Demystifying the Jabberwocky : a research narrative
This piece of research analyses lexical inferencing, the process of working out the meanings of unknown words using context clues. Three main aspects are considered: to what extent subjects succeed or fail in making plausible inferences about word meaning, their feelings and attitudes towards the process, and the techniques or strategies which they resQrt to. The thesis is structured as a research narrative, pre~ senting twelve studies dating from 1983 to 1989. Subjects were adult Brazilians, reading in English as a foreign language, and/or in their native language, Portuguese. Adult lexical inference is shown to be more successful than previous studies using children reading in their native language had suggested. Evidence is presented to suggest that subjects characteristically use~ a narrow context of a few words on either side of the target item in attempting lexical inference, and that this breadth of context was sufficient for most inferences. The suggestion that there may be a vocabulary 'threshold', below which lexical inference is impeded, is rejected. Implausible inferences came generally either from mis-recognition of word forms, or from ignoring wider amounts of context. Evidence is presented to
Scott, Michael Rowland
Lexical inferencing
Demystifying the Jabberwocky : a research narrative. This piece of research analyses lexical inferencing, the process of working out the meanings of unknown words using context clues. Three main aspects are considered: to what extent subjects succeed or fail in making plausible inferences about word meaning, their feelings and attitudes towards the process, and the techniques or strategies which they resQrt to. The thesis is structured as a research narrative, pre~ senting twelve studies dating from 1983 to 1989. Subjects were adult Brazilians, reading in English as a foreign language, and/or in their native language, Portuguese. Adult lexical inference is shown to be more successful than previous studies using children reading in their native language had suggested. Evidence is presented to suggest that subjects characteristically use~ a narrow context of a few words on either side of the target item in attempting lexical inference, and that this breadth of context was sufficient for most inferences. The suggestion that there may be a vocabulary 'threshold', below which lexical inference is impeded, is rejected. Implausible inferences came generally either from mis-recognition of word forms, or from ignoring wider amounts of context. Evidence is presented to
narrative piece analyse lexical process work meaning unknown word_use context clue three_main aspect consider_extent subject succeed fail_make plausible inference word_meaning feeling attitude_towards process technique strategy structure narrative pre twelve study date subjects adult read english_foreign language and native_language portuguese adult lexical inference show successful previous_study use child read native_language suggest evidence_present suggest subject characteristically use narrow context word either_side target item attempt lexical inference breadth context sufficient inference suggestion may vocabulary threshold lexical inference impede reject implausible inference come generally either mis recognition word_form ignore wider amount context evidence_present