A Correlation Study Between Academic Knowledge And General Reading Comprehension For Academic Purpose Of Chinese Non-English Majors

At present, the academic vocabulary plays an important role in the process of English teaching and learning, which is the basis of the development of the academic English skills. In the study of first language (L1) and second language (L2) acquisition, the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension has been studied from the relationship between vocabulary size and reading comprehension to the relationship between vocabulary in multi-dimensions and reading comprehension, however, the relationship between academic vocabulary and reading comprehension can be further studied. In order to detect the role of academic vocabulary in vocabulary knowledge, and to examine influence of academic vocabulary on reading comprehension, the relationship between academic vocabulary and academic reading is to be examined based on two dimensions of breadth and depth in the thesisThis thesis attempts to test 108 non-English major sophomores from an ordinary undergraduate in the southwest, exploring the relationship between academic vocabulary and general academic reading comprehension, of which the vocabulary breadth and depth are as two basic dimensions. Three tests were included in the thesis. The first test is to measure overall vocabulary breadth and academic vocabulary breadth with Vocabulary Level Test designed by Schmitt and Clapham. The second test is to measure overall vocabulary depth and academic vocabulary depth with the Word Associate Test designed by Read, and the last test is to measure general academic reading with the reading materials selected from CET-Band Four and CET-Band Six. SPSS was used to analyze data, from which scores of vocabulary breadth, the scores of vocabulary depth, the scores of the breadth of academic vocabulary and the scores of the depth of academic vocabulary as the independent variables, as well as reading scores as the dependent variable, were measured with Pearson correlation analysis and linear regression analysis respectively.The following findings are drawn in the thesis:1) Academic words in the vocabulary knowledge plays an important role, and there is a positive correlation between academic vocabulary and general academic reading, in which the correlation coefficient between academic breadth and general academic reading is for.670 and that between academic depth and general academic reading is for.656.2) Academic vocabulary breadth and depth are closely related to general academic reading, but due to relatively low coverage of the academic vocabulary in reading comprehension, academic vocabulary knowledge cannot independently predict general academic reading achievement.3) Comparing the breadth and depth of the academic vocabulary of testees from different groups, the data show that the larger the vocabulary, the higher the reading performance is. However, the relationship between the breadth and depth of academic vocabulary is more closely related to the general academic reading when vocabulary size is inadequate to testees.4) The relationship between academic vocabulary breadth and depth are so close that they are complementary to each other. When the mastery of vocabulary size is as important as academic vocabulary quality, vocabulary depth should be taken into consideration.The results of this study show that in English teaching, the breadth and depth of academic vocabulary should be paid attention to. When vocabulary breadth is required to increase in the process of English learning, vocabulary depth should be met to gradually increase at the same time. Enhancing academic vocabulary is an important way to increase college English. In addition, it should also be appropriate to increase the number of scientific and technological articles in the College English teaching materials. The conclusion of this paper provides reference data for the study of the relationship between academic vocabulary and reading comprehension for academic purpose in Chinese College English teaching, and some suggestions for academic vocabulary teaching for College English are put forward in the future.