Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure

First language acquisition requires relatively little effort compared to foreign language acquisition and happens more naturally through informal learning. Informal exposure can also benefit foreign language learning, although evidence for this has been limited to speech perception and production. A...

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Main Authors: Bisson, Marie-Josée, van Heuven, Walter J.B., Conklin, Kathy, Tunney, Richard J.
Format: Article
Published: Public Library of Science 2013
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2499/
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author Bisson, Marie-Josée
van Heuven, Walter J.B.
Conklin, Kathy
Tunney, Richard J.
author_facet Bisson, Marie-Josée
van Heuven, Walter J.B.
Conklin, Kathy
Tunney, Richard J.
author_sort Bisson, Marie-Josée
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description First language acquisition requires relatively little effort compared to foreign language acquisition and happens more naturally through informal learning. Informal exposure can also benefit foreign language learning, although evidence for this has been limited to speech perception and production. An important question is whether informal exposure to spoken foreign language also leads to vocabulary learning through the creation of form-meaning links. Here we tested the impact of exposure to foreign language words presented with pictures in an incidental learning phase on subsequent explicit foreign language learning. In the explicit learning phase, we asked adults to learn translation equivalents of foreign language words, some of which had appeared in the incidental learning phase. Results revealed rapid learning of the foreign language words in the incidental learning phase showing that informal exposure to multi-modal foreign language leads to foreign language vocabulary acquisition. The creation of form-meaning links during the incidental learning phase is discussed.
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spelling nottingham-24992020-05-04T16:36:31Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2499/ Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure Bisson, Marie-Josée van Heuven, Walter J.B. Conklin, Kathy Tunney, Richard J. First language acquisition requires relatively little effort compared to foreign language acquisition and happens more naturally through informal learning. Informal exposure can also benefit foreign language learning, although evidence for this has been limited to speech perception and production. An important question is whether informal exposure to spoken foreign language also leads to vocabulary learning through the creation of form-meaning links. Here we tested the impact of exposure to foreign language words presented with pictures in an incidental learning phase on subsequent explicit foreign language learning. In the explicit learning phase, we asked adults to learn translation equivalents of foreign language words, some of which had appeared in the incidental learning phase. Results revealed rapid learning of the foreign language words in the incidental learning phase showing that informal exposure to multi-modal foreign language leads to foreign language vocabulary acquisition. The creation of form-meaning links during the incidental learning phase is discussed. Public Library of Science 2013-04-08 Article PeerReviewed Bisson, Marie-Josée, van Heuven, Walter J.B., Conklin, Kathy and Tunney, Richard J. (2013) Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure. PLoS ONE, 8 (4). 7/1-7/7. ISSN 1932-6203 http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0060912 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0060912 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0060912
spellingShingle Bisson, Marie-Josée
van Heuven, Walter J.B.
Conklin, Kathy
Tunney, Richard J.
Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title_full Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title_fullStr Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title_full_unstemmed Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title_short Incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
title_sort incidental acquisition of foreign language vocabulary through brief multi-modal exposure
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2499/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2499/
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/2499/