Ma s2745925 A. - Palaska

Running head: The efficiency of subtitles in Second Language Acquisition 1
The efficiency of subtitles in Second

Language Acquisition
Athanasia Palaska
S2745925
MA in Applied Linguistics
Faculty of Liberal Arts
University of Groningen
Supervisors:
Dr. Hanneke Loerts(primary supervisor)
Dr. Marjolijn Verspoor (second reader)
05/06/2015
Words: 14.937
The efficiency of subtitles in Second Language Acquisition 2
Abstract
The present study attempts to answer the questions whether there is a
subtitling condition that is more effective in second language vocabulary acquisition
and meaning comprehension. Several studies have pointed out the importance of
multimodality in language processing, as well as the efficacy of subtitles in second
language acquisition. Therefore, an experiment was set up in order to examine the
efficacy of two different subtitling conditions: standard and intralingual. The
participants were native speakers of Greek and L2 speakers of English with an
advanced level of proficiency. Participants were exposed to a video containing one of
the subtitling conditions. Both before and after watching the video, subjects had to
take a vocabulary test containing some words of the target language that were in the
video. Moreover, they also had to take a comprehension test regarding the video
content right after they had watched the film fragment. The results showed that even
though a learning effect took place in each of the subtitling conditions, significant
results highlighting the effectiveness of the intralingual subtitles were only found
regarding the comprehension tests and not regarding vocabulary acquisition. Finally,
further research is suggested concerning the efficacy of subtitling and different
subtitling conditions for the aforementioned language aspects.
1. Introduction
During the past decades, the film industry begun to rise and nowadays, movies
are a big part of peoples’ entertaining activities. Great amount of money is invested in
new movies, cinemas, film festivals as well as in DVDs. Different kinds of film
awards have been created as well as opportunities for people who work in the film
industry to win several prizes; people such as directors, actors, scriptwriters and music
composers. What is more, people spend their spare time watching all different film
genres, such as comedies, dramas, science fiction etcetera, for a hobby, discussing
their impressions and ideas with other people. Therefore, it is widely accepted that the
film industry constitutes an integral part of our lives. However, movies and series can
serve as more than just a hobby.
Throughout the history of applied linguistics, an important part of research has
investigated various learning strategies which contribute to the process of language
acquisition. Over the past years, a major part of academic research supported that
explicit language teaching, such as grammar translation, is a more effective way of
facilitating second language learning. According to Hulstijn (2005), explicit learning
is the conscious analysis of the input in order to discover the linguistic regularities
contained in the given information and, if so, “to work out the concepts and rules with
which these regularities can be captured” (p.131). On the other hand, more modern
approaches, such as Total Physical Response (TPR) (Asher, 1977) and Content and
Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) (David Marsh, 1994), are in favour of implicit
second language learning methods. These learning strategies propose that second
language knowledge can be facilitated unconsciously, through noticing, without
awareness of what is being learned. A very interesting method of implicit learning,
which has become quite popular in the recent studies as well as in the education field,
is the one of language acquisition through films. There are several types of films used
in the classroom environment, such as film with or without subtitles, films with
subtitles in the same language as the audio, films with L1 subtitles, dubbing, which is
when the initial audio is replaced by a new, translated one, etcetera. Individual
differences of every learner play an important role on the effect of each type of
subtitling condition (Caimi, 2006; Guichon & Mclornan, 2009). Teacher’s choice of
the right film is important and should highly rely on research conducted on this
subject area, otherwise the use of subtitling in the classroom might prove ineffective
for teaching purposes (Guichon & Mclornan, 2009). Several studies have investigated
the use of subtitles in language teaching as a learning strategy (Hayati and Mohmedi,
2009; De Bot, Jagt, Janssen, Kessels & Schils, 1986; Holobow, Lambert & Sayegh,
1984; Lavaur & Bairstow, 2011; Danan, 2004; Bos, 2014). Their results, however,
failed to adequately and consistently prove video subtitling to be an effective strategy
of language learning to a certain extent.
The present study, therefore, aims to examine whether audiovisual input,
presented more twice to the learners, positively affects second language vocabulary
acquisition as well as comprehension of second language input. More specifically,
this paper intends to investigate if two different types of video subtitling have an
effect on vocabulary acquisition and input understanding, and if so, which type is
more efficient. The types under investigation are two: standard or interlingual
subtitles, which is providing subtitles in the viewers’ native language, and intralingual
subtitles (also called ‘captions’, Danan, 2004), which is providing subtitles in the
second language.
According to d’Ydewalle & van de Poel (1999), vocabulary acquisition is one
of the most essential aspects of language learning since “words, particularly nouns,
are indeed the easiest building blocks in acquiring a new language; accordingly, it is
not too surprising to find the first signs of language acquisition in the vocabulary” (p.
