How much do Japanese college students know about affixes?

Graduation Thesis

Presented to

the Faculty of the Department of

English Language and Literature

Notre Dame Seishin University

In Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirement for the Degree

Bachelor of Arts

byAyaka Tamizane

2015

Contents

Abstract 4Chapter One: Affix knowledge of Japanese university students

1.1 Introduction 51.2 Affixes 6

1.2.1 Types of affixes 61.2.2 The source of affixes in English

121.2.3 The importance of affixes for EFL learners

201.2.4 The knowledge required to use word parts effectively23

1.3 Learning load 24

1.3.1 Levels of difficulty 25

1.3.2 Acquisition rate 291.4 Research Questions321.5 Conclusion 32

Chapter Two: Experiment2.1 Introduction 332.2 The experiment 33

2.2.1 Introduction 33

2.2.2 Method 342.2.3 Results

382.3 Summary 48

Chapter Three: Discussion1

3.1 Introduction 503.2 Summary of the results 50

3.2.1 Discussion of the results 513.3 Research Questions513.4 Implications 583.5 Limitations of the thesis 583.6 Further research 603.7 Conclusion 60

Appendices

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Abstract

Many Japanese people are studying English in their own way these days.

Students touch English at schools for the first time learning grammar and words,

however, most of the schools don’t tech about English prefixes and suffixes to

students. Students only remember words for the tests they take machinery, without

caring about each small pieces which make up a word. This thesis is about which

prefixes and suffixes are familiar to Japanese students, and how much they know

about the meaning of each element.

In Chapter One, we looked at what prefixes, suffixes, and affixes are, and some

examples of them which came from other languages through ages. We also had a look

at the affixes which were given to the subjects to test their knowledge.

In Chapter Two, we looked into the data of 72 subjects and found out how

much Japanese students know about English affixes, and which of them are familiar

to them. Subjects took two kinds of tests for each element, prefixes and suffixes.

In Chapter Three, we discussed the results and answered the research

questions from the massive data obtained. According to the results from the

experiment, prefixes seemed to be easier to answer for the subjects, and suffixes

such as –s, superlative -est, and comparative -er were more well known receptively

and also productively. Finally, some suggestions were made for what is needed for

Japanese schools to teach English to Japanese students effectively.

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Chapter One Affix knowledge of Japanese university students

1.1 Introduction

It is generally accepted that memorising English vocabulary is a very useful way for English learners to accomplish a variety of English learning acts. However, non-native speakers sometimes have trouble when they learn English as a second language due to the complexity of the English word systems that have roots and standard rules for prefixes and suffixes that extend the way these core important items are used.

According to Nation (1993), “recognising what a word looks like and what it sounds like are the ability to recognise and use the various word parts that can make up a word. Learning vocabulary does not simply involve learning the root forms of words, but also the affixes we attach to add or change meanings, or to make words grammatical,” so understanding basic affixes can allow us to predict the meanings of unknown words.

There are so many affixes that can be used to create a new form of a word with a similar or derived meaning. However, we can suppose that many Japanese students don't know about them well unfortunately, because they don’t learn about these things at school. We meet many different types of words by reading, listening, writing, and speaking, but we cannot remember all these things just by remembering like a machine. Many people tend to try to remember new words as one word, because they don't know how to split the word into small pieces, so we don't get the skill to see a word morphologically. This is because of the education system in Japanese schools that is controlled by the Japanese government and the lack of time to teach about word parts such as prefixes and suffixes. The text books they made and recommend often have some weird examples of things to say to somebody who speaks English as their first language. Moreover, many of the sentences and words in the text are contrived mainly for studying for tests, not for creative conversation. This is a main reason that many people say Japanese people cannot speak English, because many people know just about the English for the test, to decide which class they will be put in, which school they can go to, and they have to get a high score on the test to get nice grades.

According to Sakai (2005), people who are studying English as their second language can be a professional about this way of thinking. This is because people who speak English as their first language don't use this way of thinking and they don't even get the meaning of the test we will look at later in Chapter Two. They look

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at a word as one string, and understand the meanings from a whole word without parsing it. This theory is based on a supposition, but people who had great training to be a teacher tend to be able to answer the questions about affixes better than others.

1.2 Affixes

1.2.1 Types of affixes

There are two types of affixes in English. One is prefixes, and the other is suffixes, which itself has two types. We will look at these later. Before we look at the definition of affixes and their basic patterns, we should know what the roots, prefixes, suffixes, and affixes are.

RootsRoots are the important and main parts which make up many English words

because they carry the core meanings of each word. When we try to guess the meanings of the word, we can use the root to help us guess. Many English words contain a root, and the roots and affixes are put together to form a new word form or meaning sense. If we removed the prefixes or suffixes, the root can usually be found at the front or the back of the remaining word. For example, the words scissors, dictation, and graphics, have interesting roots. Some example roots are summarised below in Table 1 with their meanings and an example for each to see how the meaning of the root can affect the meaning of the example word.

Table 1: roots can have their own meaning

Roots Original meaning Example word

Sciss Cut Scissors

Aqua Water Aquamarine

Audio sound or hearing Audible

Bell War Bellicism

Dict Say Dictation

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Geo Earth Geography

Graph Write Graphics

Hydra Water Hydrofoil

Man Hand Manual

Path feeling or suffering Pathetic and Apathy

Sol Sun Solar

Therm Heat Thermometer

Vac Empty Vacuum

As we can see from the Table 1, there are many roots that have some kind of connection between the example words for each. For example, Geo means earth, and the example word geography means that the science which deals with the study of the Earth and its land, features, and inhabitants. From the meaning and the definition for each part, we can see there is a relationship between the root geo and the word geography. If we look at one more example from the list, the root sol means the sun, and the word solar is frequently used to describe something that has a connection with the sun such as solar panel, solar heating, and solar flare. All of these can get massive power from the sun and give us electricity or warmth.

Some of these words are used in Japanese as katakana, and cannot be translated in other way to say it in Japanese. These roots might seem a little bit difficult to remember, because we are not so familiar with the roots, however, once we understand the core meanings, we can often guess the meaning of the word naturally.

These are just a few examples of the many roots which came from another language and became English words. Even if we try to remember the meanings of roots, our knowledge and skill to guess new English words doesn't get higher so easily. Basically, roots cannot stand in the sentence alone if there are no prefixes and suffixes with them like the example above. Roots like think, break, believe, stand, and publish can stand alone, because they have their own meanings even if they don't have any prefixes and suffixes. However, roots like clud, dit, fect, lig, and rept cannot do the same because they don't have obvious meanings which we can understand without other elements.

The one thing we should be careful about is that some roots don’t always show the right definition for us. That is, they make less sense. For example, take the word apology as an example. The roots logy is the study of something, and apo means from

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or away from, so if we interpret the meaning of apology based on roots alone, we would see that it means away from the study of something. This doesn’t make sense. When we see apology we think sorry or sad about something, so although many words have roots, knowing the meaning of the roots won't always provide us with an articulate and correct meaning. Most native English speakers do not know the meanings of roots except those who learn then to teach them to non-natives. This is because they are not using the words thinking about in what ways the word is split into when they speak. They use the context first to guess what they need, and then check with morphological knowledge. They also have the knowledge to choose the words at the right occasion. We, Japanese do the same. We use difficult words many times, but we are saying that just because we know how to say it when the time is right. According to many researchers (e.g. Kageyama 2004, Tamamura 1989), the number of people who know the definition and apparent meaning of each Japanese word parts is small. Roots which hold core meanings in English mainly came from another language such as Latin and Greek, so their meaning might a bit hard to guess, but they are very helpful and give us a massive amount of information about English words to build a strong connection. Many students aren’t familiar with Latin and Greek so much, however, they still are found in many English words we see today. Even if they have changed their original forms over time, we can become aware there are some patterns and specific type that were descended from other languages.

Affixes

Affix means to put something or to attach something basically, and this word came from Latin with the original meaning to adhere. Affix is a linguistic term that include prefixes and suffixes, Other affixes include circumfix, duplifix, interfix, transfix, simulfix, suprafix, and disfix but we will not deal with them in this thesis.

PrefixesOne of the constituent items that help us guess the meaning of unknown words

or sentences is prefixes. They are put before a root to support and change the meaning of the root. They don’t change the part of speech like suffixes do. The definition of prefix is “an element which is placed at the beginning of a word to adjust or qualify its meaning.” Let’s look at prefixes through some examples.

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Many English words are made up of two or three parts, and one of them could be a prefix. For example, unhappy is split into the prefix un and the root happy, and means not happy. This prefix is not unfamiliar to the students, because we can meet it, and teachers teach it at school as one of the basic way to indicate negatives. However, there are some patterns for which affixes will be put before and after each affix, so if they acquire the patterns for the order and the combinations, it becomes much easier to make a proper word with proper affixes for each root. Prefixes tend to show whether the things are good or bad, the order of the things, the state of something, and surroundings.

SuffixesA suffix is a part of a word that is attached at the end of a word. The definition

for suffix is “an element which is placed at the end of a word to form a derivative, or frequently one that converts the roots into another part of speech.” For example, the word wearable. Wearable is split into wear, and able, then means can wear. The function of some suffixes is to change the part of speech whereas prefixes don’t.

There are two types of suffixes, one is inflectional suffixes, and the other is derivational suffixes. Inflectional suffixes conjugate sentences grammatically within their syntactic category. This means they don’t change the meaning of the roots but they mainly change the tense and displays who the subject in the sentence is. For example, -s means third person singular present tense, -ed means past tense, and -ing means progressive or continuous. We can create a new word from a word that cannot be separated in a small piece anymore such as book and dog plus suffixes. Book and dog are called elements of words, and they can be put together to make a new form that has a similar meaning, like doggie that came from dog-ie means a playful way to call a dog, and bookish that came from book-ish which means someone who likes reading. Some examples are summarised below in Table 2.

Table 2: Examples of Inflectional suffixes

Inflectional

suffixes

Meaning Example sentence

-s third person singular present

He understands this problem so easily, but I could not understand it at all.

-ed past tense She climbed the mountain yesterday with her

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friends.

-t past tense Danny learnt the difficult word quickly.

-ing progressive orcontinuous

Keith Urban is playing his guitar at CMA now.

-en past participle I have written fan letters to Johnny Depp two times.

-s Plural Hugh has so many nice friends.

-er Comparative Who is cooler, Tom Hiddleston or Matthew Goode?

-est Superlative Johnny Depp is the kindest man I have ever met.

-n’t Negative He isn’t a nice guy at all.

When a derivational suffix is added to the end of a word, it changes its meaning, but usually retains the original meaning of the root, but can change the part of speech. For example, if we attach the suffix “-ation” to a word “organise”, it becomes “organisation” and the part of speech changes from a verb to a noun. We will look at how each derivation can change the part of speech by adding them to roots. Some examples are summarised below in Table 3.

Table 3: Some derivational suffixes

Derivational suffixes

Meaning and function Example words

-ian Person politician, comedian, grammarian

-ful full of something helpful, handful, playful

-able can, talent breakable, wearable, accountable

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-hood condition, occupation , state

Childhood, neighbourhood, adulthood

-ess make feminine nouns goddess, lioness, actress

-ness conditon, state acceptableness, acidness, deftness

-less not, cannot hopeless, meaningless, causeless

-ism principle, action feminism, neuroticism, stoicism

-ish condition, state, property childish, brownish, offish

-ology study of etymology, morphology, biology

There are many derivational suffixes, but not all of them change the part of

speech. The roots such as happy and wear, can stand alone with their own meaning in the sentence, so they are easy to understand and remember. However, even if we know about the roots, we still need to know about prefixes and suffixes to get a much higher successful guessing rate of the meanings of unknown words. Prefixes and suffixes have lots of key information and they help us to decide which part of speech the word has. Especially, according to some researchers, suffixes are much more important than prefixes.

A suffix cannot be used alone in sentences, and are always be put before or after the roots to make a new form of a word. This is a morpheme and it has two types, infix and suffix, and depends on where the each element will be put. For example, mis in misunderstanding is a prefix, and ation in globalisation is a suffix.

We already looked at prefixes and suffixes, so let's look at infixes a little bit. Infix is a type of affix which appear in the roots to add another meaning to the original word. This doesn't appear in English, but in Tagalog which is spoken by people in the Philippines, does. The word su:lat means writing in Tagalog and the root is su. On the other hand, the word sumu:lat means someone who wrote. From this changing, we can see the meaning the one who did it was added to the original word.

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1.2.2 The source of affixes in English

English has a large, rich vocabulary, with a large number of lexical items that have changed over time and have been assimilated from other languages during the complex history of the language’s development. Vocabulary is one of the most essential parts of second language acquisition, and can be broadly defined as knowledge of words and word meanings. Many affixes in English which have a strong connection with other languages especially Greek, Latin, German and French.

