The Role Of Input Enhancement And Task Load Involvement In Collocation Acquisition By EFL Learners

Recently researchers have drawn their attention to collocation acquisition, and have recognized problems that EFL learners are facing in achieving native-like collocations. The present study, a factorial design of 2x2, aims at investigating English-collocation acquisition by EFL learners under the effect of input enhancement and task load involvement, following the three research questions:1) Do EFL learners acquire collocations following the two treatments:lexical elaboration only and lexical elaboration and textual enhancement (reading text which contained highlighted target structures)? 2) Do high task load involvement and low task involvement influence the acquisition of collocations differently? 3) Is there any interaction between input conditions and task load involvement on the acquisition of collocations?In order to achieve the aim of the current study, participants were designed to experience four kinds of instructions:1) input enhancement with high task load involvement - learners received enhanced input and were assigned high-load-involvement tasks; 2) input enhancement with low task load involvement - learners received enhanced input and were assigned low-load-involvement tasks; 3) unenhanced input with high task load involvement - learners were instructed with unenhanced input and assigned with high-load-involvement tasks; 4) unenhanced input with low task involvement - learners were instructed with unenhanced input and assigned with low-load-involvement tasks.85 non-English major freshmen from Guangxi University participated in the research. They were divided into four groups according to the four instruction conditions mentioned above. And a pretest which intended to demonstrate English proficiency and vocabulary competence was held, that four groups were at the same level. After 12 weeks instruction, a battery of test tapping into different aspects of collocation knowledge:form and meaning, receptive and productive, and free production in writing, was performed. ANOVA, GLM-Univariate and GLM-Repeated Measure were adopted to analyze the data through SPSS 19.0.Major findings concerning with the current study were summarized as follows:1. Conditions of input may affect learners’acquisition of different level of collocations. However, effect of input enhancement responded differently to the acquisition of different aspects of collocational knowledge. Results of the present study offer evidence that textual enhancement has main effect on facilitating learners’acquisition of the form of English collocations rather than on meaning acquisition. In terms of the mastery of receptive and productive knowledge of collocation, input enhancement seemed to be more effective on the acquisition of receptive knowledge. But it did have impact on promoting collocation production in the participants’writing.2. Different task types lead to different levels of collocation acquisition. In the present study, high task load showed its superiority in the acuisition of all aspects of collocation knowledge, including form and meaning, receptive and productive knowledge, and even in the free production of collocations in writing. However, the advantage of high task load involvement on the mastery of receptive knowledge was more remarkable than productive knowledge.3. No statistically significant interactive effect between input enhancement and task load involvement was observed, which should theoretically be seen in the meaning recall tasks for textual enhancement may detract participants’attention from meaning. However, input enhancement and task load involvement led to the improvement of EFL learners’gains of target collocations and attention to produce more collocations in their writing. And EFL learners tended to use more grammatical collocations than lexical ones.In conclusion, textual enhancement in the reading materials and high load involvement tasks can facilitate the learning of collocation knowledge by EFL learners. However, no remarkable statistic evidence shows the interactive effect between input enhancement and task load involvement on the acquisition of collocations. Instructors can adopt textual enhancement and design high-load-involvement tasks to help EFL learners acquire collocations.