The developmental trajectories of L2 lexical-semantic networks

Abstract This study explored the developmental trajectories of L2 Lexical-semantic networks by comparing structure lexical-semantic Chinese EFL learners at two levels English: intermediate and advanced. Analyses data from semantic fluency tasks found that with improvement language proficiency, network becomes more connected but less centralized. community revealed advanced has denser clusters than learners. Examination individual words in shows tend to reorganize themselves expanse network. In this process, frequent remain as central while fewer connections have risk being lost, although a large number new keep joining The results provide empirical evidence for preferential attachment model growth.