A Study of Word Meaning Acquisition of Polysemous Words for English Majors

Xiaoxu Wei^1,2, Yougen Lou^2*

¹College of Foreign Language, Hunan University, Changsha, China.
²School of Foreign Languages, Yangtze University, Jinzhou, Hubei, China.

DOI: 10.4236/ce.2015.618204                

Abstract

This study investigates the word meaning acquisition of polysemous words for English majors by the way of questionnaire and two word meaning tests. The conclusions are drawn as follows: providing primary meaning to students can help them guess the extended meaning of unfamiliar polysemous words than providing the other extended meanings; the English majors at different language proficiency level show similar acquisition effects in primary meaning but different acquisition effects in the extended meanings. Therefore, in vocabulary instruction, if the word meaning acquisition sequence can be followed and the connections of word meanings can be cherished, the word meaning instruction outcome will be more efficient.

Keywords

Word Meaning Acquisition, Polysemous Words, English Majors

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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