Pictures and Words as Stimuli in Learning Foreign Language Responses

Summary

Pictures and words were used as stimuli for paired-associate learning of foreign language responses in four trials. Fourth grade boys and girls (N = 42) received Indonesian responses paired with either English word translations or referent line drawings during study trials; half the word pairs were cognates, and half noncognates. Ss were tested for recall of Indonesian responses with both picture and English word stimuli. All three main effects were significant at the .001 level of confidence: more correct Indonesian responses were recalled in the picture-word condition than in the word-word condition, recall for cognates was greater than recall for noncognates, and the number of correctly recalled responses increased over the first three trials and decreased on the fourth trial two weeks later. The research has potential for direct application in the foreign language classroom.