The Effects of Task Type and Task Involvement Load on the Initial Vocabulary Retention

Čupić, Antonela. (2018). The Effects of Task Type and Task Involvement Load on the Initial Vocabulary Retention. Diploma Thesis. Filozofski fakultet u Zagrebu, Department of English Language and Literature. [mentor Geld, Renata].

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Abstract

This thesis examines the effects of task type on the initial vocabulary retention in the Croatian secondary school context from the involvement load hypothesis perspective. The theoretical part of the paper gives an overview of literature examining the involvement load hypothesis and the levels of processing theory. According to the former, a task’s efficiency in promoting vocabulary retention will depend on a tasks involvement load, i.e. a combination of need, search, and evaluation components, while the latter advocates the importance of task type for vocabulary learning. The second part of the thesis presents the study conducted in two grammar schools in Zagreb. Its aim was to test out whether task type would have an effect on the initial vocabulary acquisition when two tasks with the same involvement load are assigned. The results showed that, in spite of their same involvement loads, the sentence writing task resulted in better retention scores than the gap-fill task. Therefore, the study corroborated the levels of processing theory claim that a task involving deeper processing would facilitate vocabulary learning more effectively than a task involving shallower processing. Simultaneously, the present study did not show support for the involvement load hypothesis.

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