大学英语教材课文词汇分布特征实证研究——《新视野》与Brown语料库的对比分析

An Empirical Analysis of Lexical Distribution in Texts of College English Textbooks:A Comparison between New Horizon College English and Brown Corpus

词汇是英语学习中的一个重要部分，有研究表明，大学英语阶段较为适合的词汇学习方法是直接学习辅以阅读中的多次“遭遇”。因此，阅读材料中词汇重复模式就直接影响到学生的词汇习得。《新视野》阅读教材是很多大学生重要的学习资料，对《新视野》课文与Brown语料库随机语料的对比分析表明，课文词汇整体分布与本族语语料无显著差异，但清晰地表现出先易后难的趋势，比较符合词汇学习规律；课文中一次词分布呈同样的趋势，开始时与本族语相似，随着学习的深入，课文中一次词显著多于本族语语料；5至15次及以上的多次词在两种语料的词汇中占比均较少，课文中5至8次的多次词甚至少于本族语语料，不利于学生的词汇学习。

Vocabulary is an important part in English language learning. Previous researches show that the best vocabulary learning approach for college English learning should be ＂direct learning＂ plus multi-encountering of the words in reading. Therefore, the lexical repeating patterns of reading materials have a direct influence on students＇ acquisition of vocabulary. New Horizon College English textbooks are the most important learning material for many college students. A statistical comparison of texts in textbooks and Brown corpus shows that the ratios of vocabulary to token are similar in both varieties, but the ratio becomes larger significantly from Book 1 to Book 4 in textbooks, which is in accordance with language learning rules; the ratios of hapax legomena to all vocabulary indicate similar tendency, namely, the ratio in Book 1 is similar to Brown but grows significantly in other books; the ratios of vocabulary repeating 5 to 15 times and more to all vocabulary are relatively low in both varieties and the ratio of vocabulary repeating 5 to 8 is even less than that in Brown corpus, which may pose difficulty for students in their vocabulary learning.