The Effect of Morphological Awareness on Depth and Breadth of Vocabulary in Reading Comprehension among EFL Learners

Vocabulary is central to language learning. Morphological awareness is also reported to highly related to vocabulary knowledge. A large body of research revealed that both the breadth (size) and depth of vocabulary knowledge, as well as morphological awareness are predictors of reading comprehension in English as the first (L1) and the second language (L2). The present empirical study was an attempt to investigate the impact of L2 morphological awareness on the breadth and depth of vocabulary along with L2 reading comprehension in English. In particular, it examined whether L2 morphological awareness may influence L2 reading comprehension ability beyond vocabulary knowledge, and also to investigate if explicit teaching of morphological awareness may influence the breadth and/or depth of vocabulary. To this end, 100 English language learners (ELL) at intermediate levels of English language proficiency were recruited. The participants were randomly divided into two groups: a control group who received regular reading comprehension instruction, and an experimental group who also received reading comprehension instruction, but with additional instruction on morphological awareness. Assessments of breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge, morphological awareness and reading comprehension were undertaken before and after the instruction. The collected scores on these skills were compared between the two groups to examine the effect of explicit teaching of morphological awareness on the breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension. The results showed that morphological awareness contributed to reading comprehension ability and the breadth of vocabulary but not to the depth of vocabulary knowledge. It was concluded that morphological awareness influences the breadth of vocabulary, which consequently supports reading comprehension skill among ELLs.

Keywords:

Vocabulary acquisition , morphological awareness , breadth of vocabulary , depth of vocabulary , L2 reading comprehension