This study empirically explores how lexical frequency and contextual cues affect college students’ incidental collocation acquisition and retention in listening and reading scenarios, aiming to clarify the debate over the two factors’ relative importance. Two parallel freshman English-major classes were recruited. Experimental materials were adapted from Black Beauty with audio recorded at 90 words per minute, focusing on 8 low-congruence verb-noun collocations. Receptive and productive collocational knowledge were measured via pre-tests, immediate post-tests, and delayed post-tests, with data analyzed by SPSS 27.0. Results showed frequency exerted a stronger impact on receptive knowledge, while contextual cues dominated productive knowledge; receptive retention relied on frequency and productive retention on context, confirming the two factors’ distinct roles across knowledge dimensions and providing practical references for differentiated L2 vocabulary teaching.

Huang Caixia, Chen Rui, Zhang Yulu. A Study on the Influence of Lexical Frequency and Contextual Cues on the Incidental Acquisition of Collocation in College School English Listening and Reading. Frontiers in Educational Research (2025), Vol. 8, Issue 10: 14-22. https://doi.org/10.25236/FER.2025.081003.

[1] Webb, S., Newton, J., & Chang, A. C. S. (2013). Incidental learning of collocation [J]. Language Learning, 63, 91-120.

[2] Chan, S., & Liou, H. C. (2005). The acquisition of English verb-noun collocations by Chinese EFL learners [J]. TESOL Quarterly, 39(2), 225-248.

[3] Gan, H., & He, X. (2015). Incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading: A meta-analysis [J]. Applied Linguistics, 36(4), 456-481.

[4] Richards, J. C., & Platt, H. (2000). Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics [M]. Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.

[5] Ellis, N. C. (2002). Frequency effects in language acquisition: A review with implications for theories of implicit and explicit learning [J]. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 24(2), 143-188.

[6] Henriksen, B. (2013). Research on L2 learners’ collocational competence and development [M]//Bardel, C., Lindquist, C., & Laufer, B. (Eds.). L2 Vocabulary Acquisition, Knowledge, and Use: New Perspectives on Assessment and Corpus Analysis. European Second Language Association, 29-56.

[7] Hill, J., & Lewis, M. (1997). Dictionary of Selected Collocations [M]. Hove: Language Teaching Publications.

[8] Durrant, P., & Schmitt, N. (2010). Adult learners’ retention of collocations from exposure [J]. Second Language Research, 26(2), 163-188.

[9] Pellicer-Sánchez, A. (2017). Incidental learning of L2 collocations: A classroom study [J]. Language Teaching Research, 21(3), 381-402.

[10] Szudarski, P., & Carter, R. (2016). The role of input flood and input enhancement in EFL learners’ acquisition of collocations [J]. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 26(2), 245-265.

[11] Nagy, W. E., & Herman, P. A. (1987). Breadth and depth of vocabulary knowledge: Implications for acquisition and instruction [M]//McKeown, M. G., & Curtis, M. E. (Eds.). The Nature of Vocabulary Acquisition. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 19-35.

[12] Nagy, W. E., Herman, P. A., & Anderson, R. C. (1985). Learning words from context [J]. Reading Research Quarterly, 20(2), 233-253.

[13] Nagy, W. E., & Anderson, R. C. (1984). How many words are there in printed school English? [J]. Reading Research Quarterly, 19(3), 304-330.

[14] Beck, I. L., McKeown, M. G., & McCaslin, E. S. (1983). Vocabulary: All contexts are not created equal [J]. Elementary School Journal, 83(3), 177-181.

[15] Cai, W., & Lee, B. P. H. (2010). Investigating the effect of contextual clues on the processing of unfamiliar words in second language listening comprehension [J]. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics, 33(2), 181-204.

[16] Wang, T. S., Yao, Y., & Xu, Y. Y. (2012). A comparative study of incidental L2 vocabulary acquisition through listening-reading input [J]. Foreign Languages and Their Teaching, (6), 1-5.

[17] Golonka, E., Bowles, A., Silbert, N., Kramasz, D., Blake, C., & Buckwalter, T. (2015). The role of context and cognitive effort in vocabulary learning: A study of intermediate-level learners of Arabic [J]. The Modern Language Journal, 99(1), 19-39.

[18] Bolger, D., et al. (2008). Context variation and definitions in learning the meanings of words: An instance-based learning approach [J]. Discourse Processes, 45(2), 122-159.

[19] Godfroid, A., et al. (2018). Incidental vocabulary learning in a natural reading context: An eye-tracking study [J]. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 21(3), 563-584.

[20] Lauro, J., Schwartz, A., & Francis, W. (2020). Bilingual novel word learning in sentence contexts: Effects of semantic and language variation [J]. Journal of Memory and Language, 113, Article No. 104123.

[21] Balass, M. (2011). Learning Words in Context: An ERP Investigation of Word Experience Effects on Familiarity and Meaning Acquisition [D]. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh.

[22] Horst, J., Parsons, K., & Bryan, N. (2011). Get the story straight: Contextual repetition promotes word learning from storybooks [J]. Frontiers in Psychology, 2, Article No. 17.

[23] Chang, A. C. S. (2009). Incidental vocabulary acquisition through reading-while-listening [J]. Language Learning & Technology, 13(2), 61-84.

[24] Teng, H. Y. (2018). The effect of reading-while-listening on incidental vocabulary acquisition [J]. System, 73, 105-115.

[25] Yan, L. L. (2015). Incidental acquisition of verb-noun collocations through listening-reading interaction [J]. Computer-Assisted Language Learning, (4), 6-18.

[26] Nation, I. S. P., & Beglar, D. (2007). A vocabulary size test of controlled productive ability [J]. Language Testing, 24(1), 9-29.

[27] Nation, I. S. P. (2004). Learning Vocabulary in Another Language (2nd ed.) [M]. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[28] West, M. (1953). A General Service List of English Words [M]. London: Longman.

[29] Webb, S., Newton, J., & Chang, A. C. S. (2017). Measuring collocational knowledge [J]. Language Assessment Quarterly, 14(3), 234-250.

[30] Elgort, I. (2013). Incidental vocabulary acquisition from L2 reading: A review [J]. Language Teaching, 46(3), 393-435.

[31] Nation, I. S. P. (2001). Learning Vocabulary in Another Language [M]. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[32] Craik, F. I. M., & Lockhart, R. S. (1972). Levels of processing: A framework for memory research [J]. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 11(6), 671-684.

[33] Webb, S. (2007). The effects of repetition on vocabulary knowledge. Applied linguistics, 28(1), 46-65.

[34] Wang, G. Y. (2010). A study on the cognitive mechanism of incidental vocabulary acquisition in second language reading [J]. Foreign Language Teaching, (3), 45-48.

[35] Lockhart, R. S., & Craik, F. I. (1990). Levels of processing: A retrospective commentary on a framework for memory research. Canadian Journal of Psychology/Revue canadienne de psychology, 44(1), 87.