LINGUIST List 15.2189

Mon Aug 2 2004

Books: Language Acquisition: Malvern et al

Editor for this issue: Neil Salmond <neillinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. palgravemacmillan, Lexical Diversity and Language Development: Malvern, Chipere, Richards, Duran

Title: Lexical Diversity and Language Development
Subtitle: Quantification and Assessment

Publication Year: 2004
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
		http://www.palgrave.com

Book URL: http://www.palgrave.com/products//Catalogue.aspx?is=1403902313

Author: DAVID D. MALVERN, Head of the Institute of Education at the
	University of Reading
Author: NGONI CHIPERE, Lecturer in Language Arts at the University of
	the West Indies in Barbados
Author: BRIAN J. RICHARDS, Professor of Education at the University of
	Reading
Author: PILAR DUR�N, Marketing Consultant at Research Solutions Ltd

Hardback: ISBN: 1403902313, Pages: 272, Price: U.K. � 50.00

			
Abstract:

'This book represents a major contribution to the study of both
lexical diversity and language development... [and] provides the most
comprehensive and compelling study available to date of vocabulary
measurement, including type-token ratios, number of different words,
and word length. The innovative, empirically validated, and
user-friendly measure of lexical diversity (VOCD - or simply "D") that
it proposes is based on deep understanding of mathematical models
combined with rich background in language acquisition and language
assessment. The culmination of fifteen years of cooperative research
between David Malvern, Brian Richards, and their co-authors at the
University of Reading, this study represents the best of
inter-disciplinary research. In style, the book is both erudite and
readable. It should be an invaluable source of reference for scholars
and graduate-level students in general and psycho-linguistics, in
first and second language acquisition, language education, and
language pathology.'
- Ruth A. Berman, Professor Emeritus, Department of Linguistics, Tel
Aviv University

'David Malvern and his co-authors have developed a new and very
promising approach to the study of lexical diversity and language
development. Their statistical method is far more sophisticated than
anything we have had in the past. This book will be of great interest
to the developmental psycholinguistic community.'
- Professor Jean Berko Gleason, Department of Psychology, Boston
University

Various facets of vocabulary richness, including lexical diversity and
use of rare words, have an important role in assessing first and
second language proficiency, diagnosing progress and testing theories
of language development. There are, however, considerable difficulties
in quantifying these variables reliably. This book reviews and
evaluates different methods of measuring how vocabulary is deployed in
spontaneous speech and writing, before introducing alternative
approaches which can assess overall lexical diversity, measure
morphological development and compare the development of different
word classes. These practical solutions are validated and illustrated
by their application to a succession of data sets, including speech
and writing, and first and second language. The book also contains a
glossary that throws light on the confusing proliferation of measures
used in language assessment, sample transcripts, and documentation for
a new and more flexible version of the vocd software developed by the
authors.

CONTENTS: List of Tables - List of Figures - Acknowledgements - PART
I: MEASURING LEXICAL DIVERSITY - Introduction - Some Approaches to
Measuring Lexical Diversity - A Mathematical Model of Lexical
Diversity - PART II: VALIDATION OF THE MODEL THROUGH ITS APPLICATION
TO LANGUAGE CORPORA - Early Child Language 1: The New England Corpus -
Early Child Language 2: The Bristol Corpus - Lexical Diversity and the
Investigation of Accommodation in Foreign Language Proficiency
Interviews - A New Measure of Inflectional Diversity and its
Application to English and Spanish Date Sets - PART III: DIFFERENT
WORD CATEGORIES AND THEIR DIVERSITY: TYPE-TYPE VERSUS TYPE-TOKEN -
Comparing the Diversity of Lexical Categories: The Type/Type Ratio and
Related Measures - Lexical Diversity and Lexical Sophistication in
First Language Writing - PART IV: CONCLUSION - Overview and
Conclusions - Notes - Glossary of Technical Terms and Acronyms -
Appendices - Index


Lingfield(s):	Language Acquisition
		Morphology
		
Written In:	English (Language Code: ENG)


 See this book announcement on our website:
 http://linguistlist.org/get-book.html?BookID=11012.