Gauging the impact of literacy and educational background on receptive vocabulary test scores

Abstract

The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) is a widely used test of receptive vocabulary, but no researchers to date have examined the performance of low-educated, low-literate L2 adults, or compared these individuals’ performances to their more highly educated peers. In this study, we used many-facet Rasch analysis and mixed-effects linear regression to determine the impact of educational background and other demographic variables on PPVT test performance. The analyses rely on the performance data of 1014 adult learners of Dutch as a second language on the Dutch version of the PPVT (PPVT-III-NL). The results show that a substantial proportion of score variance can be attributed to educational background variables and to the educational tracks the participants followed. These tracks, which cater to the needs of different L2 learner profiles, appear to exacerbate rather than mediate any performance differences. Although this study provides evidence of performance differences and differential item functioning resulting from linguistic, demographic, and educational variables, it offers no data to invalidate the use of the PPVT on low-educated L2 adults.

Can L2 course duration compensate for the impact of demographic and educational background variables on second language writing development?

“…While the beneficial impact of L2 instruction on higher educated learners has been widely reported (Housen & Pierrard, 2005;Loewen, 2018), little or no research has examined the L2 gains of adults who have had reduced access to formal education and who are not functionally literate in an alphabetic script (Deygers & Vanbuel, 2021;Ortega, 2005;Rüsseler et al, 2021;Tarone, 2010). Throughout this paper, we will use the acronym LESLLA to refer to adult L2 learners with a history of (functional) illiteracy and reduced educational access (Carlsen, 2017;Deygers & Vanbuel, 2021;Huettig, 2015). We define reduced educational access as not having had the opportunity to attend formal education for more than nine years (European Commission/EACEA/Eurydice, 2015; Vagvoelgyi et al, 2016).…”

“…There are good reasons to assume, however, that the type of L2 track does impact gains. In a study on receptive vocabulary gains, Deygers & Vanbuel (2021) found that track type was a significant predictor of receptive vocabulary scores on a standardized test (the Dutch version of the Peabody Picture-Vocabulary Test, the PPVT-III-NL, see Dunn et al, 2005), after controlling for individual learner characteristics.…”