Word Association Responses in L1 and L2 to the Chinese Word Yueliang (Moon): Implications for L2 Vocabulary Instruction

A mental lexicon refers to the stored knowledge of vocabulary in one's mind. Representation of the mental lexicon is usually obtained through a word association test. A majority of the literature in mental lexicon studies has employed such word association test and focused on the response types to compare mental lexicons in first language (L1) and second language (L2) through responses to stimulus words. This study investigates the response types and detailed response items in Chinese L1 and L2 by focusing on one stimulus word yueliang, which means ‘moon’ in English. The findings lend support to the semantic view among the three standpoints presented (semantic, syntactic and phonological) that L2 mental lexicon might be mainly organized by semantic links. The detailed response items in Chinese L1 and L2 have been carefully studied and implications for L2 vocabulary instruction have also been discussed.