The effect of partial synonymy on second language vocabulary learning

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effect of the intra-lingual semantic similarities of words (partial synonymy) on second language vocabulary learning. To this end, two groups of participants were selected. Both groups received a pre-test. Then, the experimental group participants were taught semantically similar words contrastively, being made aware of the semantic similarities and contrasts, while the control group participants received the same words randomly with an interval of at least two weeks between the presentation of semantically similar words. A post-test was then administered and the means of the groups were compared using a case II t-test procedure. Results showed that the contrastive teaching of semantically similar words positively influences the learning of second language vocabulary.