There are numerous studies of English affixes. Some have attempted to calculate the proportion of English words that came from Latin, Greek, Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, and other countries (Grinstead, 1924; Roberts, 1965; Bird, 1987 and 1990). Their studies relate to affiliation because a large proportion of words coming from Latin or Greek make use of affixes.

Latin was the language spoken by the ancient people in Rome. As the Romans conquered almost all of Europe, the Latin language spread throughout the region. Over time, the Latin people started to speak other languages such as Italian, French, and Spanish. These languages are considered as "sisters" as they descended from Latin, their mother language. In 1066, England was conquered by William, Duke of Normandy, which is in northern France. It was during this time that many French words were borrowed by English. Linguists estimate that about 60 percent of our common vocabulary for everyday today came from French. For this reason many Latin words came into English indirectly through French. As well as French, many Latin words came into English through the ages. Around the 17th and 18th century, people who made dictionaries and the grammarians thought English was an imperfect language whereas Latin was perfect for them. Many English words and word parts we use as our communication skill were came from Latin and Greek, so we can trace them back to the connection between English and other languages such as Latin and Greek that made up modern English today. Some common roots that came from Greek, German, Latin, and France were shown in the tables below.

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Table 4: Some common Greek roots

Greek roots Basic meanings Example words

-chron(o)- Time chronic, synchronise

-path- Feel empathy, pathetic

-phil- Love philosophy, bibliophile

-phon- Sound phonics, phonology

-tele- far off telecast, telephone

-bio- Life biography, biology

We can see some words such as syncronise and biography, and these words

can be seen in Japanese without being translated as in katakana.

Table 5: Some common Latin roots

Latin root Basic meaning Example words

-dict- to say contradict, dictate, diction, edict, predict

-duc- to lead, bring, take

deduce, produce, reduce

-gress- to walk digress, progress, transgress

-ject- to throw eject, inject, interject, project, reject, subject

-pel- to drive compel, dispel, impel, repel

-pend- to hang append, depend, impend, pendant, pendulum

-port- to carry comport, deport, export, import, report, support

-scrib-, -script- to write describe, description, subscribe,

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transcription

-tract- to pull, draw, drug

attract, contract, detract, extract, protract

-vert- to turn convert, divert, invert, revert

As we can see from this table, the basic meanings of these roots are verbs such as to do something. These suffixes can often be seen when we read something, this is because English words today have a strong connection with Latin words.

Table 6: Some common German roots

German roots Basic meanings

Cobalt A colour

Rucksack Backpack

These words came from German and as we can see, these words have the same spelling as English. Also, Japanese people use these ones when they speak. As example words, we say Cobalt blue as one of the names for colours, and we also say rucksack and backpack too. Even if we know these, we might not be able to notice they came from German originally.

Table 7: Some common French roots

French roots Basic meanings Example words

art- human effort to imitate artist, artificial

base- A place for something basement, basically

beau- a lover or dandy Beautiful, beauty

brochure- to stitch Brochures

From the list above, let’s look at the root beau. This spelling and sound are similar to French, and this appears in French very often. Beau basically means a

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lover or dandy, and most of the time these words are intended for humans. So, we can see the word beauty and beautiful show us the condition of someone who is loved by someone. This is the origin of this root. These words were imported from French, but they are pronounced according to English rules of phonology, rather than the special way that French has. Roots that came from French are in a minority, but we can see them in these words we meet frequently. This is because French and English have strong connection historically.

As we can see from the tables above, there are many roots that came from Latin and other languages. As well as Latin, we can see these example words have prefixes and suffixes that were attached to these roots to make other meanings from the same roots, and it is easy to see how the roots are combined with each prefix and suffix. The following tables show us the prefixes and their basic meanings that came from Latin, Greek, French, and German.

Table 8: Some Greek prefixes and their basic meanings

Greek prefixes Basic meanings Example words

acro-, acr height, summit acrobatics, acromegaly, acronym

arch-, arche- Ruler archangel, archetype, architect

athl- Prize athlete, Triathlon

cali-, calli, call Beautiful calligraphy, calisthenics

gramm- Writing grammar, grammatical

hyper- above, over hyperbole, hypertonic

kil(o)- Thousand kilobyte, kilogram, kilometer

Myth- Story mythic, mythology

These suffixes are quite familiar to many students, because they meet these affixes as in many words that are used frequently. Kilo- is used to measure the length of something, athl- in athlete is also seen as Japanese like asuliito. If we look at these ones one by one, it’s a bit hard to guess each meaning, however, Greek and Latin

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prefixes appear more often in English words today. That’s why these suffixes seem more familiar than the others from German and French.

Table 9: Some Latin prefixes and their basic meanings

Latin prefixes Basic meanings Example words

co- together coauthor, coedit, coheir

de- away, off, removal deactivate, debone, defrost, decompress, deplane

dis- not, not any disbelief, discomfort, discredit, disrepair, disrespect

inter- between, among international, interfaith, intertwine, interject

non- Not nonessential, non-mentallic, nonresident, nonstop

post- After postdate, postwar, postnasal, postnatal

pre- Before preconceive, preexist, premeditate, predispose

re- again, back, rearrange, rebuild, recall, remake, rerun, rewrite

sub- Under submarine, subsoil, subway, subhuman,

trans- across, beyond transatlantic, transpolar

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Latin prefixes are one of the most important ones to learn to make our knowledge about English words wider and richer. As we can see from this table, there are some prefixes that we tend to meet often. According to the education ministry textbooks in Japan, schools should deal with these prefixes many times to make the students’ knowledge deeper and wider. If students know these prefixes, they can say things in many ways, like native or non-native, and read or re-read. Just by adding these things before the verbs they already knew, they can generate new meanings.

Table 10: Some French prefixes and their basic meanings

French prefixes Basic meanings Example words

Neo- Something new Neology, neophyte

Sur- Over, on top of something Surname, surplus

Paleo- Old, ancient Paleography, Paleocene

Omni- All of something Omnibus, omniscope

The prefix neo can be seen many times on TV or in advertisements when we look back. This means new, and we can see this prefix often and it’s pronounced in similar way in Japanese also. As this prefix has the similar sound with that of English pronunciation, so it might be easier for the students to remember the sound, meaning, and the spelling also. We can say the same thing for omni-. A CD album that gathered many kinds of music by different musicians is called omnibus, we can hear it quite a lot in our everyday lives. Sur- and paleo- are less familiar than the other two, however, British and Australian people say surname, not family name, so we might have meet this. The prefixes that came from French are unfamiliar and not frequently used ones, but there are some of them that are familiar to us.

Table 11: Some German prefixes and their basic meanings

German prefixes Basic meanings Example words

Hinter- After, back Hinterdeck, hinterhalt

Sonder- Special, nonstandard Sonderangebot

Miss- Same with mis- in English Misserfolg, missachten

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Elektro- Same with electro- in English Elektromagneto, elektroterapio

There are not so many German prefixes that are used in today’s English, but when we look at these four with German words, we can find similar spellings in the last two, miss- and elekro-. Miss- means do badly like mis- in English does the same, and the other one elektro is same with electro- in English. We don’t meet these German prefixes in today’s English, however, they have similar meanings and spellings.

Derivation of suffixes

So far, we looked at the roots and prefixes from four languges, so in this section we are going to look at are suffixes. Some common suffixes are summarised below as in each table.

Table 12: Latin suffixes and their basic meanings

Latin suffixes Basic meanings Example words

-able, -ible forms adjectives and means “capable or worthy of”

likable, flexible

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-ation forms nouns from verbs creation, civilisation, automation, information

-fy, -ify forms verbs and means “to make or cause to become”

purify, acidify, humidify

-ment forms nouns from verbs entertainment, amazement, statement

-ty, -ity forms nouns from adjectives

subtlety, certainty, loyalty, royalty, electricity

These suffixes are called derivational suffixes as they change the part of the speech by adding a morpheme after the root. Many Latin words are common in English today. There is no correct way to remember these, so we have to increase our input and meet those many times to get a sense of them. However, because of the massive connection with Latin words, we are quite familiar with the words that hold the Latin suffixes.

Table 13: Greek suffixes and their basic meanings

Greek suffixes

Basic Meanings Example words

-gram Something written or drawn, a record

Cardiogram, telegram

-logue Speech, discourse, to speak Monologue, dialogue

-oid Like, resembling, or shape, form Humanoid, spheroid, trapezoid

-meter, -metry Measuring device, measure Spectrometer, geometry, kilometer

-logy Study, theory, discourse Dermatology, biology

Some of these suffixes like –gram, -logue, and –logy are familiar to us and they are used in some Japanese loanwords like, -gram is in telegram (teleguramu), -logue is in monologue (monolo-gu), and –logy is in biology (baiologi-). It might be hard to get the meanings of each small part, but we can meet them in some lexical domains.

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For example, -logy means study of something. So, if we look up the words of names of the study specifically, we can encounter the suffix –logy, so our knowledge for the element increases. Students might think it’s difficult to remember suffixes which come from other languages, however, if they keep increasing the chance to meet them, they may gradually understand their meanings.

Table 14: French suffixes and their basic meanings

French suffixes Basic meanings Example words

-et (noun) masculine Booklet

-ette (noun) Feminine Cigarette, brunette

--et, -ette (adjective)

Sort of/kind of cute Mignonnet, mignonette

-et, -ette (verb) Make verbs from the related nouns

un fumet (aroma)/ un jouet (toy)

There are not so many suffixes which came from French, so let’s look at a suffix, -et and –ette this time as examples. These suffixes can be added to some words to make nouns, verbs, and also adjectives.

Every French noun has gender, and they change the spelling of its ending. As English has a connection with French, some English words we’re using today are similar. For example, the French suffix –ette, has a feminine suffix, and what English speakers call a brunette which means female with dark hair would just be une brune in French. As for French verbs, nouns which contain similar meanings are the original base to make them up. The word fumer which means to smoke or cure is added to the noun un fumet and changes the meaning; this means aroma.

Table 15: German suffixes and their basic meanings

German suffixes Basic meanings Example words

-logie Same with –logy in English

Biologie, Geologie

-ment Same with –ment in English

Dokument, monument

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-phobie Same with –phobia in English

Homophobie, erotophobie

As we saw with German prefixes, the there are few morphemes which were descended from German and they don’t retain exactly same spelling, but they are similar to those in English. -Logie and –phobie becomes –logy and -phobia in English.

As we can see from each table above, there are quite a few roots and affixes that came from Latin, Greek, and other languages through the ages. Learning to recognise common roots and affixes will help students to build their vocabulary and improve their ability to make educated guesses about unknown words when they encounter them in reading and test-taking situations. One of the good ways to improve their guessing ability is to look at dictionaries and get various kinds of information from there. Good dictionaries give information about the origin of each word that we see very often. Whenever students look up something in their dictionary, if they care about and try to remember this important information, they can build the strong connection between affixes and the original meanings and forms, and it will make it easier to get the gist of each word when they meet them next time.

1.2.3 The importance of affixes for EFL learners

Most EFL researchers will agree that there is a strong relationship between knowledge of word parts and overall vocabulary size. Bauer and Nation (1993) showed the idea of a word family as consisting of a “base form and all of its derived forms that can be understood by a learner without having to learn each form separately.” English students tend to see a word as one block, for example, the word researchers, not as an each element that make up of a word such as a root with its affixes - research-er-s or researcher-s

Memorising vocabulary properly is one of the basic and the most powerful skills when we read, speak, listen, and write. Hudson (2007) says language is formed of words and learners’ vocabulary is the key in language and its acquisition. Most English learners in Japan tend to learn and memorise English words and other items with their meaning in Japanese, not with the meanings in English and the other way to say in English. Richards (1976) discussed several types of knowledge a learner must have:

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1. Semantic networks between a word and other connected words2. Semantic value of a word3. Underlying form and possible derivations of a word4. Syntactic behaviour associated with a word5. Probability of encountering a word in speech or print6. Situational constraints on word choice

Once these component aspects of words and their interactions are better understood, there will be an improved chance of developing a theory of how vocabulary is acquired, much like what happened with our understanding of language proficiency in general. The study in this thesis focuses on two aspects of word knowledge, namely formal knowledge and associative knowledge. Formal knowledge can embrace a variety of things, from the spelling of a word, how many syllables it contains, how it sounds, to morphological knowledge. (Richards, 1976)

Concurrently, there has been an increasing awareness that there is much more to knowing a word than just learning its meaning and form, so Richards (1976) made the list of different types of knowledge that are necessary to fully know a word. Based on the Richards’s list, Nation (1990) developed a list of various types of knowledge that one who study English must possess both receptively and productively in order to have complete command of a word (Meara, 1997):

1. The spoken form of a word.2. The written form of a word.3. The grammatical behaviour of the word.4. The collocational behaviour of the word.5. How frequent the word is.6. The stylistic register constraints of a word.7. The conceptual meaning of a word.8. The associations a word has with other related words.

