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The Contribution of Radical Knowledge and Character Recognition to L2 Chinese Reading Comprehension

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Abstract

Although there have been extensive theoretical discussions on the various component skills needed in comprehending texts in L2 English and L1 Chinese, empirical investigations on the component skills of L2 Chinese are scarce. This study attempts to fill in this gap by investigating the direct and indirect contributions of two lower-level latent component skills, radical knowledge and character recognition, to L2 Chinese passage-level reading comprehension. Radical knowledge was measured by a Receptive Semantic Radical Knowledge Test and a Semantic Radical Meaning Matching Test. Character recognition was assessed by a Lexical Decision Test and a Character Knowledge Test. Two tests, a Multiple-choice Test and a Cloze Test, were adopted to measure textual reading comprehension. The data were collected from 209 learners of Chinese as a second language (CSL). Radical knowledge was found to have a significant direct effect on character recognition and significant indirect effect on L2 Chinese reading through the mediation of character recognition. Character recognition was found to have a significant direct effect on reading comprehension. Taken together, this study suggests the importance of lower-level character and sub-character component skills to L2 Chinese reading.

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  1. Department of Asian Languages and Literatures, Pomona College, 333 N College Way, Claremont, CA, 91711, USA

    Jing Zhou

  2. School of English Studies, Zhejiang International Studies University, 2 Xiyuanjiu Rd, Xihu, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, 310030, China

    Jing Zhou

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Table 7 Descriptive Statistics of the Participants- Birth Places and Home Countries
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Table 8 Descriptive Statistics of the Participants of the Main Study – Native Languages
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Zhou, J. The Contribution of Radical Knowledge and Character Recognition to L2 Chinese Reading Comprehension. J Psycholinguist Res 52, 445–475 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-022-09880-w

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