Meara (1996)。

2。2 Related  study in China on vocabulary  knowledge

Vocabulary knowledge research has attracted many Chinese researchers to  carry out both theoretical and empirical studies。 Jiang, Wu & Chen are most representative。

Jiang (2000) deals with L2 vocabulary acquisition from the angle of psycholinguistics。 He points out that the lemma including semantic and syntactic information, and the lexeme including morphological and formal information are the two components making up a lexical entry。 And the distinctive difference existing between L1 and L2 lexical information in the mind is also deliberated, which is in L2, various types  of vocabulary  information are not highly integrated with other lexical entries in the mental representation as compared with L1。 Jiang (2000, 49) mentions two constraints imposed on L2 vocabulary learners in instructional settings: poverty of input and the presence of an established conceptual system  with L1 lexical system, both of which reduce the opportunities for the L2 learners to extract meaning from contextual clues。 Based on the above findings, he further proposed three stages for L2 lexical development, namely the formal stage, L1 lemma meditation stage and L2 integration stage, aiming to  help  learners extract the specification of an L2  word  by means of  exposure

and using。 Though Jiang’s model based on three stages of lexical deve lopment has provided significant implications from the psycholinguistic perspective in  L2  vocabulary acquisition and possible routes of L2 lexical developments, there are some  limitations because a  great deal of research indicates that even with adequate and highly contextualized input, the lexical competence of L2 learners might become fossilized at the second stage  due  to  learners’ inability of taking good advantage of the information available in the put。文献综述

Wu and Chen (2000) pide Chinese learners of English into three proficiency levels labeled as elementary, intermediate and advanced, and test on their English vocabulary knowledge by selecting six high- frequency English nouns and four types of word knowledge including meaning,  synonym, derivative and collocation as testing material。 The  result   have

revealed  that:1、word  meaning  has  developed  at  the  greatest  rate  in  the  early  stage    of

vocabulary development;2、Other types of word knowledge have equally progressed but presented no hierarchical order of development;3、knowledge of meaning tends to slow down in development as L2 learners reach the intermediated proficiency level, however, the other three types of word knowledge grow at a rapid speed;4、the whole process of acquisition of

inpidual words is characterized by the fact that receptive word  knowledge  is  always superior to productive word knowledge。 They further indicate the internal and external factors that affect the development process of word knowledge, i。e。 the limitation of input quantity, lack of production practice, and lack of attention paid to the established network of linking a wide range of types of word knowledge。 Their findings confirm the incremental nature of vocabulary development from receptive knowledge to productive knowledge。 (Ma 19)