Vocabulary Development A Morphological Analysis [Paperback]

This monograph studies research conducted for the purpose of investigating the relationship between vocabulary recognition and morphological knowledge during the early and middle elementary school years. The findings suggest that lexical development can be characterized in terms of increasing morphological complexity, and as a child ages, the proportion of known complex words that the child figured out by analyzing their morphological structure increased.

Abstract v

I. Introduction 1

II. Estimating Children’s Vocabulary Knowledge 8

III. Morphological Development 27

IV. Constructing a Basis for Estimating Vocabulary Knowledge 43

V. A Study of Vocabulary Development in Elementary School Children 57

VI. Distinguishing Potentially Knowable Words from Psychologically Basic Vocabulary 80

VII. Vocabulary Development and the Growth of Morphological Knowledge 118

Appendix: The 196 Words on Which Children were Tested, with Comments on their Morphological Classifications 153

References 157

Acknowledgements 166

Commentary

On Anglin’s Analysis of Vocabulary Growth 167
George A. Miller and Pamela C. Wakefield

Reply

Knowing Versus Learning Words 176
Jeremy M. Anglin

Contributors 187

Statement of Editorial Policy 188

Jeremy M. Anglin received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1970. He is associate professor of psychology and currently the chair of the Developmental Psychology Division at the University of Waterloo. His research interests include language acquisition and cognitive development. Several of his recent studies have focused on lexical, semantic, and conceplc<