抄録
The relationship between reading comprehension and vocabulary knowledge has been examined in many studies. However, few studies so far have distinguished the vocabulary knowledge in isolation and in context. Addressing this point, this study considered two types of vocabulary tests: Mochizuki (1998) Vocabulary Size Test (VST) and TOEFL vocabulary items, and tried to clarify the relationship further. Adding to this, we classified question types in the reading test and examined each relationship with two types of vocabulary knowledge in order to differentiate reading items by the level of reading comprehension. The results of Experiment I suggested that regardless of the presence or absence of context, there was no significant difference between the correlation coefficients of the two vocabulary tests and TOEFL Reading scores. In addition, no correlation coefficients were significantly different in any question type, remaining the issue about whether the vocabulary tests in context and without context really differ or not. For the sake of investigating this point further, the word inference test was newly introduced in Experiment II to examine what knowledge or ability the two vocabulary tests measure. The results revealed a large overlap between VST and TOEFL vocabulary items. It suggests not only VST but also TOEFL vocabulary items which present target items in context tend to measure isolated vocabulary knowledge. Pedagogical implications for vocabulary testing and recommendations for further research are also discussed.
