dc.description.abstract | This study investigates effects of a massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) on incidental vocabulary acquisition. The MMORPG was specifically designed for English learning. Participants of this study were university students (20 to 23 years old) in Taiwan. This study explores how glossing types and frequency of gloss impact incidental vocabulary acquisition, also explores whether different game experience lead to variations of effectiveness on incidental vocabulary acquisition.
Regarding the overall effectiveness of incidental vocabulary learning using MMORPG, the results demonstrate a significant difference between test scores on Vocabulary Knowledge Scale (VKS) that were administered before and after the experiment. For both high and low game experience groups, the pre- and post-scores on VKS show significant difference, while no significant difference in VKS gain score is identified between the two groups.
Regarding the impact of glossing types and game experience on the effectiveness of incidental vocabulary learning, the results show that full gloss, retrieval gloss, and inference gloss have significant difference between pre- and post-VKS gain scores. Inference gloss was significantly higher than full gloss, and there is no difference between retrieval gloss and inference gloss, and between retrieval gloss and full gloss. Therefore, inference gloss enhances incidental vocabulary acquisition more than full gloss does. For high game experience group, retrieval gloss was significantly higher than full gloss, and there was no difference between retrieval gloss and inference gloss, and between inference gloss and full gloss. Thus, for the high game experience students in this study, retrieval gloss could enhance incidental vocabulary acquisition than full gloss does. For the low game experience group, no difference in performance could be identified among full gloss, retrieval gloss, and inference gloss.
Regarding the relationship between effectiveness of incidental vocabulary acquisition and flashcard frequency and game experience, the results show that frequency of flashcard is positively correlated to the effectiveness of incidental vocabulary acquisition, but at a marginally significant level. For the high game experience group, no correlation was found. For the low game experience group, a significant positive correlation was found, although at a moderate level. | en_US |