Every type of knowledge is important for an English learner, and according to Richards (1976), if the students mastered all these types of word knowledge fully, then they are able to use the word in a native- like fluent manner. This is not to say that natives have full command of this knowledge. They can know the meanings of low-frequency words receptively, but not productively. L2 learners will also have different mastery of the various kinds of word knowledge. The grammatical behavior

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of a word, how frequent the word is, and the conceptual meanings of a word, these types of knowledge have direct relationships with the knowledge of affixes. Some affixes are grammatical, so if the students don’t have any knowledge about them, they cannot make the correct grammaticalizations. for example, the suffixes –s, -er, and –est. These elements need to be known to make correct sentences with correct grammar, and these are the basic things that students learn at school for at very beginning. Even if students miss these items in conversation, the listener might be able to understand what they would like to say, however, if they make a mistake on tests, they won’t pass because it doesn’t make sense in their writing. Thus, the conceptual meanings of each affix are important for the learners. They need to know the basic conceptual meanings for each affix to guess the meanings of unknown words. One of the biggest points here is the frequency of the affix. Even if they try to remember the meanings of each element, they don’t have enough time for input if they cannot meet them often.

According to Meara (1983), word associations are words that are connected or related in some manner in a person's mind. A common way of eliciting them is to have a tester give a prompt word and have the subject say the first word which comes to mind. The study by Meara (1983) was held to investigate 5 questions.

1. Is verbal suffix knowledge related to vocabulary size and language proficiency?2. Is word association knowledge related to vocabulary size and language proficiency?3. Are word association knowledge and verbal suffix knowledge related?4. How does productive and receptive performance differ in these areas?5. How does a student's assessment of her familiarity with a verb relate to her knowledge of its suffixes and associations?

He summarised the work done on word associations and concluded that L2 learners tend to give more varied responses than native speakers, even though their vocabularies are smaller. He also noted that learners tend to produce clang associations, nonrelated but similar-sounding words (reflect-effect), instead of the semantically related responses which adult native-speakers topically produce.

Once these aspects of English word knowledge and students' interactions are better understood, there will be an improved chance of developing a theory of how

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vocabulary is acquired and remembered, much like what has happened with our understanding of language proficiency in general.

1.2.4 The knowledge required to use word parts effectivelyEnglish learners need to know several things when they try to use word parts.

Firstly, they have to know about morphemes that make up complex words, and be able to recognise them correctly to guess the right meaning in receptive use. Tyler and Nagy (1989) said the parts that make up complicated long words like unhappiness and dismissed are called 'relational knowledge'. Learners often need to know what each part means exactly, because there are several similar parts with close meanings. Moreover, they have to be able to recognise how the meanings of the root and each affix are combined to make a new form with a related meaning. Many roots have their own particular prefixes and suffixes that can be put before and after them, so students should learn the pattern by reading and listening to English many times. If they keep reading and listening in many areas they will come to know which stem goes with which item, and they gradually master the specific and frequently used patterns. One good way to acquire the skill and to acquire the knowledge to guess which affix can be used is to look through an English to English dictionary many times. The Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary is one of the recommended dictionaries to build students' knowledge about word parts. Good dictionaries show us where each word part comes from, and which word part can be attached to which root. By understanding how the meaning of each word part relates to the dictionary meaning of a new word, this then allows the parts to act as mnemonic devices for the meaning.

For productive use, learners need much more detailed awareness of the formal changes to the stem and the affix that can occur when they are combined to form a new complex word. These formal changes affect the written form and pronunciation too. Some of the changes are covered by regular spelling rules. Also, learners need to become aware which form class of stem can take certain affixes. Tyler and Nagy (1989) named this 'distributional knowledge'. For example, -ly can be added after adjectives, but not after nouns.

While reading, we will meet many unknown words that include new affixes for ourselves, however, if we remember basic affixes, we can guess their meaning and we don’t have to use a dictionary to look up the meanings of unknown words. Of course we have to remember roots to get the main meaning of the word, but

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remembering affixes helps us a lot to guess the meanings when we met unknown words. If you recognise the parts, you will understand the whole.

1.3 Learning load

It is generally accepted as a truism that most students already know that memorising English words is one of the most useful ways to accomplish a variety English learning acts. Japanese students are learning English in many kinds of ways, but they don’t have enough chances to meet the particular patterns of prefixes and suffixes. This is because Japanese schools don’t have a system to teach these to students as one of their curriculums. Most English learners in Japan learn and memorise English vocabulary, focus on the spellings, learn vocabulary items, and try to memorise the English words in Japanese. However, if English learners can learn to use prefixes and suffixes effectively, this may help them understand and use vocabulary for reading comprehension and writing composition. (Petersen, 1988). To learn English efficiently and get massive amounts of knowledge, it is necessary for us to acquire a strong connection between each word in our head. Even if we know high level grammar, we can't speak unless we know the words to make up sentences. Vocabulary is largely classified into five groups: high-frequency words, middle-leveled words, academic words, low frequency words, and technical words (Ortega, 2009). High-frequency words are those that are the most common and are uttered or written most often in all uses of the language. Coxhead (2000) stated that approximately 2000 English words (such as clock, birth, admire, popular) make up about 76 percent of all words used.

Examination of the best way to learn words has created a massive body of research investigating about how much overall growth of effective vocabulary will increase if people pay attention to the uses of affixal morphemes. Among many researchers, several important ideas have emerged about the importance of affixal learning in language acquisition; the direct effect of learning affixes; affixation with morphological awareness; experimental vocabulary used; and finally useful acquisition strategies. Morphological awareness is the consciousness of the meaning and structure of morphemes in relation to words (Carlisle, 1995). Graves (2004) says that in order to improve English, the most effective word-learning strategy is related to morphological awareness. Morphological awareness is very useful and flexible, and it has a close relationship with vocabulary knowledge. Especially, derivational morphology can change a word's lexical category such as play/player, and hope/hopeless.

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The investigation of acquisition among less frequent affixes appears to be much less well understood and much less systematically researched than the regular and frequent word inflections. There are two important words that are connected with the learning load of affixes, they are semantic complexity and language transfer.

1.3.1 Levels 0f difficulty

There are so many affixes that make another word with similar meanings, however, we tend to ignore these important affixes when we read or write. Nation and Bauer (1993) divided affixes into seven levels from much more frequent ones to infrequently occurring ones. The list is in Table 16.

Table 16: The levels of difficulty of some affixes by Nation and Bauer (1993)

Level Affix

1 n/a different form is a different word

2Regularly inflections: plural, 3rd person singular present tense, past tense, past participle, -ing, comparative, superlative, possessive

3 -able, -er, -ish, -less, -ly, -ness, -th, -y, non-, un- (all with restricted uses)

4 -al, -ation, -ess, -ful, -ism, -ist, -ity, -ize, -ment, -ous, in- (all with restricted uses)

5

-age, -al, -ally, -an, -ance, -ant, -ary, -atory, -dom, -eer, -en, -ence, -ent, -ery, -ese, -eque, -ette, -hood, -i, -ian, -ite, -let, -ling, -ly, -most, -ory,anti-, ante-, arch-, bi-, circum-, counter-, en-, ex-, fore-, hyper-, inter-, mid-, mis-, neo-, post-, pro-, semi-, sub-, un-

6 -able, -ee, -ic, -ify, -ion, -ist, -ition, -ive, -th, -y, pre-, re-

7 Classical roots and affixes

Bauer and Nation (1993) divided more than 80 affixes into seven bundles and showed which affixes they thought would be understood well by natives and which ones were not. Moreover, Nation and Bauer (1993) set the definition for each level

25

from 1 to 7 dealing with affixation. These definitions were quoted from Nation and Bauer (1993).

Level1: Each form is a different wordAt this level, it is assumed that learners will not recognize that I book or books

are members of the same word family. This is a very pessimistic assumption and it is unlikely that with regard to written forms, learners are ever at this level. Learners need to be aware of some difficulties and they must be taken into account in any estimation of vocabulary load for reading.

Level 2: Inflectional suffixesAt this level, words with the same base and inflections are considered as

members of the same word family. The inflectional categories used here are –plural; third person singular present tense; past tense; past participle; -ing; comparative; superlative; possessive. Readers have to be able to undertake minimal morphographemic analysis in order to recognise regular inflections. A word-final <e> is regularly elided before an affix beginning with a vowel, a word-final <y> becomes <i> before any affix that does not begin with <i>, and letter doubling also applies before many affixes. These graphemic alternations don’t have any phonological correlations, but need to acquire these bases as their knowledge.

Level 3: The most frequent and regular derivational suffixesAt this stage, the eight criteria;

1, Frequency2, Productivity3, Predictability4, Regularity of the written form 5, Regularity of the spoken form of the base6, Regularity of the spelling of the affix7, Regularity of the spoken form 8, Regularity of function

These criteria are applied to derivational morphology. All the criteria are applied quite strictly at this level, and the strictness with which they are applied is reduced at subsequent levels.

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Level 4: Frequent, orthographically regular affixesAt this level, the eight criteria are prioritised. In particular, the fact that an

affix is frequent (widely generalised) is taken to be more important than whether it is productive or not, and orthographic criteria are taken to be more important than phonological criteria. This decision is based on the assumption that the processes recommended here are aimed at allowing comprehension of written rather than spoken forms.

Level 5: Regular but infrequent affixesThis level adds a number of affixes whose behaviour is fairly regular, which

may be productive, but which, because they are not widely generalised, do not individually add greatly to the number of words that can be understood.

Level 6: Frequent but irregular affixesThis level includes those affixes which provide major problems of

segmentation, either because they cause gross (orthographic) allomorphy in their basis (that is, parts of the base are deleted or additions besides the suffix are needed), or because there are major problems involved in segmenting them caused by homography.

Level 7: Classical roots and affixesThis level contains all the classical roots which around in English words and

occur not only as bound roots in English (as in embolism) but also as elements in neo-classical compounds (such as photography). Native speakers as well as L2 speakers have to be taught these explicitly, and there are books available which deal with these matters (Brown, 1971).

Further affixesNot all the affixes of English have been mentioned above. In some cases the

omission is deliberate, such as the omission of cis- because it appears in so few words (e.g. cisalpine) that it is scarcely worth learning. In other cases like the cases of what Marchand (1969) calls semi-suffixes, the formatives can almost be taken to be compound elements, and child-like can be interpreted as a compound. It will be difficult for many learners to develop an understanding of affixes at this level.

1.3.2 Acquisition rate27

Here, we will look at the aspect order and the proportion when students learn affixes in English. Some studies showed the order of acquisition of the elements we are looking at. Moreover, as is often the case, acquisition order and its rate were well researched over nearly 40 years (Nation 1993). In Table 17, Brown’s (1973) order of acquisition of some English grammatical morphemes is summarised.

Table 17: Brown’s (1973) order of acquisition for some English grammatical morphemes

Rank Morpheme1 Present processing –ing

2/3 In, on4 Plural –s5 Past irregular6 Possessive ‘s7 Uncontractible copula (is, am, are)8 Articles (a, the)9 Past regular –ed

10 Third person singular –s11 Third person irregular12 Uncontractible auxiliary (is, am, are)13 Contractible copula14 Contractible auxiliary

This list is very precise, and less frequent affixes such as hyper-, -atory, and ante- were omitted, because they are grammatical function words. We will look at some affixes that have these functions. For example, inflectional suffixes change the tense, but retain their original meaning. On the other hand, derivational suffixes change the part of speech and add a meaning. We will look more deeply at these key items later. As we can see from the list above, there are some suffixes that we learn at the first level in junior high school, Third person singular, past tense, and be verbs, are taught at elementary level. These suffixes have a strong connection with English grammar and teachers must teach these many times, very carefully. Let’s look at an example with the word play. If we omit –ed when we write about what happened in the past, the sentence becomes odd, and people think it is inappropriate. Other affixes were not taught so carefully because they don’t have a strong effect on the

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sentence, but these ones are important, and students try to remember them to make correct sentences, so naturally they can get the repeating cycle of basic inflectional suffixes.

Mochizuki and Aizawa (2000) studied the acquisition order of affixes from levels 3 to 6 of the list by Nation and Bauer (1993). They investigated the link between vocabulary size and English affix knowledge and derived an order of affix acquisition for 29 affixes; there were 13 prefixes and 16 suffixes. These are summarised in Table 16. The vocabulary size test they used was developed by Mochizuki (1998). It was a modified version of the vocabulary levels test by Nation (1990), which consists of five sections with each constructed form 1000 wordlist on a frequency count based on Hokkaido University English vocabulary List (Sonoda, 1996). Their data answered their research questions whether a) the learners’ vocabulary size related to their understanding for affixes, and b) in what order do learners acquire affixes? As for their second research question, they found that there was a stable difficulty rank of prefix and suffix knowledge. They are summarized in Figures 1 and 2 for each item.