240). Listening comprehension through the use of a digital video is equally important
as vocabulary acquisition in the process of language learning. According to
Vandergrift (1999), listening comprehension is a complex activity in which the
listener is required to “discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and

grammatical structures, interpret stress and intonation, retain what was gathered in all
of the above, and interpret it within the immediate as well as the larger sociocultural
context of the utterance” (p. 168). Thus, the present study poses the question whether
a specific type of subtitling enhances vocabulary acquisition and input comprehension
by testing two groups of Greek native speakers exposed to an English video with two
different subtitling conditions; standard subtitling (providing subtitles in the
participants’ native language) and intralingual subtitling (providing subtitles in the
second language). It is expected that, audio-visual material combined with subtitles
either in the native language (L1) or the second language (L2) is a helpful tool in
language learning, as the learners receive input through both modalities
simultaneously. The participants were tested both before and after watching the video
fragment on their knowledge of target words present in the fragment in order to
discover in which degree their vocabulary knowledge had been increased after the
film. Furthermore, they were tested regarding their understanding of the video content
by taking a multiple choice comprehension test, the same for each subtitling
condition. On that account, three research questions were addressed:
1. Does audio-visual material positively affect vocabulary acquisition?
2. Is there any different effect between standard and intralingual subtitling in
the acquisition of lexical items?
meaning comprehension?
In the following chapters, an overview of research regarding different types of
subtitles will be presented, followed by this study’s experimental set-up as well as its
results.
2. Background
During the past years, many studies showed a great interest in examining
language acquisition through audio-visual material. Films have become quite popular
as a teaching method in the educational field. Therefore, the need for further
investigation on the efficacy of the use of film in classroom is apparent. In this
section, an overview will be presented on the use of film in education and more
specifically, on the complex issue of the efficacy of different subtitling conditions.
Moreover, an attempt will be made to link the already existing findings of the
previous studies with the design of the present one, which aims to establish facts
regarding the use of subtitles in second language classroom environment.
2.1 Comprehensible and authentic language
There have been different approaches towards language teaching in the
applied linguistics field during the past years. One main distinction made, regarding
language learning, is described by the terms ‘explicit’ and ‘implicit’ learning.
According to Ellis (2005), explicit knowledge is achieved through conscious
awareness of what is being learned, can be facilitated only in non-time-pressured
circumstances, demands a focus on form and can be verbalized using ‘metalanguage’.
Implicit learning, on the other hand, is attained without awareness, through noticing,
in time-pressured situations with focus on meaning and without the need of specific
explanations (Lichtman, 2013). According to Reber, Allen and Reber (1999):
“Implicit learning (a) operates largely independent of awareness, (b) is
subsumed by neuroanatomical structures distinct from those that serve
explicit, declarative processes, (c) yields memorial representations that can be
either abstract or concrete, (d) is a relatively robust system that survives
psychological, psychiatric, and neuroanatomical injury, (e) shows relatively

little interindividual variability, and (f) is relatively unaffected by ontogenetic
factors” (p. 504).
Researchers have different opinions with regard to the complex issue of explicit
versus implicit language instruction. Some of them (Ellis; 1994, 2004, Krashen; 1989)
claim that explicit language teaching alone is not enough in order to promote second
language learning. Consequently, there is also the need for focus on meaning
combined with explicit classroom instruction. According to Ellis (2004), explicit
knowledge can contribute indirectly “to the acquisition of implicit knowledge by
facilitating attention to form in the input” (p. 228), whereas Krashen believes that it
only helps in “L2 production through monitoring” (Ellis, 2004, p. 228). Other
researchers see “explicit knowledge as a component of L2 proficiency: It is needed to
engage effectively in context-free language use” (Cummins, 1983, as cited in Ellis,
2004, p. 228). Nonetheless, context constitutes a very important factor in second
language teaching; learners should be able to use the target language in meaningful
frameworks and not merely acquiring the words’ definitions and the rules and
principles underlying in the language. Therefore, in order to make input
comprehensible for learners, the need for alternative teaching materials, rather than
grammar books, textbooks and dictionaries, is present. For this purpose, many
educational systems have started using films as a language teaching method.
Watching a film is far more interesting than observing a teacher explaining the
grammar and syntactic rules, definitions of words and general principles of the target
language. A very crucial part of language learning is the learners’ exposure as much
as possible to the target language and to comprehensible input, in order to be able to
produce comprehensible output. Thus, explicit instruction alone is not enough in order
to facilitate second language learning; there is the need for both explicit and implicit
input. Krashen (1981, 1982) has proposed that in order for a learner to acquire a
language he has to be able to understand what is being said as well as what he/she
hears. With his Input Hypothesis, he supports that language acquisition occurs when
the input is comprehended and contains structures that are one level beyond the
learner’s current stage of linguistic competence (i + 1) (Krashen, 1985). According to
this hypothesis, it can be argued that learners do not need the provision of detailed
linguistic information since they are able to extract the rules of the language from the
comprehensible input combined with their general knowledge about the world.
