The effects of vocabulary learning strategies use on the breadth and depth of vocabulary and reading comprehension performance among L2 pre- university students

Competency in the English Language especially in acquiring a sufficient vocabulary threshold and effective reading skill is vital for pre-university students. The lack of vocabulary knowledge to assist reading comprehension is seen as an obstacle to the students. Previous studies fixated on the relationship between Vocabulary Learning Strategies (VLS), vocabulary knowledge and reading, yet lacked focus on specific VLS and the need for intervention in relation to reading. The present study aimed to examine pre- university students’ vocabulary breadth and depth which are vital for the Malaysian University English Test (MUET) text comprehension, and explore students’ perception in employing the five VLS for vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension enhancement. This study utilised the quasi-experimental study which involved 19 students from the experimental group and 21 students from the control group who were pre- and post-tested for data collection. A semi-structured interview was also conducted on six selected students from the experimental group. The results revealed that students’ vocabulary level deteriorated as they reached the 5,000- word level before the intervention. Moreover, the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group in the New Vocabulary Levels Test (NVLT), Depth of Vocabulary Knowledge (DVK) and MUET reading comprehension post-tests after the intervention. Vocabulary breadth significantly correlated with students’ reading comprehension score and assisted them in improving their MUET reading comprehension performance. However, vocabulary depth depicted otherwise. Furthermore, ‘Guess from textual context’ was found to be the most useful strategy in improving students’ vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension performance. Hence, the findings of the study have offered an insight and implications on the usefulness and effects of Vocabulary Learning Strategies on vocabulary learning and reading comprehension from a theoretical and pedagogical perspective. It has opened a broad view in the study of vocabulary, language testing and measurement, and subsequently contributes to the growing body of research.