Figure 1: Prefix accuracy order from Mochizuki and Aizawa (2000)

reun

prenonanti

semiexen

postinter

counterin-

ante

0.0% 10.0% 20.0% 30.0% 40.0% 50.0% 60.0% 70.0% 80.0% 90.0% 100.0%

93.0%81.0%

80.0%76.0%

71.0%59.0%

57.0%54.0%

50.0%37.0%

34.0%27.0%

11.0%

Prefixes

Prefixes

As we look at the whole data of prefixes, we can see that there is a huge gap between each element. Out of 13 prefixes, only one of them reached more than 90% known, and the lowest score was 11%, which means this prefix ante- is low frequently known for their subjects.

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Figure: 2: Suffix accuracy order from Mochizuki and Aizawa (2000)

-ation-ful

-mentister

izeally

ousnessism

ablelessish

yity

0.0% 10.0% 20.0% 30.0% 40.0% 50.0% 60.0% 70.0% 80.0% 90.0% 100.0%

91.0%84.0%

81.0%76.0%

75.0%75.0%75.0%75.0%

70.0%67.0%

66.0%65.0%

54.0%46.0%

42.0%34.0%

Suffixes

Suffixes

According to Mochizuki and Aizawa (2000), some affixes were shown to be well known by the stronger groups, and less known by the weaker, less experienced students. They found some possible factors to lead the acquisition order from their results. They thought there are four factors that might affect the affix acquisition order for Japanese students.

Firstly, many loan words from English to Japanese seem to have strong connection to with the order. According to their result, more than half of the subjects with a vocabulary of over 2000 words knew the meaning of such prefixes as re- (0.73), un- (0.65), non- (0.63), and anti- (0.60). There are common loan words in Japanese that contain these prefixes: resaikuru (recycle), anrakki (unlucky), nonsutoppu (nonstop), and anti-kyojin (anti-Giants). Knowledge of loan words is part of the subjects’ L1 competence and seems to transfer to their English knowledge.

The second factor which seems to be involved is instruction. In English teaching situations in Japan, it is unusual practice to teach the meaning of common prefixes with some examples when they appear in new words. This practice might be responsible for greater understanding of such prefixes as –pre, semi-, ex-, in-, and post- in the larger vocabulary bands. But, it is difficult to substantiate without further empirical work.

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The third factor to be considered is the frequency of prefixes. The prefixes, counter-, and ante-, are rather infrequent in use, which appears to be the main reason for their inertia irrespective of vocabulary size.

The fourth factor is the polysemous nature of some prefixes and their study did not take into account the possibility that the subject might know other meanings of a tested prefix. This means that though the prefix in- has the meanings of not and inside, only the former was tested in the present study. The polysemous nature of a prefix may account for the rather moderate understanding of in- and inter- (0.51 and 0.49, respectively, on the over 5000 word level).

1.4 Research Questions

From the above we have seen how well Japanese learners know certain affixes but we do not know about students at this university and with a more complete list of affixes. In Chapter Two we will collect the data to answer the following research questions:

1. How much do Japanese college students know about the meaning of affixes?

2. Which language did the subjects use to answer the part of the test they can answer in either language, English and Japanese?

1.5 Conclusion

In this chapter we looked at what roots, prefixes, suffixes, and affixes are, their origins, and the levels of difficulty for each item. In Chapter Two, we will look at a test that was given to 72 subjects to test how well Japanese students who are learning English know English affixes.

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Chapter Two: Experiment

2.1 Introduction

In Chapter One, we looked about how useful affixes are and why it is important to get a gist of the meaning for each word without a dictionary. We also looked at where each prefix and suffix come from, and the acquisition rankings the affixes for some Japanese learners. Also, we looked at the difference of the way of understanding of words between Japanese and native speakers.

In this chapter, we will look at how much Japanese people know about the meaning of each affix, and discover which affixes are familiar to them, using the affixes test. We will see two types of test; productive and receptive, so we will find out some common points and big gap between the two tests through the subjects’ answer.

2.2 The experiment

2.2.1 Introduction This experiment was made to see how much Japanese students know about prefixes and suffixes of English words. Many people are studying English at home and school these days, but there are not so many people who can have massive knowledge about English affixes and use their knowledge wisely to learn English effectively. The lack of time, poor curriculum and outdated teaching methods in Japanese schools provide insufficient input of English, which leads them to not fully acquire the langauge, or learn effective ways to learn it,. Students don’t have enough time or training to realise how important the affixes are to guess the meanings of English words. We will find out how deep and clear their knowledge is about English affixes. The test was put on the internet, and the data were analysed in Excel. The percentages for each prefix and suffix were calculated and each of them was ranked.

2.2.2 Method

Aims

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The aims of this experiment are to find out how much, and which affixes, Japanese college students know. On the productive test, the subjects will write their answers in their own words, and they can choose the language to answer; English or Japanese. Based on the supposition that Japanese students tend to remember the meanings in Japanese which is their native language, we will see how many of them will answer in Japanese for the questions where they are given the choice of responding in English or Japanese.

We also find out whether there are any relationships between productive scores and receptive scores.

1) Subjects

As shown in Figures 3 and 4 below, the subjects of this experiment were 72 students who are studying English in NDSU and other people outside of the school who are studying it by themselves in some ways. These subjects outside of the school include the students from other universities. Most of the subjects are seniors in Seishin and they are studying English in the English department. Some of them had been to other countries to study English. Students in Seishin are all third year and fourth year female students, and most of them grew up in Japan. Some of them have foreign parents like from Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines. The majority of the subjects were 21 or 22 years old (64 people), 4th year students in college.

Figure 3: The number of participants, their age and gender

3

69

Gender of the subjects

Male

Female

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Figure 4: Number of the subjects for each age

8

40

24

Number of the subjects and their age

NDSU 3rd years

NDSU 4th years

4th years from another col-leges

2) Test design

An affix knowledge test comprised four sections divided into two parts and is summarized in the following table.

Table 18: The structure of the testReceptive Productive

Prefixes 23 items multiple choice 23 items, write answers in subjects’

own wordsSuffixes 30 items multiple choice 30 items, write

answers in subjects’ own words

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One of the test was made to become aware of how much Japanese students know about prefixes, and it contains 23 prefixes. They were listed from the most frequently to less frequently used ones. The other section of the test was made to learn the knowledge of suffixes, and it contains 30 suffixes in order like the one for prefixes.

The test is divided into four parts, and two modes, one is for the knowledge of prefixes and the other is for suffixes. In each part, there are two types of tests, one is productive, and the other is receptive. The order of presentation of the affixes in the test referred to that in Nation and Bauer (1993). The test used their list of affixes so we can compare the data from Nation and Bauer. On the productive test, the subjects typed the answer by themselves in a box below the question. Each question has three words that contain the target prefix or suffix in the words. The target affixes were shown in capital letters so that the subjects can easily know what they have to focus on each question. Subjects can answer both in Japanese or English.

Table 19: Productive test (Prefix)

Q: What do these parts of words mean? UNhappy UNreliable Unlucky

not, without, ~ で な

い...etc.

On the receptive test, they chose the correct answer from the five alternatives including an “I don’t know” choice. Subjects could use this last choice when they really have no idea which one is the proper answer for the question. The three alternatives have dissimilar meanings to not make them confused with the correct item. Subjects write possible answers in the box below in Japanese or English.

Table 20: Receptive test (Prefix)

Q: What do these parts of words mean? UNhappy UNreliable UNlucky

a) full of b) not c) far awayd) beyond e) I don’t know

Subjects chose the correct answer from these five alternatives.

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Table 21: The affixes that were chosen to make the tests

Nation and Bauer Level

Affix

1 -er, -s, -est,

2 -able, -less, -ness,

3 -th, -y, -er, non-, un-, im-

4 -ism, -ment, -ous, -ity, -ation

5

-ess, -atory, -ence, -ory, -ery, -age, -ese, -ian, -hood, -ary, -ling, ante-, anti-, arch-, bi-,circum-, counter-, en-, ex-, fore-, hyper-, inter-, mid-, mis-, neo-, post-, pro-, semi-, sub-,

6 -ee, -ive, -ify, -ist, -ion, pre-, re-

This table shows the target affixes which were used from Nation and Bauer (1993). The affixes that we will look at in this chapter include these affixes to measure the knowledge of Japanese subjects.

This test was made on Google doc forms, so people who know the link for the test could take the test. The subjects took the productive test first, because we can find out how much information they have about each affixes without any hints. From

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this type of test, we can determine how well the subjects can express the meaning of each in their own words.

3) ProcedureThis test was made from the list of affixes that were ranked into seven levels

by Nation and Bauer (1993). It was made from a productive and a receptive test. Both of them have two areas, prefixes and suffixes, so the subjects will take four different types of tests. After all the parts of the test were made in English, the instructions and multiple choice parts were translated into Japanese. They were printed and piloted with a few people to find out whether the test works properly and they can understand the instructions correctly. After the feedback and comments, some typographic errors were fixed. After correcting all the errors, the test was uploaded on the internet, so the people who know the link can access to the test anytime they want. After that, the test was given to seven different people those who helped with piloting, to check whether the internet Japanese version worked correctly. After their feedback, the mistakes and errors were corrected and the completed test was given to other subjects. After they finished answering, the data was collected automatically by the computer system. The data of the subjects who did the piloting were included too. All the data were collected on the spreadsheet on Google docs, and analysed automatically. The calculated data showed how the subjects answered each question. Google docs made pie graphs too, so we can see the number and the rate for each easily. A list of names of the subjects was kept, to check everyone had taken the tests. In the last section, they wrote comments on the bottom of the page, so we can find out which part was difficult for them, and how they felt or what they thought about this test of affixes.

After the link was sent to the test to the subjects, they started to take it and 72 people took it. It took about half and a month to collect all the data from the subjects. After finishing the data, the test on the internet was closed and the data were calculated in Excel. First, the four parts of the test were gathered and they all were put on one page from left to right, prefix productive, prefix, receptive, suffix productive, and suffix receptive. Then, the names of the subjects were put in alphabetical order in each line. After that, the calculation was started from the receptive parts using COUNTIF. The calculation for the productive parts was counted, and their number was divided into four parts, correct, nearly correct, wrong, and I don't know.

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All of the four parts of the test were gathered on one page from left to right, prefix productive, prefix receptive, suffix productive, and suffix receptive. The names of the subjects were matched in each line from the top to the bottom, and the number of correct answers were shown in down below each question. The answers of productive test were separated into four parts to calculate the number, correct, nearly correct, wrong, and I don’t know. After calculated the percentage for each type of answer, the difference of the percentage for each part was shown. Each percentage of the correct answer was ranked, and the differences of the rank were also shown. We will look at that later with the Table that gathered all the percentage and their rank.

2.2.3 ResultsThis study examined about how much Japanese subjects know about English

affixes, and which affixes are familiar to English learners and which ones are not. The test has two modes, so the subjects answer to the questions productively and receptively. The target affixes and the rate of correct answers were calculated and they were shown down below in a full table containing all the results from the test. Table 22 is for the prefixes, and Table 23 is for the suffixes. There are small and huge gaps, and common points among these data. However, there is no evidence to show that the stages in these tables represent the clear and stable order that English learners acquire knowledge of English affixes. Also, there is no reason to expect that there is an invariant order that can be acquired by the English learners.

In order to answer the three research questions, the results were analysed deeply over a number of days. To answer the question about which prefix and suffix are most likely to be known by English learners productively and receptively, and to illustrate the relationship between the results of the two types of the test, each affix was ranked and the rank were also compared one by one. The results didn’t support a strong facilitative effect for knowledge of affixes. Instead, it revealed that learners tend to have strong knowledge for some basic affixes which have strong connection with correct English grammar. Let’s look at them in order by comparing each result.