Therefore, “acquirers will receive comprehensible input containing structures just
beyond them if they are in situations involving genuine communication, and these
structures will be constantly provided and automatically reviewed” (Krashen, 1981, p.
71). However, other approaches (Schmidt, 1990; Schmidt & Frota, 1986) claim that
there is the need for conscious attention to the input in order for acquisition to take
place. Thus, comprehensible input is necessary but not the only factor contributing to
second language learning. Krashen (1983) stresses the importance of turning input
into intake as follows:
“First, learners understand a message using the not yet acquired i + 1 L2
structure and somehow connect the form with its meaning. Second, learners
must notice a difference between their current interlanguage (IL) competence
and the L2 form. If the form then shows up again with enough frequency, it
may be acquired” (Krashen as cited in Loschky, 1994, p. 304).
Consequently, input can turn into intake only through noticing; for that reason, a
combination of explicit instruction and implicit comprehensible input seems suitable
for promoting second language learning.

Another important factor concerning language teaching is authenticity.
Although this term is quite complex, Morrow (1977) tried to define it as follows: “An
authentic text is a stretch of real language, produced by a real speaker or writer for a
real audience and designed to convey a real message of some sort” (p. 13). Authentic
discourse, according to Gilmore (2007), differs in a great extent from the language
presented in the course books. Since learners can only notice what is available to them
in the input, authentic language promotes L2 development due to the fact that it offers
a wide range of elements (interaction patterns, discourse markers, communication
strategies, etc.) and that “this noticing had beneficial effects on learners’ development
of communicative competence” (Gilmore, 2007, p. 60). What is more, authentic
material is considered by many researchers to be a strong incentive for enhancing
students’ motivation (Cross, 1984; Hill, 1984; Wipf, 1984; Swaffar, 1985; Freeman &
Holden, 1986; Keinbaum, Russell & Welty, 1986; McGarry, 1995; Peacock, 1997).
Authentic language materials are more appealing than the overly planned ones due to
their aim to “communicate a message rather than highlight target language” (Swaffar,
1985; Freeman & Holden, 1986; Little & Singleton, 1991, as cited in Gilmore, 2007,
p. 46). Furthermore, the use of authentic materials allows the educator to adjust them
to the learners’ needs and individual differences, while textbooks are designed for a
large group of learners. Moreover, the fact that some learners discern the various
authentic materials as being real, affects positively their motivational levels (Hill,
1984; Peacock, 1997). The use of film in the classroom constitutes a powerful
example of authentic language material, since in conveys a real message and offers
the learners the opportunity for active engagement in the process of language
learning. Furthermore, videos “are closer to real life because visual clues and context
make it possible to view the message as much as listen to it” (Baltova, 1994 as cited
in Danan, 2004, p. 68).
2.2 Audiovisual information processing
Audiovisual material as a teaching tool for language learning has become
quite central in education. According to Tschirner (2001), “Digital video makes it
possible to `read' communicative situations, to move back and forth just as in written
texts, to repeat, to pay close attention to language and other features of the
communicative situation, and to stop and reflect on the components that contribute to
a deeper understanding of linguistic and semiotic data and to the language learning
process” (p. 307). Over the past years, teachers have become more flexible, started
using several alternative teaching tools in the classroom. Audio-visual material has
gained ground in education, due to the fact that “its rich context is a powerful
instructional tool known to have a motivational, attentional, and affective impact on
viewers, which in turn facilitates auditory processing” (Baltova, 1994 as cited in
Sokoli, 2006, p. 1). Furthermore, Herron, Morris, Secules, and Curtis (1995)
supported that students’ exposure to audiovisual material has a positive effect to their
fluency when communicating with native speakers of the second language, since films
and videos entail authentic oral language input. There are several consequences that
make the use of video in the classroom a powerful tool, such as vocabulary
acquisition, listening and information processing as well as “narrative visualization,
recognition and identification by the student” (Sokoli, 2006, p. 3). More specifically,
subtitled audiovisual material can enhance vocabulary learning and content
understanding even for beginners (Baltova, 1999) and, according to Borrás and
Lafayette (1994), subtitles can link together reading and listening skills.
