Lexical coverage and reading comprehension revisited

Abstract

The present study is a partial replication of the most widely cited study of lexical coverage and reading comprehension by Hu and Nation (2000). Ninety-four advanced L2 learners read a short story at one of 90%, 95%, 98%, and 100% lexical coverage and then completed a 14-item reading comprehension test. The results showed that although comprehension scores did tend to increase from 90% to 100% coverage, there were no statistically significant differences in comprehension scores between those who read the text with 90%, 95%, and 98% lexical coverage. Participants who read the text with 100% coverage did have significantly higher scores than those who read it at 90% and 95% coverage. The results also revealed that lexical coverage and perceived difficulty both have a role in predicting comprehension scores, but the amount of variation explained is small (11% and 8%, respectively).