Effects Of EFL Learners' Polysemous Representation On Lexical Access In English To Chinese Translating Process

This study was undertaken to investigate the representation of polysemous senses in the EFL learners'mental lexicon, and then to survey the differences of polysemous access speed and accuracy of EFL learners at different English proficiency levels, that is, subjects of a higher proficiency level and the ones of a lower proficiency level, during the process of translating polysemy in sentence context. The research questions to be addressed in the study are as follows:1. How are the polysemous senses represented in the mental lexicon of EFL learners at a lower and a higher proficiency levels?2. What differences of access speed and accuracy exist between the EFL learners with different polysemous representation in the process of translating polysemy?The present research consists of two experiments. The participants in this study were sixty English majors (30 freshmen and 30 seniors) from Hebei North University. The first experiment was employed to investigate the different polysemous representation of EFL learners at two English proficiency levels. The second experiment is designed to find out how polysemous representation of the EFL learners affects their lexical access speed and accuracy. The results from the first experiment address the first question and those from the second experiment, the second question.The quantitative analysis of the data revealed the following major findings:1. EFL learners'polysemous representation follows a developmental pattern. Freshmen tend to show core-sense representation in their mental lexicon, while seniors are inclined to display the separate-sense representation. The polysemous senses are more distinctly represented in the mental lexicon of the higher proficient learners than that of the lower proficient ones (Zhao Cuilian, 2006). 1) for highly frequent words, high-proficiency EFL learners represent the polysemous senses more separately in their mental lexicon than low-proficiency ones; 2) the senses of low-frequency words tend to be stored in a manner of core representation; 3) the degree of distinctness in polysemous representation is positively correlated with EFL learners'proficient levels. 2. Affected by different polysemous representation patterns, high-proficiency EFL learners, on the whole, access the polysemous sense more quickly and more accurately than low-proficiency ones. Meanwhile, word frequency and sense category of each polysemous word constitute fundamental factors which influence access process of polysemous words. Therefore, EFL learners of different proficiency levels present some similarities and differences in access speed and quality. The detailed descriptions are as follows: 1) for the high-frequency words with two familiar and closely related senses, both advanced and less proficient EFL learners can access word meanings quickly and accurately; but considering word classes (e.g. paper: n. used as v.), the access speed of EFL learners is slowing down and the access quality is not so high as that of the noun form; 2) as for the high-frequency words with one familiar and one unfamiliar sense, the access quality and speed present a different picture. For the familiar sense of the word, both groups of EFL learners can access the exact sense and their speed makes no difference; but for the other unfamiliar sense of the word, the access quality and speed of high proficient EFL learners are better and quicker than that of low proficient ones; 3) for high-frequency words with two familiar but clearly distinguished senses, both freshmen and seniors can access the proper polysemous sense, though the access speed of the seniors is a little quicker than that of the freshmen; 4) for the low-frequency words, learners of both proficient levels spent much more time accessing word senses in contrast with accessing the senses of high-frequency words, and the access quality is not good. The last but not the least, the lexical access speed and access quality are adversely correlated.The above findings are discussed from the perspectives of cognitive process involved in L2 polysemous representation, EFL learning environments and vocabulary teaching method. Finally, implications for teaching and learning L2 vocabulary are examined, and recommendations for future research on the related issues are also proposed.