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Table 22: The whole data of prefix

Prefixes ProductiveReceptiv

e

Difference Receptive / productive Rank

I don't know Correct Nearly correct

Combined Correct /

nearly correct Correct Productive Receptive Average rank Combined rank Differences

RE 1.40% 97.20% 0.00% 97.2% 97.20% 0% 1 3 2 1 2

UN 0.00% 91.70% 2.80% 94.5% 100.00% 9% 2 2 2 1 0

MID 4.20% 87.50% 4.20% 91.7% 94.40% 8% 3 4 3.5 3 0.5

PRE 2.80% 83.30% 12.50% 95.8% 90.30% 8% 4 7 3.5 3 0.5

BI 8.30% 75.00% 4.20% 79.2% 93.10% 24% 5 5 5 6 1

FORE 5.60% 70.80% 4.20% 75% 87.50% 24% 6 8 7 8 2

NON 0.00% 63.90% 16.70% 80.6% 100.00% 57% 7 1 4 5 1

IM 1.40% 58.30% 11.10% 69.4% 93.10% 60% 8 5 6.5 7 0.5

SUB 5.60% 58.30% 9.70% 68% 66.70% 14% 8 12 10 9 1

ANTI 11.10% 48.60% 5.60% 54.2% 70.80% 46% 10 11 10.5 10 0.5

SEMI 12.50% 47.20% 25.00% 72.2% 59.70% 26% 11 17 14 13 1

EX 8.30% 45.80% 6.90% 52.7% 77.80% 70% 12 9 10.5 10 0.5

POST 8.30% 43.10% 8.30% 51.4% 61.10% 42% 13 15 14 13 1

INTER 4.20% 41.70% 5.60% 47.3% 54.20% 30% 14 21 17.5 17 0.5

PRO 16.70% 36.10% 2.80% 38.9% 75.00% 108% 15 10 12.5 12 0.5

NEO 25.00% 29.20% 18.10% 47.3% 62.50% 114% 16 14 15 15 0

CIRCUM 22.20% 26.40% 11.10% 37.5% 58.30% 121% 17 18 17.5 17 0.5

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HYPER 8.30% 25.00% 4.20% 29.2% 63.90% 156% 18 13 15.5 16 0.5

COUNTER 20.80% 19.40% 4.20% 23.6% 59.70% 207% 19 16 17.5 17 0.5

EN 15.30% 13.90% 11.10% 25% 54.20% 290% 20 20 20 20 0

ARCH 30.60% 13.90% 2.80% 16.7% 33.30% 140% 20 22 21 21 0

MIS 2.80% 12.50% 27.80% 40.3% 25.00% 100% 22 23 22.5 23 0.5

ANTE 30.60% 4.20% 0.00% 4.2% 56.90% 1267% 23 19 21 21 0

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Table 23: The whole data of suffix

Suffixes Productive Receptive

Difference

Receptive /

productive Rank

I don't know Correct

Nearly

correct

Combined

correct/nearly correct Correct

Productiv

e Receptive

Average

rank

Combined

rank

Difference

s

EST 0.0% 100.0% 0.0% 100% 100.0% 0% 1 1 1 1 0

ABLE 0.0% 100.0% 0.0% 100% 95.8% -4% 1 3 2 2 0

ER 0.0% 98.6% 1.4% 100% 98.6% 0% 3 2 2.5 3 0.5

ER 0.0% 95.8% 2.8% 99.6% 90.3% -6% 4 4 4 4 0

IST 8.3% 81.9% 9.7% 91.6% 58.3% -29% 5 20 12.5 12 1.5

S 2.8% 73.6% 9.7% 83.3% 83.3% 13% 6 9 7.5 5 2.5

ISM 5.6% 66.7% 18.1% 84.8% 61.1% -8% 7 17 12 11 1

EE 15.3% 59.7% 9.7% 69.4% 84.7% 42% 8 8 8 6 2

ESS 19.4% 58.3% 1.4% 59.7% 69.4% 19% 9 12 10.5 7 3.5

LESS 1.4% 56.9% 26.4% 83.3% 88.9% 56% 10 5 12.5 12 0.5

ITY 19.4% 44.4% 6.9% 51.3% 75.0% 69% 11 10 10.5 7 3.5

IAN 8.3% 43.1% 16.7% 59.8% 68.1% 58% 12 13 12.5 12 0.5

ERY 18.1% 37.5% 4.2% 41.7% 47.2% 26% 13 23 18 19 1

NESS 5.6% 36.1% 2.8% 38.9% 86.1% 138% 14 7 10.5 7 3.5

Y 6.9% 34.7% 1.4% 36.1% 62.5% 80% 15 16 15.5 15 0.5

ION 19% 32% 21% 53% 36.1% 13% 16 25 20.5 21 0.5

TH 18.1% 26.4% 2.8% 29.2% 87.5% 232% 17 6 11.5 10 1.5

LING 34.7% 23.6% 1.4% 25% 61.1% 159% 18 17 17.5 16 1.5

ARY 29.2% 23.6% 2.8% 26.4% 9.7% -59% 19 30 24.5 25 0.5

IFY 31.9% 19.4% 11.1% 30.5% 63.9% 229% 20 15 17.5 16 1.5

ENCE 20.8% 15.3% 8.3% 23.6% 68.1% 345% 21 13 19 20 1

ATORY 27.8% 15.3% 0.0% 15.3% 52.8% 245% 22 21 21.5 22 0.5

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Suffixes Productive Receptive

Difference

Receptive /

productive Rank

IVE 11.1% 12.5% 54.2% 66.7% 48.6% 289% 23 22 22.5 23 0.5

OUS 26.4% 11.1% 2.8% 13.9% 72.2% 550% 24 11 17.5 18 0.5

MENT 19.4% 9.7% 2.8% 12.5% 22.2% 129% 25 28 26.5 26 0.5

ATION 8.3% 9.7% 76.4% 86.1% 18.1% 86% 25 29 27 28 1

HOOD 5.6% 8.3% 0.0% 8.3% 33.3% 300% 27 26 26.5 26 0.5

ESE 2.8% 2.8% 81.9% 84.7% 61.1% 2100% 28 17 22.5 23 0.5

AGE 16.7% 2.8% 0.0% 2.8% 30.6% 1000% 29 27 28 30 2

ORY 26.4% 1.4% 2.8% 4.2% 45.8% 3200% 30 24 27 28 1

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Table 24: Rank from the results and the suggested level (prefixes)Prefixes Rank Nation/ Bauer rank

Productive Receptive Average rank Combined rank Differences Actual Suggested Difference

RE- 1 3 2 1 2 6 1 5

UN- 2 2 2 1 0 3 1 2

MID- 3 4 3.5 3 0.5 5 1 4

PRE- 4 7 3.5 3 0.5 6 1 5

NON- 5 5 5 6 1 3 2 1

BI- 6 8 7 8 2 5 2 3

IM- 7 1 4 5 1 4 2 2

FORE- 8 5 6.5 7 0.5 5 2 3

SUB- 8 12 10 9 1 5 3 2

ANTI- 10 11 10.5 10 0.5 5 3 2

EX- 11 17 14 13 1 5 3 2

PRO- 12 9 10.5 10 0.5 5 3 2

SEMI- 13 15 14 13 1 5 4 1

POST- 14 21 17.5 17 0.5 5 4 1

NEO- 15 10 12.5 12 0.5 5 4 1

HYPER- 16 14 15 15 0 5 4 1

INTER- 17 18 17.5 17 0.5 5 4 1

CIRCUM 18 13 15.5 16 0.5 5 4 1

COUNTER- 19 16 17.5 17 0.5 5 4 1

EN- 20 20 20 20 0 5 5 0

ARCH- 20 22 21 21 0 5 5 0

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ANTE- 22 23 22.5 23 0.5 5 5 0

MIS 23 19 21 21 0 5 5 0

Table 25: Rank from the results and the suggested level (suffixes)Suffixes Rank Nation/ Bauer rank

Productive Receptive Average rank Combined rank Differences Actual Suggested Difference

-EST 1 1 1 1 0 2 1 1

-ABLE 1 3 2 2 0 3 1 2

-ER (com) 3 2 2.5 3 0.5 2 1 1

-ER 4 4 4 4 0 3 1 2

-S 5 20 12.5 12 1.5 2 2 0

-EE 6 9 7.5 5 2.5 6 2 4

-ESS 7 17 12 11 1 4 2 2

-ITY 8 8 8 6 2 4 2 2

-NESS 9 12 10.5 7 3.5 3 2 1

-TH 10 5 12.5 12 0.5 3 2 1

-ISM 11 10 10.5 7 3.5 4 2 2

-LESS 12 13 12.5 12 0.5 3 2 1

-IST 13 23 18 19 1 6 2 4

-IAN 14 7 10.5 7 3.5 5 2 3

-Y 15 16 15.5 15 0.5 3 3 0

-LING 16 25 20.5 21 0.5 5 3 2

-IFY 17 6 11.5 10 1.5 6 3 3

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-OUS 18 17 17.5 16 1.5 5 3 2

-ERY 19 30 24.5 25 0.5 5 3 2

-ENCE 20 15 17.5 16 1.5 5 4 1

-ION 21 13 19 20 1 6 4 2

-ATORY 22 21 21.5 22 0.5 5 4 1

-IVE 23 22 22.5 23 0.5 6 4 2

-ESE 24 11 17.5 18 0.5 5 4 1

-ARY 25 28 26.5 26 0.5 5 4 1

-MENT 25 29 27 28 1 4 5 1

-HOOD 27 26 26.5 26 0.5 5 5 0

-ATION 28 17 22.5 23 0.5 4 5 1

-ORY 29 27 28 30 2 5 5 0

-AGE 30 24 27 28 1 5 5 0

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Tables 24 and 25 are about the average rank on the receptive and productive test we have done, and the combined rank that was divided from the average rank. Suggested level means the one from the study by Nation and Bauer (1993). The ranks are compared with each prefix and suffix, and we can have a look about what kind of differences we found out from the test we looked at and they had with their subjects (native English speakers).

Referring to the tables above, we can see the difference between the ranks of the two tests. Japanese students knew some prefixes and suffixes such as –ee, -ist, and –ify better than that predicted by Bauer and Nation. These were listed in level 6 on the original list, but they were ranked in level 2 and 3 by Japanese subjects. The prefixes re-, mid-, and pre-, according to the list of levels of Nation and Bauer (1993), these ones were ranked in level 5 and 6, so were considered hard. However, all these three were ranked at level 1 which means they have high frequency for Japanese subjects.

We looked at the definition for each level set by Nation and Bauer (1993) in Chapter One, but again let’s have a look at them briefly to compare their results and what we have got. As the number of the level increases, it means students don’t have enough time to make the base about the items in their head.

Level 1: Each form is a different wordLevel 2: Inflectional affixesLevel 3: The most frequent and regular derivational suffixesLevel 4: Frequent, orthographically regular affixesLevel 5: Regular but frequent affixesLevel 6: Frequent but irregular affixesLevel 7: Classical roots and affixes

As we can see from these tables, there are some large differences between some particular items, and also we can see some common points between the productive and receptive test. During the process of calculating the subjects’ suffix knowledge, each score for individual suffixes were also kept to see the difference. This allowed investigation into the relationship of knowledge among many suffixes. As we expected, the data showed the subjects knew some suffixes better than others.

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There are some ways that we can find these differences, so first, let’s look at the data of prefixes.

There were 23 prefixes, and 30 suffixes that were given to the subjects. As for prefixes, none of them could reach 100% for correct answer on the productive test. On the other hand, two prefixes met this criteria on the receptive test, which were un-, and non-. They were in level 3 on the list of Nation and Bauer (1993), so we can see they were not difficult for the subjects, although non- got a lower score 63.9% on the productive test. According to Nation and Bauer, the affixes at level 3 are the most frequent and regular derivational affixes, so this means the other affixes, -able, -er, -less, -ness, -th, and –y are also used frequently. As the percentage for productive test, -able got 100%, -er (meaning superlative) was 98.6%, -less got 56.9%, -ness which makes nouns was 36.1%, -th which also makes nouns and describes a condition got 26.4%, and –y which makes adverbs was 34.7%. As we can see from the results, even if they are in the same level, the data showed the big difference according to their frequency for native English speakers, and for Japanese students.

These suffixes got high scores on the receptive test, however, -ery (47.2%), -ion (36.1%), -ary (9.7%), -ive (48.6%), -ment (22.2%), -ation (18.1%), -hood (33.3%), -age (30.6%), and –ory (45.8%), these suffixes could not reach 50% for correct answers even if the subjects were given the alternatives on the receptive part. We see these suffixes very often in many words like bakery, direction, productive, government, neighbourhood, and marriage, and most of the subjects knew the meanings of these words, because they learn them at junior high school as some of the basic easy frequent words.

On the other hand, 20 suffixes (-ity, -ian, -ery, -ness, -y, -ion, -th, -ling, -ary, -ify, -ence, -atory, -ive, -ous, -ment, -ation, -hood, -ese, -age, and -ory) out of 30 couldn’t reach 50% knowledge on the productive including the ones we already looked at above. Moreover, -ment (9.7%), -ation (9.7%), -hood (8.3%), -ese (2.8%), -age (2.8%), and –ory (1.4%) were under 10%. We can see the similar result with that of Mochizuki and Aizawa (2000). The suffixes –est, -er (comparative), and –s got high score on both the receptive and productive. Each of these items got high scores –est (100%, 100%), -er (98.6%, 98.6%), and –s (73.6%, 83.3%). From the sum of the correct answers and the nearly correct answers, -est and –er reached 100% even if it is productive. The reason why these three could reach such high scores seems to have a strong connection with the education system at school with the textbooks. The details about this factor will be mentioned and discussed in Chapter Three later.

