Exploring the effectiveness of incidental vocabulary acquisition through writing and reading: A thought experiment replicating and extending Pichette et al. (2012)

Katarzyna Li

doi:10.54475/jlt.2026.003

Authors

Katarzyna Li University of Oxford https://orcid.org/0009-0006-5029-6972

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.54475/jlt.2026.003

Keywords:

incidental vocabulary learning, emotional load, domain bias, experiment design

Abstract

This paper investigates the effectiveness of incidental vocabulary acquisition through writing and reading tasks, replicating and extending the study conducted by Pichette et al. (2012). Based on the Involvement Load Hypothesis and recent literature on cognitive and lexical processing, the paper proposes an improved methodology of a study which could investigate whether writing sentences promotes greater vocabulary retention than reading, and whether concrete nouns are more successfully acquired and retained than abstract ones. The methodology builds closely on the original study maintaining the within-subject design but introduces refined item selection, culturally negotiated translations, and additional controls to ensure ecological validity and reduce the influence of intentional learning. The proposed methodology also takes into account the impact of connotation, word length, learner proficiency, and word decay curve.

Author Biography

Katarzyna Li, University of Oxford

Katarzyna Li (Jasinska-Belfort) is a polyglot and a language teacher. She has been teaching English, German and French as first and foreign languages in various academic settings for over 10 years in Japan, Poland, Brazil, Hong Kong, UK and Switzerland. She graduated Computer Science at the University of Southern Denmark, obtained PGCE in Modern Foreign Languages from University of Manchester, and is currently completing her MSc in Applied Linguistics at the University of Oxford. Her research interests include neurology and cognitive aspects of L2 acquisition, child multilingualism, statistical learning, factors that affect one’s ability to attain high proficiency in L2, and statistical data analysis in context of education-related research.
Email: katarzyna.jasinskabelfort@education.ox.ac.uk

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