许多教育工作者，教师和学生都试图找出一种有效的方式来获取词汇。词汇习得是二语习得中的焦点中心。与词汇习得有语言学家和教育工作者在被加热的话题。对词汇习得的研究是从不同的角度进行的，如词汇习得的方式，心理词汇的表征，词汇意义的建构和形式意义的关系。
Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 Background of the Study
Lexicons are the fundamental components of language and it is on the basis oflexicons that the sentences uttered by people make sense. If we compare language to aman, the structure of grammar makes up the skeleton of the language, and lexiconsare flesh and bloods of it. As Wilkins (1972) said: “without grammar, we can hardlysay anything. But without lexis, we can say nothing”. Therefore the proficiency ingrasp and use of lexicons is of special importance. Because of the significance oflexicon, lots of educators, teachers and students all have attempted to find out anefficient and effective way to acquire lexicons. The acquisition of lexicons is ofcentral focus in the second language acquisition. And lexical acquisition has been theheated topic among linguists and educators.The studies on lexical acquisition are conducted from different perspectives,such as the way of lexical acquisition, representation of mental lexicon, theconstruction of lexical meaning and the connection of form and meaning. Thoughthese researches provide more new ways for learners to learn language, some studies of second language acquisition contribute less to the gains in language learningprocess. How to learn lexicons effectively bothers teachers and students. Massiveattempts have been made to help students develop their competence in using lexicons.
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1.2 Significance and Purpose of this Study
According to the above situations, we need to find out a way to contribute to theadvance both in language competence and in the acquisition of vocabularies oflearners. This study aims to study the influence of different aspects of lexical aspects, namely form and meaning, on the lexical acquisition. It emphasizes to provide apromising tendency for the learners to learn language. A communicative environmentneeds to be created for learners, under which the lexicon’s meaning and form can beunderstood and memorized. The attention of learners should be directed to thelexicons in the lexical learning process. Mental processing is also needed in theacquisition process to improve the memory effects. Through this study, a newperspective on lexical learning and teaching is provided for the teachers and learners,which will shed light on the puzzled teachers and learners. This study will give theteachers another teaching option to teach vocabularies and strengthen the effects oflexical learning.This thesis aims to study how lexical form and meaning effect the acquisition oflexicons respectively in a communicative learning situation, and which aspect leads toa better acquisition effect and a longer retention in the learning process. It also aims togive some evidences on the importance of lexical form and meaning, and givelearners an impetus in changing their habit of leaning vocabulary. The results of thestudy will enlighten the language learners and teachers.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 Lexical Acquisition
Lexical acquisition is the fundamental and foremost part of languageacquisition and it provides solid foundations for the acquisition of other languageitems. Therefore it is of significant value to figure out the various aspects of lexicalacquisition. Lexicon, which can be also called vocabulary or word, is a set of lexemes,including single words, compound words and idioms. According to Hu (2001), “wordis a unit of expression that has universal intuitive recognition by native speakers,whether it is expressed written or spoken. A word has three characteristics, namely, aphysically definable unit, the common factor underlying a set of forms, and agrammatical unit”(Hu, pp. 76-77).As for lexical knowledge, though there is no agreement reached on the nature oflexical knowledge, many researchers claim that vocabulary knowledge is not isolatedbut some kind of continuum connected with one another.