There are different types of film fragments used by the teachers; subtitled as
well as videos with dubbing (the initial audio is replaced by a new, translated one) and
in both circumstances the original text is sometimes shortened. In any case,
multimodal material requires the learners’ cognitive abilities to be fully active in order
to be able to process the presented information. At this point, it would be useful to
clarify that these two conditions are not equally multimodal, due to the fact that
subtitling includes audio, video and text while, dubbing does not include any written
material. According to Baltova (1999), subtitled audiovisual material “provides
simultaneous exposure to spoken language, printed text and visual information all
conveying the same message” (p. 33), while in dubbed videos learners have to pay
attention only to the audio as well as the visual input. With regard to the subtitling
types, 3 main types should be mentioned: standard or interlingual (providing subtitles
in the native language, while keeping the original audio track), intralingual (providing
subtitles in the audio language), and reversed (dubbing with subtitles in the target
language). However, it has been noticed that audiovisual material can have a negative
effect on input processing, since it can cause a certain amount of information loss.
One disadvantage of subtitling, for example, is the presentation time limit. The
longest possible subtitle can contain 64 characters, spread in no more than two lines
and is shown on the screen for about 6 seconds (Gielen and d’Ydewalle, 1989;
Minchinton, 1987). Consequently, when a subtitle contains more characters the
presentation time will decrease; the viewer, therefore, has very limited time to read
and process the information on the screen. Moreover, in the subtitling process,
sometimes part of the original transcript has to be condensed in order to fit the video.
In these cases, information loss will occur for the viewer inevitably. An additional
downside of video subtitling is that subtitles attract the viewer’s attention, distracting
him/ her from the visual content, even when they are not essential to the
comprehension (Koolstra, Peeters & Spinhof, 2002). Wickens (1984) makes two main
observations about attention. He defines attention as “the searchlight that chooses
information sources to process” (p. 15). Therefore, assigning to the learners a
complex activity that combines both visual and auditory input may provoke what is
called a ‘split-attention effect’, which is “the impairment in learning that arises from
the need to mentally integrate disparate sources of information” (Moreno and Mayer,
1999, as cited in Guichon and Mclornan, 2008, p. 4). Furthermore, Wickens compares
attention to a “resource of limited availability” (p. 15), meaning that in listening
comprehension, some procedures (e.g. word recognition) demand a great amount of
attention by causing a “deterioration in the performance of other processes (e.g. note-
taking) that receive less attention” (Guichon and Mclornan, 2008, p. 4). Opposed to
these views, however, is Navon’s and Gropher’s (1979) opinion, who support that a
learner can process the multimodal input better when several of his/her senses are
being used simultaneously. Compatible to this view is d’Ydewalle’s (2002) argument:
“Partly due to the recent theoretical advances, almost everyone will no longer
question the flexibility of the human mind in performing multiple tasks” (p. 156).
Due to the fact that the issue of information processing of audio-visual
material is rather complex, many studies set out to investigate the effects of audio-
visual material on input comprehension. A pilot study, conducted by Guichon and
Mclornan (2008), examined the effects of multimodality upon second language
comprehension. Four groups of French undergraduate students took part in the
experiment and they were tested in their understanding of an authentic BBC audio-
visual recording. The first group was exposed only to audio, the second to audio-
visual, the third to audio-visual with standard subtitling and the fourth one was
exposed to the video with intralingual subtitling. Consequently, the viewers were
asked to write a summary of the content of the video, allowed to use their notes as
well. Their results showed that understanding of the content is improved when the
viewers are exposed to a text in various modalities. Markham (1999) also found in his
experiment that subtitling indeed assists listening comprehension. He tested three
groups of different levels of proficiency (beginner, intermediate, advanced) after they
had watched two educational television programs, 2 and a half and 4 and half minutes
long respectively. The participants had to take a multiple-choice comprehension test
after watching the videos. He discovered that each of the three groups performed
beyond their proficiency level when subtitles where provided. Another research
carried out by Lavaur and Bairstow (2011) aimed to investigate the role of subtitling
in film comprehension. Three groups of French native speakers took part in the
experiment: beginners, intermediate and advanced in the English language. Each
group was presented with one of the three different versions of a short English film:
no subtitles, English subtitles and French subtitles. A translation task as well as a
questionnaire, including the most important visual and discourse information, was
given to the participants, after watching the film, regarding their understanding of the
film content in terms of both visual and discourse clues. The results showed that
subtitles indeed affect input processing. The beginners processed the visual clues
better when the video was without subtitles, whereas their dialogue understanding was
enhanced in the video with intralingual subtitling. As far as the advanced group is
concerned, they scored higher for both types of clues (visual and discourse) in the
video without subtitles, and their discourse comprehension scores were always higher
than the visual information processing. The intermediate level participants similarly
scored higher in the dialogue elements processing, without being affected by the
subtitling condition though. The researchers concluded to the fact that different
subtitling conditions have different effects on information processing depending on
the viewers’ fluency levels in each case. Another study conducted by Kruger, Hefer,
and Matthew (2013) regarding the learners’ understanding of the video content,
discovered that subtitles do not distract the learners; instead they reduce the viewers’
levels of frustration when they watch a video in a second language. In their study,
participants had to watch a recorded academic lecture with or without subtitles. The
researchers measured the viewers’ cognitive load (the total amount of mental effort
being used in the working memory) by means of “eye tracking (pupil dilation,
electroencephalography (EEG), self-reported ratings of mental effort, frustration,
comprehension effort and engagement, as well as performance measures
(comprehension test)” (p. 1). The eye tracker and the EEG provided information about
the participants’ levels of stress while watching the film. Their results showed that the
viewers’ level of frustration was higher when they were watching the video without
subtitles suggesting that subtitling does not cause mental overwhelm, but may even
reduce mental overwhelm. Moreover, several studies have proved that the human
brain is capable of automatically reading written input while viewing scenes
(d’Ydewalle et al., 1991; Cerf, Frady, & Koch, 2009).
