華語二語學習者於文本閱讀理解表現之探究──以說明文為例

A Study on CSL Learners' Reading Comprehension: A Case Study of Explanatory Text

本文旨在探討華語二語學習者閱讀不同複雜度的文本時，其閱讀理解之表現。文本類型乃是由語意透明度高低不同，以及語法連接詞難易不同，所組成的四個複雜度文本。本研究亦調查華語二語學習者的詞彙知識、主題背景知識分別與文本閱讀理解表現之間的相關性。研究結果初步發現，（1）詞彙語意透明度對讀者閱讀理解具顯著的影響，即學習者閱讀透明度高的文本，其閱讀理解表現較佳，t（24）＝11.992，p＝.000；反之，在語法連接詞難易不同的文本方面，學習者之閱讀理解則無顯著差異，t（24）＝.505，p＝.618；（2）語意透明度對閱讀理解的影響勝過語法連接詞，F＝32.76，p<.001；（3）學習者的詞彙知識與透明度低的文本顯著相關，詞彙知識表現佳的讀者閱讀透明度低的文本閱讀理解表現較佳，（r（23）＝.464，p＝.019）；（4）學習者的主題背景知識與語意透明度低的文本達顯著相關，（r（23）＝.416，p＝.038）。整體而言，本研究結果顯示文本複雜度中的語意透明度對閱讀理解具顯著影響力，且其影響勝於語法連接詞難易。此外，學習者自身因素中，其詞彙知識與主題背景知識越豐富者，其處理閱讀複雜度高之文本的能力相對較好。

The purpose of this study is to investigate Chinese L2 learners' reading performance on different text of varying complexity. The texts are categorized into four levels of complexity based on differing degrees of Chinese semantic transparency (high/low) and varying difficulty of syntactic connectives (difficult/ easy). In addition, this research investigated the correlation between learners' vocabulary knowledge (and background knowledge) and reading comprehension performance of Chinese L2 readers respectively. The following are the preliminary findings of the study: (1) Semantic transparency of a lexical word has a significant impact on learners' reading comprehension; learners' reading comprehension performance is better when the text is composed of high-transparency vocabulary, t(24) = 11.992, p = .000; on the contrary, the difficulty level of syntactic connectives in the text does not have significant impact on learners' reading comprehension, t(24) = .505, p = .618 ;(2)The effect of semantic transparency on reading comprehension is greater than that of syntactic connectives, F = 32.76, p < .001 ;(3) Chinese L2 learners' vocabulary knowledge is significantly correlated with low-transparency texts; learners with more vocabulary knowledge have better reading performance on low-transparency texts, [r(23) = .464, p = .019]; (4) similarly, L2 learners' background knowledge is significantly correlated with low-transparency texts, [r(23) = . 416, p = .038]. Overall, the results of this study show that varying levels of text complexity, in terms of the semantic transparency of the text's vocabulary, has a significant impact on reading comprehension, and its impact is greater than that of the difficulty level of syntactic connectives. Namely, Chinese L2 learners having higher vocabulary knowledge and background knowledge can be of great benefit to comprehending complex texts.