Word association: Exploring the L2 mental lexicon of Korean EFL learners

Abstract

Word association tests (WATs) provide insight into how language users store and organise words in their mental lexicons. Associative tendencies are believed to be culture-specific (Kruse et al., 1987), yet despite a large body of research into the lexicons of first language (L1) and second language (L2) learners there is a paucity of research in the Korean context. This study aims to explore the Korean L2 mental lexicon through the administration of a WAT to fifty-one Korean EFL college students. Questions investigated include: 1) How do Korean EFL learners make connections between English words they have learned?, 2) Do different WAT stimuli elicit different results?, and 3) Is there a relationship between gender and word association behaviour? The results suggest a tendency for Korean learners to store and retrieve words in syntactic strings rather than hierarchal classifications and reveal the Korean L2 lexicon to be less heavily form-driven than that of other L2 learners. Word class was found to significantly influence the connections between words, with nouns found to be the most salient lexical class in the Korean L2 lexicon. The implications these findings have for vocabulary teaching and testing as well as future WAT research are far reaching. © 2015 Asian EFL Journal.