Evidence in favour and opposed regarding the effect of subtitles on input
processing are quite strong. However, not many things have been said about the
effects of different types of subtitling in the comprehension of language input. This
study, therefore will examine if there is any difference in the viewers’ understanding
of audio-visual content when two particular subtitling conditions are used (standard
and intralingual).
2.3 Effects of several subtitling conditions

Due to the fact that, over the past few years, the use of audiovisual subtitled
material has been established as a teaching tool in foreign language envoronment, it is
important to investigate how different types of subtitles facilitate language learning as
well as, if there is any significant difference in the effect of these particular types of
subtitles on language acquisition.
The most popular subtitling type is the interlingual or else standard subtitling.
In this condition, the audio sound of the video does not change, while at the bottom of
the screen a translated text of maximum two lines is provided, in the viewers’ native
language. Interlingual subtitling, according to Dries (1995), refers to both a change in
form and language, going “from one language into another language, and from spoken
dialogue into a written, condensed translation which appears on the screen” (p. 26).
This type of subtitling is the most easily accessible to people who are able to read in
their own language render them capable of watching a film in any possible spoken
language.
Another well-known subtitling type is the intralingual subtitling. When this
type is used, instead of a translation, a transcript, sometimes condensed, of the
original video sound track is provided at the bottom of the screen. According to
Baker (1998), intralingual subtitling involves “taking speech down in writing,
changing mode but not language” (p. 247). This subtitling condition is often used for
deaf people or for language learning purposes. Therefore, when the viewers’
knowledge of the spoken language in the video is not good enough, they might have
difficulties in understanding the content, even with the presence of intralingual
subtitles. Due to this fact, beginners usually need a link between the first and the
second language. As learners’ proficiency is improving though, “the L1-L2 link
gradually fades away and knowledge of the target language is increasingly often used
to interpret what is being expressed” (Lambert and Holobow, 1984 as cited in Bos,
2014, p. 13). Intralingual subtitles are possible to lead to the learners’ spelling and
pronunciation improvement, since they offer input in a foreign language, regarding
both visual and auditory aspects.
The less known subtitling condition, which will be briefly mentioned, since it
does not constitute part of the current study, is reversed subtitling. In this case, the
foreign language soundtrack is replaced by a new soundtrack in the viewers’ native
language (dubbing) and the subtitles provided are in the foreign language. The
learners, therefore, are exposed only to the written input of the target language and not
to the auditory.
2.3.1 Effects of subtitles on vocabulary acquisition
Many studies, both former and recent, have been conducted in order to
examine the effects of films with or without subtitles, as well as the differences
between several subtitling conditions. Yuksel and Tanriverdi (2002) investigated the
effects of intralingual captioned movie clips on incidental vocabulary acquisition. 120
Turkish college students, learning English as a second language, participated in their
study. They were assigned to two groups: one group watched the 10 minute fragment
of an American TV series with English subtitles and the other watched the same
fragment without subtitles. The results, based on the participants’ scores in the
vocabulary test followed the video, showed that the intralingual captioned group
performed better than the other group, although the difference was not great.
Accordingly, Neuman and Roskinen (1992) examined the effects of intralingual
captioned television on the viewers’ vocabulary building. The participants of this
study were 129 bilingual seventh and eighth graders and this sample consisted of 72%
Cambodian, 10% Laotian, 16% Hispanic students, as well as 2% Vietnamese

students. The students had to take 2 tests, prior to the experiment, one general
vocabulary test and one knowledge test regarding the material of each unit of the
experiment. All of them were divided into one of the following groups: 1.
captioned/intralingual television, 2. traditional television without captioning, 3.
reading along and listening to text and 4. textbook only. The subjects, during a period
of nine weeks, had either to watch or read 3 units of science-oriented series, twice a
week. After every week, a word-recognition post-test was assigned to the learners,
measuring their knowledge of the target words every time. Moreover, they also had to
recall the input information by writing a summary of what they had watched or read.
