英语论文网

hree input methods. The conclusions resulting from this study are hoped tobenefit English learners in China and give implications to Chinese teachers to adjust their teachingmethods.
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Chapter Two Literature Review

2.1 Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition
Acquisition and learning are the two significant ways to learn vocabulary. Krashen’s theory is mainlyabout language acquisition, leaning and the difference of them. “Second language acquisition is sometimesconstructed with second language learning on the assumption that these are different processes. This term‘acquisition’ is used to refer to picking up a second language through exposure, whereas the term ‘learning’is used to refer to the conscious study of a language” (Ellis, 1999:6). Linli (2007) claimed “that acquisitionis a subconscious process, much like the first language acquisition. The learner is no aware what he isacquiring. The learners’ focus is on the message, not form whereas learning is a conscious process resultinginto ‘know about language’ in classroom instruction”. Krashen’s hypotheses of acquisition and learningprovide new methods to language developing, especially in vocabulary learning.Nagy, Herman and Anderson (1985) put forward the term: incidental vocabulary acquisition, whichwas first used in the field of psychology. This concept was based on studies which were about how childrenacquire vocabulary in their first language. Nagy and Herman (1987) claimed that most vocabulary wordswere acquired little by little through occurrence and enhancement for many times in different contexts(Coady, 1997: 276). So far, the approach of acquiring vocabulary incidentally has been applied to second orforeign language teaching and learning. Based on their studies, Nagy, Herman and Anderson proposed thatlanguage learners could acquire both the first language and the second or foreign language incidentally orunconsciously through various activities, like extensive reading or listening, writing or any other activities.Many researchers have done hundreds of studies to try to define second language or foreign vocabularyacquisition from different perspectives (Pulido, 2003; Laufer & Hulstijn, 2001; Joe, 1998; Joe, 1995;Newton, 1995). But there is still no agreement about the concept at present. Nation and Moister (1987)claimed that adults could incidentally acquire about 70 percent of the unfamiliar words by conducting astudy on incidental vocabulary acquisition. Schmidt (1994) defined the process of incidental vocabularyacquisition as the process of learning new words without the concentration on learning, or acquisition whilethe main purpose of learning is to learn and understand the whole passages. Joe (1998) proposed thatincidental acquisition was a helpful way to get new vocabulary.
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2.2 Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition and Topic Familiarity
There are several factors which affect the number and retention of incidentally retained new wordswhile learners try to complete other activities, like reading or listening. Sternberg claimed that learners'background knowledge and their familiarity of topics played a crucial role in the process of retaining newunfamiliar words incidentally. Learners were required to read several narratives which they were culturallyfamiliar with a part of them. But the content of the rest were abstract for learners. By means of classifyingreading materials based on le