instead of a level, can be used to match learners with lexically appropriate materials despite test creators and research not supporting this. Second is that…

Several researchers have claimed that low-achieving students, especially second language students, need explicit academic vocabulary instruction to "catch up" with their age peers (e.g., Nagy & Townsend, 2012). Two possible paths to vocabulary growth -- free reading and explicit vocabulary instruction -- were compared in terms of…

Studies of lexical coverage are valuable because they reveal the importance of vocabulary knowledge to comprehension. Lexical profiling research is also extremely useful because it indicates the vocabulary knowledge necessary to understand different text types such as novels, newspapers, academic lectures, television programs, and movies.…