The results showed that the participants’ lexical acquisition was benefited through the
provision of intralingual subtitles, since the learners in this group outperformed the
other groups in the vocabulary tests. Similar but not completely compatible were the
results found in an experiment conducted by Kootstra, Johannes & Beentjes (1999),
who tested the vocabulary acquisition of 246 Dutch native speakers (4th and 6th
graders) with no or one-year previous English instruction. The children were chosen
based on an English vocabulary pre-test, in order to reduce the chances for error
variance, and they were randomly assigned to 3 groups: 1. standard subtitling group,
2. no subtitling group and 3. control group. The first group had to watch an English
television program with Dutch subtitles, the second group had to watch the same
program without subtitles and the third group had to watch a Dutch television
program. Furthermore, two vocabulary tests were assigned to the treatment groups; an
English target vocabulary test and a word recognition test. The control group received
no treatment. Based on the results, the researchers concluded that children who were
provided with subtitles performed significantly better in the vocabulary test than those
who were treated with no captions at all.

Other studies have compared standard, intra- and/or reversed subtitling
conditions. Fazilatfar, Ghorbani, and Samavarchi (2011) for example, investigated the
effects of three subtitling conditions (standard, reversed, no subtitles) on incidental
vocabulary learning, of Iranian learners of English as a second language as well. In
the first part of the experiment, a modified version of Nation’s (1999) Vocabulary
Levels Test as well as a listening test (Richards, 2003) were assigned to the
participants, in order to define their vocabulary level and their listening ability
respectively. Furthermore, they had to take a vocabulary pretest to show their prior
knowledge of the video target words. 45 participants were chosen overall, depending
on their scores on the previously mentioned tests, and they were divided in three
groups. Each group had to watch the same movie twice with one of the subtitling
conditions though: group A – no subtitles, group B – standard subtitling, and group C
– reversed subtitling. After watching the film, each participant had to take three types
of vocabulary test: “1) a word-form recognition test; 2) a multiple-choice (prompted
recognition) test; and, 3) a meaning by translation (unprompted recognition) test” (p.
51). The results suggested that the participants in the group with the reversed subtitles
outperformed both the other two groups in terms of incidental vocabulary learning.
Also d’Ydewalle and van de Poel (1999) examined the effects of standard and
reversed subtitles on language acquisition of 327 Dutch-speaking children (8-12 years
old). The researchers, based on previous studies which proved that subtitles enhance
language learning of adult learners, were expecting the acquisition to be larger with
children. Two foreign languages were chosen for the experiment and the participants
were divided into 5 groups, according to the different subtitling condition: 1. Dutch
subtitles and French sound track, 2. French subtitles and Dutch sound track, 3. Dutch
subtitles and Danish sound track, 4. Danish subtitles and Dutch sound track and 5.
both Dutch subtitles and sound track (control group). After watching the movie, the
viewers had to take 3 tests: a vocabulary, a syntax and a morphology test. The results
revealed that although language acquisition occurs due to subtitling, “the learning of
children was not superior to that of adults investigated in prior studies” (p. 227). They
also discover that there is a learning effect only when Danish subtitling is used and
that in the reversed condition the effect occurs only in the written form, since there is
no foreign language input in the audio track. In her study, Bos (2014) examined the
potential efficacy of three different subtitling conditions: standard, intralingual and
reversed as well as non-subtitled condition. The participants were Dutch advanced L2
speakers of English who watched a film fragment in either one of the three subtitling
conditions. All of the subjects had to take the same vocabulary test, in which they had
to find the correct definitions of the target words, before and after watching the video.
The results showed that although there was a learning outcome, there was no
significant difference among the three different types of subtitling. The absence of a
difference could however be due to the lack of a sufficient number of participants.
Moreover, Guillory (1998) in his experiment concerning key-word intralingual
captioning, found that captions have no meaningful effect on the participants’
performance. 202 English learners of French as a foreign language took part in this
study. They were all randomly divided into 3 groups: no captions, full text captions,
and keyword captions groups. Each group, therefore, had to watch a video in French
with one of the prior mentioned captioning conditions. Shortly after they have
watched the video, a short-answer comprehension test was administered to the
subjects. The researchers, based on the results, discovered that if the comprehensible
input is too advanced “captions cannot sufficiently compensate for the fast rate of
speech and the difficult vocabulary level” (Guillory, 1998 as cited in Danan, 2004, p.
71).
