Effects of Context on Inference of the Meaning of Unknown Lexical Compound Verbs

Abstract

　This study examines the effects of second language proficiency and the quantity of context on the inference the meanings of unknown Japanese lexical compound verbs. Thirty-five Mongolian-speaking learners of Japanese inferred the meaning of lexical compound verbs under three conditions: word in isolation, word within a simple sentence and word within a complex sentence, selecting from four multiple choices. The main findings are: 1) The greater the quantity of context, the more accurately high-proficiency learners could infer the meanings, whereas, there is no difference between the words in isolation and the words within a simple sentence for learners with lower proficiency; 2) When the words were presented with some context, learners with higher proficiency could infer the meanings of unknown words more appropriately, compared with those with lower proficiency. On the other hand, there is no difference between learners with higher proficiency and those with lower proficiency in inferring the meaning of the words without any context. These findings indicate that learners with lower proficiency need much more information for inferring the meanings of unknown words.