Exploring the lexical profile of advanced L2 writers: Longitudinal data from the Russian Overseas Flagship program

Abstract

This study explores the lexical profile of essays written by 48 advanced learners of second language (L2) Russian who participated in the Russian Overseas Flagship, an intensive year-long study abroad program designed to help students reach Interagency Language Roundtable (ILR) Level 3 proficiency in all skills. Using the lexical frequency profile and P-Lex as measures of vocabulary sophistication, the study found that over the 9 months of the program, students significantly increased their usage of words from the lowest frequency bands. This adds to previous findings that knowledge of lexical items at the 3,000-5,000 word frequency levels predicts reading proficiency at the ACTFL advanced high-superior level in Russian. However, the increase of vocabulary sophistication was not clearly correlated with improvements in the students' writing proficiency scores, as measured on the ILR scale. A qualitative analysis of the students' low-frequency vocabulary usage reveals their control of native Russian vocabulary and derivational morphology. The analyses reveal the effects of writing tasks on student vocabulary usage.