2.3.2 Effects of subtitles on meaning comprehension
Zarei (2011) in his study, aimed to examine the effects of verbatim and
nonverbatim interlingual and intralingual subtitles second language vocabulary
comprehension and production. Verbatim subtitling refers to all the spoken elements
presented on the screen, including “pause fillers, hesitations”, etcetera, while
nonverbatim subtitling refers to “summarized subtitles conveying only necessary
information to get the film” (Zarei, 2011, p. 618). The participants of this study were
120 Iranian learners of English as a second language, who were chosen based on their
scores on a multiple-choice TOEFL proficiency test. The participants had to take a
vocabulary pretest, giving the Persian synonyms to 100 words from the experiment’s
movie, in order to determine their prior vocabulary knowledge. Consequently, they
were divided into 4 comparable groups (n=30) and each group watched the same film
with a different subtitling condition: 1. verbatim interlingual, 2. nonverbatim
interlingual, 3. verbatim intralingual and 4. nonverbatim intralingual subtitles. After
watching the film, all of the viewers had to give their own summary of the video as
well as to take the vocabulary comprehension and production posttests. The results
showed that nonverbatim subtitles, regardless of whether they were interlingual or
intralingual, enhanced vocabulary production more than verbatim, while “intralingual
subtitles were more conductive to vocabulary production irrespective of whether they
were verbatim or nonverbatim” (p. 618). A study conducted by Perez, Peters &
Desmet (2013), investigated the relation between three subtitling conditions: 1. full
subtitling, 2. keyword subtitling, and 3. full subtitling with highlighted keywords (a
control group was also added). The aim was to examine if these three different
conditions have a different effect on vocabulary acquisition as well as on the
understanding of video content. The results showed that the scores of the three
treatment groups were equal in terms of form recognition,which test indicated the
learners’ ability to recognize the target words, a selection of keywords that were not
target words and some distracters and clip association, which defined their ability to
recognize the target words and all of them performed significantly better than the
control group. Regarding the meaning recognition test, which examined the learners’
ability to recognize the translation of 17 target words, only two of the three groups
(full and keyword captioning groups) outperformed the control group. The results also
revealed that subtitling had no effect neither on comprehension nor on meaning recall,
which is the learners’ ability to actually provide the translation of the target words in
their native language. In another study, Hayati and Mohmedi (2011) examined the
effects of video fragments with and without subtitles on listening comprehension. 90
Persian native speakers, intermediate learners of English were chosen for their
experiment, based on their scores in a proficiency test. The learners were assigned
randomly in three groups: English subtitles (ES), Persian subtitles (PS) and no
subtitles (NS). The experiment lasted for 6 weeks and each participant had to watch 6
parts of two episodes of a 231 minutes long film, one per week. The same video was
used for all participants, but each group was subjected to different conditions (ES, PS,
NS). After watching each film fragment, every time, the participants had to take a
multiple-choice test, evaluating their listening comprehension. At the end of the
experiments, the viewers were asked to write down their opinion about the effect of
the subtitles. The results of their comprehension scores showed that subtitles can
actually enhance listening comprehension. The ES group outperformed the other two
groups, and the PS group scored higher than the NS group. Consequently, intralingual
subtitling is more effective than interlingual, in this particular study.
With regard to the fact that there are so many different views and many
contradictory results concerning the complex issue of the role of subtitling in second
language acquisition, as well as the fact that some of the methods in the studies that
have been conducted are questionable, additional research is required. For example, in
the first part of this subchapter, several studies are discussed regarding the role of
different subtitling conditions in vocabulary acquisition. Some of them found
significant results, favoring the role of intralingual subtitling (Neuman and Koskinen,
1992) while others supported that reversed subtitles were the most efficient
(Fazilatfar, Ghorbani, and Samavarchi, 2012). There were studies, however, which
found no significant results between the conditions (Bos, 2014). In the second part of
the subchapter, studies regarding the role of subtitles in meaning comprehension are
discussed. Some of them proved that intralingual subtitles benefit meaning
understanding (Hayati and Mohmedi, 2011; Zarei, 2011) while others failed in
providing any significant difference (Perez, Peters & Desmet, 2014).
2.4 Statement of purpose
Most of the studies that have been mentioned above are concerned with the
role of audiovisual material in language learning. Some of them had examined the
impact of subtitled videos on information processing while others the effect of
subtitles on vocabulary acquisition. A limited number of studies, however, has
investigated the efficacy of different subtitling conditions on second language
acquisition and comprehension. This study, therefore, will attempt to investigate three
aspects of using subtitled audiovisual material for educational purposes. The research
questions posed in this study are the following:

1. Does audio-visual material positively affect vocabulary acquisition?
2. Is there any different effect between standard and intralingual subtitling in the
acquisition of new lexical items?
meaning comprehension?
The first concern is to examine if there is any positive effect of subtitles on the
viewers’ vocabulary learning. Some of the aforementioned studies have concluded to
the fact that there is no significant effect of subtitles on language acquisition. On that
account, this experiment measured the participants’ knowledge of the target words
before and after they watched the film fragment. The hypothesis that will be tested,
based on the literature, is that subtitling, regardless the condition, enhances
vocabulary learning.
The second question aims to analyze which of the two subtitling conditions
used in the experiment is more efficient for vocabulary learning. The hypothesis in
this case will be that the participants in the group of the intralingual subtitles will
perform better in terms of acquiring new lexical items. This assumption is derived
from previous studies on the same issue that have found that participants receiving
intralingual subtitling treatment performed better than the other groups (i.e. Zarei,
2011).
