A Study on English Majors' Vocabulary Size and Its Correlation with Scores on Test for English Majors Grade-Four

摘要

Taking 104 second-year English majors from a normal university as the subjects, this paper investigates their English vocabulary sizes along both the receptive and productive dimensions by adopting two effective and reliable vocabulary testing instruments. It also explores the correlation between the vocabulary sizes and the scores on the Test for English Majors Grade-Four (TEM-4). The results show that on the one hand, both the English majors' receptive vocabulary and productive vocabulary are limited, with the average size of 3,707 and 1,654 respectively, which account for 69 percent and 31 percent of the average total vocabulary size; and the two dimensions of vocabularies are unbalanced, the average total productive vocabulary size being only 45 percent of the average total receptive vocabulary size; what's more, there is notable internal discrepancy among different levels of both receptive and productive vocabulary sizes; on the other hand, both the receptive and productive vocabulary sizes of the subjects correlate significantly with their TEM-4 scores, with all the correlation coefficients falling between the statistically significant sphere from .40 to .70. The findings in this paper reveal some problems in English majors' teaching and learning of vocabulary in current Chinese universities and provide certain implications. Due importance should be attached to the acquisition of both receptive and productive vocabulary, and more attention should be paid to students' productive mastery and knowledge of English vocabulary.