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There were some affixes that showed huge gap in rank between the productive and receptive. Table 24 shows some of the items with this gap easily and summarised in Table 26 below.

Table 26: Specific suffixes that have gap between the ranksSuffixes Productive rank Receptive rank

-est 5 20-ism 7 17-ery 13 23-ion 16 25-ary 19 30

-ence 21 13-th 17 6

-ous 24 11-ese 28 17

Usually subjects can answer with much higher scores on the receptive test, because they have alternatives to choose from there. However, some of these suffixes got lower scores on the productive test. We can think of several reasons for this result which will also be discussed later.

2.3 SummaryIn this chapter, we looked at how much Japanese college students know about

the meaning of each prefix and suffix, and which ones are much familiar to the subjects. We found most of the subjects answered in Japanese for the productive test, and items that are frequently seen or used on textbooks got high score.

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In the next chapter, we will discuss the results from the experiment in more detail. Also the research questions will be discussed and answered in the next chapter.

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Chapter Three: Discussion

3.1 IntroductionIn Chapter One, we looked at the functions and definitions of prefixes, suffixes,

roots, and affixes, and learned where each affix came from through ages and its historical background, the importance of knowing about affixes, learning load of affixes, and levels of difficulty of each prefix and suffix. We found out that prefixes are put before the roots to make other meanings, and suffixes are added after the root. There also were two types of suffixes, derivational suffixes and inflectional suffixes. Moreover, many affixes came from other languages like Latin, French, and Greek mainly. In Chapter Two, we looked at the result from the experiment on Japanese university students who are studying English, and found out they knew more prefixes than suffixes. Then, from the result that inflectional suffixes have got much higher score on the receptive and productive test, the subjects have strong knowledge about those elements, because they need to make correct English sentences to keep the communication with correct grammar.

In this chapter, we answer the two research questions, and the results will be discussed in great detail.

3.2 Summary of the resultsFrom the experiment we saw there were some suffixes that are very familiar to

many subjects such as -est for superlative, -er for comparative, and -s for third person singular present tense. This result has strong connection with the education system and the functions these suffixes have. They make correct grammar in English, and English learners are taught these elements at the first stage comparatively after they got the basic alphabet and basic grammar like this is a pen. We also found out that the frequency of the word for learners are the keys to remember and get the sense of each prefix and suffix.

As a whole, the subjects answered correctly or near correctly on the test for prefixes more than suffixes. This is also related with the frequency and the number of the words that have the target affixes.

3.2.1 Discussion of the resultsWe looked at the results from the experiment in Chapter 2, so we will look at

each question in great detail in this section.

3.3 Research questions

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In this section, we will look at the answers for each research question by looking back the results. There were two research questions for this thesis.

Research Question 1: How much do Japanese university students know about the meaning of affixes, and which affixes are familiar to the subjects and which ones are not?

The two tables are shown the percentage of the correct answers for each group.

Table 27: Receptive knowledgeWell-

known81-100%

61-80% 41-60% 21-40% 0-20% Total

Prefixes 8 7 6 2 0 23Prefixes% 34.7% 30.4% 26% 8.6% 0% 100%Suffixes 9 10 5 4 2 30Suffixes% 30% 33.3% 16.6% 13.3% 6.6% 100%

Table 28: Productive knowledgeWell-

known81-100%

61-80% 41-60% 21-40% 0-20% Total

Prefixes 4 3 7 4 5 23Prefixes% 17.3% 13% 30.4% 17.3% 21.7% 100%Suffixes 5 2 5 7 11 30Suffixes% 16.6% 6.6% 16.6% 23.3% 36.6% 100%

The data in Table 27 and 28 were divided into five groups depends on the percentage of correct answers. The numbers of the affixes for each percentage and the rate for each group were also calculated. More than 60% of affixes on the receptive test had correct answers, so we could see the subjects could answer properly if they have alternatives to choose. Nevertheless, when it comes to the productive test, every group had similar percentage and the rate of 41-60% for prefixes and 21-40% for the other. In short, Japanese students can guess the

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meanings of each affix if they have some hints to consider, but they are not be able to describe the meanings by their own words without any hints.

Practically, when we look through the answers of the subjects, many people answered the meaning of the word, not the meaning of the prefixes or suffixes. That is, they tend to think of the meaning of a whole word, so they don’t have massive knowledge about the specific part of a word.

There is no obvious line to show Japanese students know or don’t know about English affixes, however, we could find some patterns from the data we have got from the subjects. First, we tested 23 prefixes and 30 suffixes on 72 Japanese university students, and when we see the entire data, nobody could answer 100% correct.

Which affixes are familiar to the subjects?

There is no particular way to divide these items into levels, and how familiar they are for the subjects, so the rate will be set here to recognise which ones are familiar and which ones are not. The rate will be like this; if 70% of the subjects could answer them correctly, that means they are familiar to them, if 40% of them could answer correctly, that means they are partially known affixes for the subjects, and the other affixes that got under 30% will be recognize as largely unfamiliar ones for Japanese university students. This rule for diving applied to the result of receptive part too.

As for prefix/productive part, six prefixes were recognized as well-known and familiar to the subjects. They were, re (97.20%), un (91.70%), mid (87.50%), pre (83.30%), bi (75.00%), and fore (70.80%). The prefixes that were recognized as partially known for the subjects were, non (63.90%), im (58.30%), sub (58.30%), anti (48.60%), semi (47.20%), ex (45.80%), post (43.10%), and inter (41.70%). These most familiar and pre-familiar prefixes were summarised in Figure 5 down below, comparing how did the subjects answered on each part; productive and receptive part of the experiment.

Figure 5: The rate of correct answers on the productive and receptive test (Prefixes)

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RE UN MID PRE BI FORE NON IM SUB ANTI SEMI EX POST INTER0

20

40

60

80

100

120

97.291.7

87.583.3

7570.8

63.958.3 58.3

48.6 47.2 45.8 43.1 41.7

97.2 10094.4

90.3 93.187.5

10093.1

66.770.8

59.7

77.8

61.154.2

productive test receptive test

From the table above, the five prefixes that were recognised as the most familiar ones marked over 70% on both types of the test. These five prefixes can be seen in Japanese when we read the words with these prefixes in katakana. There are some words that contain these target prefixes such as –re is in reuse (ri yu-su), -un is in –unlucky (an lakki-), and –non is in –nonstop (non-stoppu). We are using these words unconsciously as wasei-eigo, so we may have the skill to guess the meanings from the data they have in their head already. Not surprisingly, the aall of the prefixes were better known on the receptive test, as we expected. We are now looking at the level of knowledge of the students, so if we separate the known and unknown or unfamiliar prefixes at 80%, we can say re-, un-, mid-, and pre- are the familiar prefixes for Japanese university students.

Next, let’s look at suffixes. Figure 6 below shows the data for the correct answers of high frequency suffixes and middle frequency ones. They were summarised below comparing the productive and receptive test scores..

Figure 6: The rate of correct answers on the productive and receptive test (Suffixes)

If we set the border to separate each suffixes into familiar, middle frequency, and not familiar items depends on the percentage of productive test as we did for

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prefixes, 6 suffixes were recognised as familiar. The suffix –er, -est, and –s appear in beginner level textbooks enough times for acquisition to occur. If students lose these suffixes when they are writing sentences, teachers correct their mistakes, so they can notice that they made mistakes and the grammar is incorrect because of that.

The other suffixes such as –ism, -ee, -less, and ian are also seen in texts sometimes, however, these ones don’t have a relationship with grammar and are added after specific roots, so students can’t have enough feedback from what they read or write.

Research Question 2: Which language did the subjects use to answer the part of the test they can answer in either language, English and Japanese?

The subjects were able to answer in either languages when they took the test. The productive part required them to type their answers in their own words without any alternatives. According to some researchers, Japanese students who are learning English tend to remember the meanings and other information about English in Japanese at the beginner level. Some people who are used to learn English tend to remember the meanings in another way to say with the basic meanings. However, if the students don’t try to remember it in many ways, they might not be able to answer in English when asked. The table below shows the prefixes and suffixes that the subjects could answer in English, and the example answers the subjects wrote.

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EST ABLE ER ER IST S ISM EE ESS LESS ITY IAN0

20

40

60

80

100

120

100 100 98.6 95.8

81.9

73.666.7

59.7 58.3 56.9

44.4 43.1

10095.8 98.6

90.3

58.3

83.3

61.1

84.7

69.4

88.9

7568.1

Productive Receptive

Table 29: The prefixes and suffixes that subjects could answer in English and the some examples of their answers.

Prefixes and suffixes

Example answers in English (the number shows how many of the subjects answered in the same way)

Non- Not (4), no (2), negative (2)Un- Not (7), negative, deny, cannotIm- Not, deny, cannot, impossible, negativeAnte- Huge, bigAnti- Opposite side (2), not, dangerous, against, rejectArch- Powerful, main partBi- Middle, two (3), both, doubleCircum- Be surrounded by (3), surrounding, aroundCounter- BeforehandEn- Meet something bad, outside (2), almost, not reallyEx- Out of, before, out, expressFore- Front, beforeHyper- up, above, super, beyondInter- First, between, middleMid- Middle, centreMis- Negative, differently, mistake, do badlyNeo- New, new thing, environment, systemPost- Later, add, after, postpone, extendPro- Before (2), another, organizeSemi- Half, centre, half of somethingSub- Under, second (3), anotherPre- Before (2), first thingRe- Again (2), another chance-er (comparative) Comparative-est Superlative, the best-able Possible-ness Make a noun-th Condition-er (person) Person-ous Full of, condition

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-ation Thing, condition-atory Place-ence Condition-ery Place-ian Person-ary Condition-ling Small-ify Condition-ion Condition

As we can see from the table above, all 23 prefixes were answered in English, on the other hand, only 17 suffixes out of 30 could get the English answers from the subjects. None of the subjects could write the answers in English for all suffixes, however, only one person answered in English for the prefixes only. The number of the people who answered in English at least one time was 8 for prefixes, and 3 for suffixes. From the table above, we can see some patterns in the answers. First, prefix test has some similar answers such as not, cannot, negative, and no. These words all means deny something and negative side.

This doesn’t mean the answers are all correct, but from what we saw already, some prefixes have negative meanings. This is not difficult like the meanings of suffixes (some mean condition, or process for example). By just adding these simple prefixes with simple meanings, the word can be changed to alternative meanings, so the subjects were more able to answer at a high rate in English.

The second finding was, the number of people who used English to answer as quite small actually, however, we could see some people answered in exactly the same words like not, cannot, and negative. This phenomenon was seen only on the prefix test, Again, if we compare the meanings between prefixes and suffixes, prefixes have a little bit easier meanings to remember, so the subjects answered in a same simple way even if they don’t have enough words to explain in another words.

Thirdly, none of the subjects answered in English on the suffix test. This might have strong connection with the education system in Japanese schools. Teachers don’t give the lessons about these things, so students can’t have enough information to answer well in English. Some prefixes have much easier meanings than suffixes as we saw from the results, so students can guess their meanings, like mid- which means middle of something.

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The experiment showed that 11% (8 subjects) answered in English for prefixes and only 4% (3 subjects) did for suffixes. Some subjects answered the same word about the same prefixes. Some suffixes had same answer condition, even if the meanings for each were slightly different. From these three parts mainly, we found out Japanese students don’t have enough English skill to answer properly for each item, and prefixes were easier for the subjects.

Now, let us look at some comments that the subjects left at the end of the experiment briefly. We will find out what they found out and felt, and what was the difficult point for them.

- When I look up something unknown for me on the dictionary, I felt I was seeing the word as one string not part by part, and didn’t care about the small elements.

- I thought we might be able to guess the meanings of each unknown word if we know about these elements well.

- I thought we already knew about these prefixes and suffixes with our sense, but it was difficult to describe the meanings with our own words.

- I could answer the items which I meet often while studying English, however, I thought deeply about the other less known ones, considering the meaning which the words have.

- When I thought the prefix and suffix with the three words, I couldn’t come up with the meaning of the affix well. But it was easier to guess it with the meanings of the words itself.

- The meanings of words pop up into my head, not the ones of affixes.- It was difficult to type the meaning by my own words even if it’s Japanese.- I thought Japanese schools should teach about these important elements to

students when they build the base information in their head. If teachers do so, students might be able to have massive information and knowledge to guess the meaning without the dictionary.

- Even if I know the meanings, it was a bit difficult to transfer into my words.- Easy ones are not difficult to answer on both tests, but the items which I don’t see

often in my daily lives were difficult even if there were some alternatives in Japanese.

- The tests said we can choose the language to answer, so I tried to answer them in English first, but it became much difficult gradually, so I gave up.

- There were some items that I have no idea even if there were some words to help us guessing.

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- I didn’t care about these elements before and didn’t look at a word by part by part, so if I could have the knowledge about prefix and suffix, I guess I don’t have to use the dictionary so much.

- This knowledge helps me a lot while I’m reading something without dictionary.- As I could answer if there were some alternatives, so I thought there is some kind

of images towards each affix in my head.- The origin and the structure of each word should be taught at school.

As we can see from the comments which were given from the subjects above, many subjects

had difficulty when they write their answers without alternatives. Even if the small number of subjects who answered in English on the productive test, they couldn’t clear answer for them. They wrote like, not, cannot, no, and deny for the items which show the negative meanings. There were some students who wrote the meaning of the words instead of the one of affix. We also found out that the subjects are not good at describing the meanings in English even if they can do the same thing in Japanese. These data show Japanese students tend to remember the meaning of English words in Japanese. As some people mentioned in their comments, Japanese schools should have the chance to teach these things to students to make their knowledge wider.

When we study kanji at school, we learn the origin and the structure of each, so it’s also very important teach them to make a connection between each element.

3.4 ImplicationsWe found out that to acquire the correct meanings of each prefix and suffix,

and get the sense of each are important and very helpful for English learners. They can guess the meanings of unknown words even if they have no idea what the whole word means. Japanese students who are studying English tend to miss the opportunity to meet affixes one by one because of the curriculum at Japanese schools. However, if they understand that there are some patterns for each element, and if they can segment the word, they can gradually get the sense of the meanings of affixes and they don't need to look up the word on dictionary. To get the clear correct meanings, of course they need to have massive amount of information of roots first because they carry the core meaning of each word, and if the students meet the roots many times through massive input, they will gradually acquire the sense to guess the meanings of the root just by looking at the word and from their knowledge of Japanese meanings for the word.

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It is sometimes said that looking up unknown words in a dictionary isn't the recommended way to build a network in our head. Before we look up something we should guess the meaning by looking at the word thinking firstly about the meaning and only later about affix knowledge. This order is important because if learner use word part knowledge before the meaning in a sentence they may get the wrong meaning. English learners in Japan don't have this habit, so it is a bit hard for them, but this way of thinking about unknown words is very helpful in language learning.

3.5 Limitations of the thesisFrom the experiment and the data we looked at, we could get a lot of

interesting results, however, there were some limitations for this thesis. First, all the subjects who took the test were university students. 72 students took the test, three male, 69 female. Moreover, only 8 subjects were 3rd year subjects, 40 people were 4th

years from Seishin, and the other 24 subjects were also 4 th year students from another universities. To get much better results from a wider range of generations, this thesis would have benefitted from the data from various kinds of people, not only from the university students but also from some adults who are studying English by themselves, and much younger, elementary-leveled students like Junior high school students and high school students. These data would be lead to much deeper results and we can get better general results from there. Moreover, this experiment needed more male subjects, because there were only three male students who took the test this time.

The second limitation is about the data and the experimental method. As for the data, and the original list that was used for the experiment were made by two linguistic researchers and they had different ways to find their results from the one we saw in Chapter Two. The subjects just took the test about each prefixes and suffixes productively and receptively.

Thirdly, subjects for this thesis should have taken the test in a specific order (they have to take productive test first, and then receptive test without long term between the two). However, for some reasons, some subjects took the receptive test first, and then they took productive test after some long term. Some of the data which had these problems were deleted, but there might be still conflicted data, as subjects took their test by themselves at home or school without observation.

Finally, the affixes of this thesis were picked up randomly from the study by Nation and Bauer (1993), so we couldn’t know about another prefixes and suffixes they didn’t mention. There are so many affixes in English and we looked at just a few of them. There may be some affixes that the subjects know much more than we

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looked at, and there may be some affixes that nobody can answer correctly. Nation and Bauer (1993) also mentioned their rank and levels were largely arbitrary, saying that at each level, it was necessary to prioritise the criteria and balance them against each other (Nation and Bauer, 1993).

3.6 Further researchThe experiment had asked the Japanese subjects to take a test of English

affixes and found out some problems too. Most of the Japanese students don’t have such high skill to describe the meanings of affixes in English, and most of them couldn’t answer the meanings of suffixes correctly except –s,-er, and –est which students learn on the textbooks to lead correct grammar. As students don’t learn about these items at schools, they can’t increase the information of the system.

We suggest that we should think about the effective lessons about affixes at schools as one part of the English curriculum. Students need them not just studying for the test at schools or to enter the schools, and need to know how effective it will to know about English affixes to guess the meanings when they meet some unknown or unfamiliar words. The acquisition patterns for the meanings of prefixes and suffixes are vague sometimes, but many of them have clear easy simple meanings to remember, and they should try to make a base with these items and deepen their knowledge with massive information. We might be able to think about the effective way to teach affixes to students.

This experiment didn’t have enough affixes to test the students, in future research, more questions should be added. There are so many affixes in English, and the experiment figured out how well the subjects know them, so we need to test more affixes in different ways, not just productively and receptively.

Finally, this experiment had 72 subjects (third years and fourth years at university), and most of them were female fourth years, so we need to test various kinds of people such as junior high school students or senior high school students, and possibly adults are should be tested to get much wider and deeper results.

3.7 ConclusionThe education system is now moving on to improve students’ knowledge and

each skills, however, many people started to touch English when they entered junior high school. They study basic grammar, words, reading tips, and sometimes do

60

listening practice, however, students were not taught about affixes at schools so much.

We looked about 23 prefixes and 30 suffixes through the experiment, and found out that Japanese students who are studying English at school are familiar with the basic suffixes that they study at school for the first time such as third person singular form and comparative. Also, the affixes which appear in Japanese such as anti-, un-, and sub- got were recognised as familiar items. Except these familiar ones, subjects could answer correctly on the receptive way. Among so many English affixes, we just had a look at only a few of them, and the results depend on the knowledge of each person, but we can say Japanese schools have to think about the curriculum to make their knowledge about affixes better. Many affixes came from other countries, so it’s not easy to remember all of them, however, once we got the patterns of each item, we might be good at guessing the meaning of each prefix and suffix.

61

References

Articles

Schmitt, N. 1998.Tracking the Incremental Acquisition of Second Language

Vocabulary: A Longitudinal Study. Language Learning.

Nation, P. Bauer, L. 1993. Word Families. Victoria University of Wellington.

Mochizuki, M. Aizawa, K. 2000. An affix acquisition order for EFL learners: and

exploratory study.

Schmitt, N. Meara, P. 1997. Researching Vocabulary Through A Word Knowledge

Framework. Cambridge University Press.

Nation, P. 2001. Learning Vocabulary in Another Language. Cambridge University

Press

Milton, J. 2009. Measuring Second Language Vocabulary Acquisition. Multilingual

matters

Kim, C. 2013. Vocabulary Acquisition With Affixation: Learning English Words Based

On Prefixes And Suffixes. University of Hawaii.

Schmitt, N. Schmitt. D. 1995. Vocabulary Notebooks: theoretical underpinnings and

practical suggestions. Oxford University Press.

Schmitt, N. Zimmerman, C. 2012. Derivative Word Forms: What Do Learners Know?.

Tesol Quarterly.

62

WebsitesLatin Roots, Prefixes, and Suffixes. Accessed 13 June. 2014 http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0907036.html

Examples of Root Words. Accessed 3 July. 2014http://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-root-words.html

A List of 30 Common Word Roots. Accessed 28 June. 2014 http://grammar.about.com/od/words/a/wordroots.htm

Prefix. Accessed 23 July. 2014

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prefix

A Little Etymology. Accessed 3 August. 2014http://ancienthistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa052698.htm

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Appendices

Suffix / Productive1. Productive test (Suffixes)例) 　これらの単語に含まれている ATION の意味は何でしょう。回答は英語

でも日本語でもいいので、下の空欄に打ち込んで下さい。personalisATION limitATION orientATION 　　

( ここでは、"状態" が最も近い答えなので日本語で、もしくは英語で "condition" と打ち込んで下さい)

 

あなたの英語のレベルは、どのくらいですか。*必須

 初心者

 初級

 中級

 準上級

 上級

Are u a male, or a female?

 Male

 Female

Name*必須

 

(1) これらの単語に含まれている ER の意味は何でしょう。 bettER biggER tallER*必須分からなければ、"I

don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(2) これらの単語に含まれている S の意味は何でしょう。 waterS pourS understandS*必須分からなければ、

"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(3) これらの単語に含まれている EST の意味は何でしょう。 HighEST CutEST CheapEST*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

64

(4) これらの単語に含まれている ABLE の意味は何でしょう。reliABLE profitABLE capABLE*必須分からな

ければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(5) これらの単語に含まれている LESS の意味は何でしょう。meaningLESS careLESS hopeLESS*必須分か

らなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(6) これらの単語に含まれている NESS の意味は何でしょう。happiNESS awkwardNESS madNESS*必須分

からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(7) これらの単語に含まれている TH の意味は何でしょう。truTH youTH strengTH*必須分からなければ、"I

don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(8) これらの単語に含まれている Y の意味は何でしょう。healthY spicY windY*必須分からなければ、"I don't

know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(9) これらの単語に含まれている ER の意味は何でしょう。teachER lovER keepER*必須分からなければ、"I

don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(10) これらの単語に含まれている ISM の意味は何でしょう。 feminISM modernISM nationaISM*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(11) これらの単語に含まれている MENT の意味は何でしょう。governMENT abandonMENT

accomplishMENT*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(12) これらの単語に含まれている OUS の意味は何でしょう。luxuriOUS gloriOUS gaseOUS*必須分からなけ

れば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

65

 

(13) これらの単語に含まれている ITY の意味は何でしょう。humidITY humanITY authorITY*必須分からなけ

れば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(14) これらの単語に含まれている ATION の意味は何でしょう。 organisATION civilisATION

accomodATION*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(15) これらの単語に含まれている ESS の意味は何でしょう。 lionESS goddESS actrESS*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(16) これらの単語に含まれている ATORY の意味は何でしょう。observATORY laborATORY

commandATORY*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(17) これらの単語に含まれている ENCE の意味は何でしょう。residENCE defENCE prefENCE*必須分からな

ければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(18) これらの単語に含まれている ORY の意味は何でしょう。directORY preparatORY satisfactORY*必須分

からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(19) これらの単語に含まれている ERY の意味は何でしょう。bakERY trickERY robbERY*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(20) これらの単語に含まれている AGE の意味は何でしょう。marriAGE strAGE packAGE*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(21) これらの単語に含まれている ESE の意味は何でしょう。 JapanESE portuguESE ChinESE*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

66

 

(22) これらの単語に含まれている IAN の意味は何でしょう。 humanitarIAN musicIAN politicIAN*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(23) これらの単語に含まれている HOOD の意味は何でしょう。childHOOD adultHOOD neighborHOOD*必

須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(24) これらの単語に含まれている ARY の意味は何でしょう。revolutionARY primARY necessARY*必須分か

らなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(25) これらの単語に含まれている LING の意味は何でしょう。duckLING darkLING sterLING*必須分からなけ

れば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(26) これらの単語に含まれている EE の意味は何でしょう。trainEE employEE addressEE*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(27) これらの単語に含まれている IVE の意味は何でしょう。actIVE productIVE receptIVE*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(28) これらの単語に含まれている IFY の意味は何でしょう。 verIFY clarIFY modIFY*必須分からなければ、"I

don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(29) これらの単語に含まれている IST の意味は何でしょう。 pianIST illusionIST tourIST*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

  

67

  

(30) これらの単語に含まれている ION の意味は何でしょう。 definitION positION competitION*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

このセクションは終了です。送信ボタンを押してください。

Suffix / ReceptiveName*必須

 

2. Receptive test (Suffixes) *必須例) 　これらの単語に含まれる ATION の意味は何でしょう。 　

personalisATION limitATION orientATION (ここでは"状態" が最も近い意味なので、下の選択肢から選んで

マークしてください)

 状態

 グループ

 組織を形成する

 起源

 分からない

(1) これらの単語に含まれる ER の意味は何でしょう。*必須bettER biggER tallER

 物事

 人

 比較

 場所

 分からない

(2) これらの単語に含まれる S の意味は何でしょう。*必須waterS pourS understandS

 過去

 3 人称単数現在形

 複数形

 最上級

 分からない

(3)　これらの単語に含まれる EST の意味は何でしょう。*必須highEST cutEST cheapEST

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 比較

 複数

 過去

 最上級

 分からない

(4) これらの単語に含まれる ABLE の意味は何でしょう。*必須thinkABLE brakABLE capABLE

 ~が可能な

 ~に長けている

 ~を誇りに思う

 才能

 分からない

(5) これらの単語に含まれる LESS の意味は何でしょう。*必須meaningLESS careLESS hopeLESS

 小さい

 遠い

 ~なしの

 他の

 分からない

(6) これらの単語に含まれる NESS の意味は何でしょう。*必須awkwardNESS happiNESS madNESS

 悪い

 性質、状態

 性格

 気分

 分からない

(7) これらの単語に含まれる TH の意味は何でしょう。*必須youTH truTH strengTH

 状態

 年

 過程

 順序

 分からない

(8) これらの単語に含まれる Y の意味は何でしょう。*必須healthY spicY windY

69

 気持ち

 副詞

 そのものの性質

 望み

 分からない

(9) これらの単語に含まれる ER の意味は何でしょう。*必須teachER lovER keepER

 期間

 人

 委員会

 起源

 分からない

(10) これらの単語に含まれる ISM の意味は何でしょう。*必須feminISM modernISM nationalISM

 時代

 期間

 宗教

 理論

 分からない

(11) これらの単語に含まれている MENT の意味は何でしょう。*必須governMENT accomplishMENT

abandonMENT

 組織する

 行動

 物事

 場所

 分からない

(12) これらの単語に含まれる OUS の意味は何でしょう。*必須luxuriOUS gaseOUS gloriOUS

 ~で満たされた

 ~可能な

 気持ち

 ~だと考える

 分からない

70

(13) これらの単語に含まれる ITY の意味は何でしょう。*必須humidITY humanITY authorITY

 気分

 それぞれの人の性格

 性質

 特徴

 分からない

(14) これらの単語に含まれる ATION の意味は何でしょう。*必須organisATION accomodATION civilisATION

 過程

 人

 場所

 動き

 分からない

(15) これらの単語に含まれる ESS の意味は何でしょう。*必須actrESS goddESS lionESS

 全体の

 女性

 人々のまとまり

 行動

 分からない

(16) これらの単語に含まれる ATORY の意味は何でしょう。*必須laborATORY observATORY

commandATORY

 特徴

 ~に関連した

 試みる

 場所

 分からない

(17) これらの単語に含まれる ENCE の意味は何でしょう。*必須residENCE difENCE preferENCE

 物事

 気分

 行動

 状態

71

 分からない

(18) これらの単語に含まれる ORY の意味は何でしょう。*必須preparatORY directORY satisfactORY

 ~のための場所

 心の中で思っていること

 ~の技術

 過程

 分からない

(19) これらの単語に含まれる ERY の意味は何でしょう。*必須bakERY robbERY trickERY

 仕事

 性格

 多くの人々

 ~のための場所

 分からない

(20) これらの単語に含まれる AGE の意味は何でしょう。*必須marriAGE packAGE strAGE

 つながり

 集合

 ~でいっぱいの

 収容能力

 分からない

(21) これらの単語に含まれる ESE の意味は何でしょう。*必須JapanESE ChinESE PortuguESE

 居住者

 宗教

 地域

 ~の場所

 分からない

(22) これらの単語に含まれる IAN の意味は何でしょう。*必須musicIAN humanitarIAN politicIAN

 人

 仕事

 ~に生まれる

 性格

72

 分からない

(23) これらの単語に含まれる HOOD の意味は何でしょう。*必須childHOOD adultHOOD nighborHOOD

 ~の集合

 年齢

 状態

 期間

 分からない

(24) これらの単語に含まれる ARY の意味は何でしょう。*必須revolutionARY primARY necessarARY

 活動

 現在から次の段階へ

 過程

 ~に関連した

 分からない

(25) これらの単語に含まれる LING の意味は何でしょう。*必須darkLING duckLING princeLING

 位置

 状態

 人々

 変化

 分からない

(26) これらの単語に含まれる EE の意味は何でしょう。*必須trainEE adressEE employEE

 人

 上司

 ~のための場所

 過程

 分からない

(27) これらの単語に含まれる IVE の意味は何でしょう。*必須actIVE productIVE receptIVE

 質

 ~の総計

 十分に

 ~する傾向にある

73

 分からない

(28) これらの単語に含まれる IFY の意味は何でしょう。*必須clarIFY verIFY modIFY

 ~出来る

 現状

 物事の状態を変える

 ~に見せる

 分からない

(29) これらの単語に含まれる IST の意味は何でしょう。*必須pianIST illusionIST tourIST

 ~をする技術

 職業

 機会

 人

 分からない

   

(30) これらの単語に含まれる ION の意味は何でしょう。*必須positION competitION definitION

 行動

 方向

 比較する

 ~の場所

 分からない

このセクションは終了です。送信ボタンを押してください。

Prefix / ProductiveName *必須

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3. Productive test (Prefixes)例） これらの単語に含まれている DIS の意味は何でしょう。回答は日本語で

も英語でも構いません。 DISlike DISmiss DISablity ( ここでは、"negative force" が最も近い答えなので、

英語もしくは日本語のこれに相当する答えを打ち込んで下さい)

 

(1) これらの単語に含まれている NON の意味は何でしょう。 NONsense NONhuman NONevent*必須分から

なければ、"i don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(2) これらの単語に含まれている UN の意味は何でしょう。 UNhappy UNnatural UNlucky*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(3) これらの単語に含まれている IM の意味は何でしょう。IMpossible IMmature IMmortal*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(4) これらの単語に含まれている ANTE の意味は何でしょう。 ANTEroom ANTEcedent ANTEdate*必須分か

らなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(5) これらの単語に含まれている ANTI の意味は何でしょう。ANTI-body ANTI-climax ANTI-dote*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(6) これらの単語に含まれている ARCH の意味は何でしょう。 ARCHbishop ARCHrival ARCHangel*必須分

からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(7) これらの単語に含まれている BI の意味は何でしょう。BIlingual BIcultural Bicycle*必須分からなければ、

"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

75

(8) これらの単語に含まれている CIRCUM の意味は何でしょう。 CIRCUMnavigate CIRCUMscribe

CIRCUMference*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(9) これらの単語に含まれている COUNTER の意味は何でしょう。 COUNTER-act COUNTER-factual

COUNTER-part*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(10) これらの単語に含まれている EN の意味は何でしょう。ENsure ENcourage ENdanger*必須分からなけ

れば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(11) これらの単語に含まれている EX の意味は何でしょう。 EXhibited EXcommunicate EXport*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(12) これらの単語に含まれている FORE の意味は何でしょう。FOREhead FOREarm FOREcast*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(13) これらの単語に含まれている HYPER の意味は何でしょう。HYPERcar HYPERlink HYPERtension*必須

分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(14) これらの単語に含まれている INTER の意味は何でしょう。 INTERnational INTERlanguage

INTERchange*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(15) これらの単語に含まれている MID の意味は何でしょう。 MID-air MID-brain MID-day*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(16) これらの単語に含まれている MIS の意味は何でしょう。 MISuse MISunderstand MISapply*必須分から

なければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

76

 

(17) これらの単語に含まれている NEO の意味は何でしょう。 NEOphyte NEOnate NEOlogism*必須分からな

ければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(18) これらの単語に含まれている POST の意味は何でしょう。 POST-war POST-test POST-script*必須分か

らなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(19) これらの単語に含まれている PRO の意味は何でしょう。 PRO-war PRO-choice PRO-European*必須分

からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(20) これらの単語に含まれている SEMI の意味は何でしょう。 SEMI-final SEMI-conscious SEMI-circle*必須

分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(21) これらの単語に含まれている SUB の意味は何でしょう。 SUBculture SUBfamilies SUBproducts*必須

分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

(22) これらの単語に含まれている PRE の意味は何でしょう。PREannounce PREarranged

PREchecking*必須分からなければ、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

    

(23) これらの単語に含まれている RE の意味は何でしょう。 REmarry REappoint REbuild*必須分からなけれ

ば、"I don't know" と打ち込んで下さい。

 

このセクションは終了です。送信ボタンを押してください。

 

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Prefix / ReceptiveName*必須

 

4. Receptive test (Preffixes)　　例） これらの単語に含まれている DIS の 意味は何でしょう。 DISlike

DISmiss DISability ( この中では "消極的な強制" が最も近い答えなので、下の選択肢からそれを選んでマー

クしてください。 )

 皿

 消極的な強制

 不可能

 嫌悪

 分からない

(1) これらの単語に含まれている NON の意味は何でしょう。*必須NONsense NONhuman NONevent

 ~なしで

 より~である

 期待どうりの

 他の

 分からない

(2) これらの単語に含まれている UN の意味は何でしょう。*必須UNhappy UNlucky UNnatural

 ~ではない

 より~の

 外の

 完全に

 分からない

(3) これらの単語に含まれている IM の意味は何でしょう。*必須IMpossible IMmature IMmortal

 状態

 おそらく

 ~ではない

 ~でいっぱいの

 分からない

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(4) これらの単語に含まれている ANTE の意味は何でしょう。*必須ANTEroom ANTEdate ANTEcedent

 3 番目の

 予備の

 内側の

 過程

 分からない

(5) これらの単語に含まれている ANTI の意味は何でしょう。*必須ANTI-body ANTI-dote ANTI-climax

 2 番目の

 危険な

 自分と敵対する立場にあること

 敵

 分からない

(6) これらの単語に含まれている ARCH の意味は何でしょう。*必須ARCHbishop ARCHangel ARCHrival

 権威のある

 全体の

 中心

 主要な

 分からない

(7) これらの単語に含まれている BI の意味は何でしょう。*必須BIlingual BIcultural BIcycle

 代理の

 主なもの

 間の

 2 つ

 分からない

(8) これらの単語に含まれている CIRCUM の意味は何でしょう。*必須CIRCUMnavigate CIRCUMference

CIRCUMscribe

 中心

 囲まれている

 球体

 性質

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 分からない

(9) これらの単語に含まれている COUNTER の意味は何でしょう。*必須COUNTER-act COUNTER-factual

COUNTER-part

 ~に反する

 前の

 状態

 主な

 分からない

(10) これらの単語に含まれている EN の意味は何でしょう。*必須ENcourage ENdanger ENsure

 物、事柄を大きくする

 出会う

 物、人をある状態に置く

 制限する

 分からない

(11) これらの単語に含まれている EX の意味は何でしょう。*必須EXhibited EXcommunicate Export

 内側の

 外側

 循環

 つなぐ

 分からない

(12) これらの単語に含まれている FORE の意味は何でしょう。*必須FOREhead FOREarm FOREcast

 後ろ向きに

 真ん中

 部分的な

 前側の

 分からない

(13) これらの単語に含まれている HYPER の意味は何でしょう。*必須HYPERlink HYPERcar HYPERtension

 上

 前

 下

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 向こう側

 分からない

(14) これらの単語に含まれている INTER の意味は何でしょう。*必須INTERlanguage INTERchange

INTERnational

 内側

 半分

 間の

 予備の

 分からない

(15) これらの単語に含まれている MID の意味は何でしょう。*必須MID- air MID-brain MID-day

 強靭な

 真ん中

 2 番目

 物事の終わり

 分からない

(16) これらの単語に含まれている MIS の意味は何でしょう。*必須MISuse MISunderstand MISapply

 ひどい状態に~する

 ~の欠如

 不思議な

 前の

 分からない

(17) これらの単語に含まれている NEO の意味は何でしょう。*必須NEOlogist NEOphyte NEOnate

 今の

 近くの

 新しい

 国際的な

 分からない

(18) これらの単語に含まれている POST の意味は何でしょう。*必須POST-war POST-test POST-script

 ~を追いかける

 前方の

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 上の

 後の

 分からない

(19) これらの単語に含まれている PRO の意味は何でしょう。*必須PRO-choice PRO-war PRO-European

 前の

 他の

 ~からの

 ~に賛同する

 分からない

(20) これらの単語に含まれている SEMI の意味は何でしょう。*必須SEMI-final SEMI-conscious SEMI-circle

 ほとんど

 半分

 最後の

 中心

 分からない

(21) これらの単語に含まれている SUB の意味は何でしょう。*必須SUBculture SUBculture SUBproducts

 支える

 後ろ盾

 ~の後を追う

 2 番目の

 分からない

(22) これらの単語に含まれる PRE の意味は何でしょう。*必須PREarranged PREannounce PREchecking

 ~の後の

 ~を超えた

 ~の前の

 すでに

 分からない

(23) これらの単語に含まれている RE の意味は何でしょう。*必須REactions REappoint REbuild

 2 倍の

 再び

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 ~の代わりに

 何度も

 分からない

全てのテストが終了しました。ご協力ありがとうございました。*必須コメント、気づいたことなどを下に打

ち込んでください。

 

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