As far as the third research question is concerned, it will examine the possible
different effects of the two subtitling conditions on the viewers’ input comprehension.
It is expected that learners will understand the meaning of the video better when the
subtitles provided are in the second language (intralingual subtitles). Previous studies
had reported similar results to this assumption (i.e Lavaur and Bairstow, 2011).
3. Method
In order to examine the efficacy of subtitling on second language acquisition
and processing and particulary each of the aforementioned research questions a short-
scale experiment was set up, in which the participants had to watch a video fragment
entailing either one of two subtitling conditions mentioned in section 2.4 (intralingual
and interlingual subtitling). It is expected, from the studiy’s experimental set up, that
one of the two subtitling conditions (intralingual subtitles) will have a greater effect
on the learners’ vocabulary learning as well as on the input comprehension and it can,
therefore, be assumed that the degree to which the participants’ vocabulary
knowledge and understanding (dependent variables) was enhanced depended upon the
subtitling condition they were exposed to (independent variable).
In the following segments, the study’s method will be presented. In the
beginning, in section 3.1, a detailed description of the participants will be given,
followed by an overview of the materials used in section 3.2, which constitute part of
the next segment (3.3), the procedures of the study. In section 3.4, the way in which
the data were analyzed will be discussed, while in chapters 4 and 5 the results of the
experiment will be presented and discussed respectively.
3.1 Participants
A small sample of participants was used for the purposes of the pilot study.
The subjects were 4 students of different departments of the University of Groningen,
who volunteered to participate. There were no specific requirements regarding the
participants’ background, since the aim was to reassure that the experiment was
properly designed. On that account, there will be no analysis of this pilot data and the
results.
For the actual experiment, a total of 30 students with various educational
backgrounds, from different age groups and different sexes participated. In order to
avoid high diversity in the cognitive abilites of the subjects between the groups, only
high school and university students were invited to participate in the study. Below, an
overview of the participants’ study subject is presented in a pie chart. By ‘other’, high
school students are implied.
4
7 History
Linguistics
Phsychology
6 Physics
2 Chemistry
Education
Medicine
4 Other
3
2 2
Figure 1. Participants' Study Field.
The invitation of the participants occurred in two ways. Most of them, around
20 people, were personal acquaintances, family members or ex-colleagues of the
researcher. The other 10 subjects were invited either through the Facebook platform,
or heard about the experiment from other people who took part in it or knew about it.
As was expected, most of them had or were studying different educational subjects at
the time of testing. Unfortunally, some of them were more familiar with the
experiment’s video content than others. All of them, though, participated knowing
that there were no attractive incentives or any other reward, although the experiment
was about 1.5 hours long. Therefore, they took part in the study out of interest for the
actual research or due to their motives to offer their help and not for money.
The main requirements regarding all of the participants were: 1. to have Greek
as their native language, 2. to be advanced speakers of English as their second
language without, though, being balanced bilinguals, 3. not to have lived more than
one year in an English speaking environment. Other than these demands, the diversity
of the participants was quite wide concerning various aspects. For example, the
foreign languages spoken between the subjects were several: German, French,
Spanish, and Russian. Some of them were speaking more than one or two foreign
languages. In all cases, however, English was their second language and everyone
was quite proficient in it. Furthermore, from the total of 30 participants, only 10 of
them have spent time abroad, for less than one consecutive year.
The other feature that renders the group diverse is the age difference between
the participants. The age ranges from 18 to 27, with a mean of 22.2. In figure 2 below,
an overview of the participants’ ages is presented. Moreover, the sex is not the same
for every subject. Out of the total of 30 people, 20 participants were females and the
rest 10 were males. The fact that the groups were diverse can be considered a positive
element, since the sample is more representative of the real world, meaning that the
results of the study can be applied to the real population. On the other hand, it can
also be considered a limitation, due to the fact that it can negatevily affect the results,
as it will be discussed in the discussion section later on.

age 27 3
age 25 13
age 22 2 Number of participants
age 19 2
age 18 10
0 5 10 15
Figure 2. Age range among the participants.
All of the participants were randomly distributed among the two different
subtitling conditions, but the number of the participants in each group was the same:
15 participants in the intralingual subtitling group and the remaining 15 subjects in the
interlingual subtitling group.
3.2 Materials
3.2.1 L2 proficiency data and background information
In order to measure the participants’ general word knowledge, the Word
Associates Test (Read, 1998) was used. This particular test format is designed to go
beyond conventional vocabulary tests which simply allow the provision of an
affirmative or negative answer (yes/no). The objective of this test, therefore, is to
examine to what extent the learners know the target words; in other words, the quality
of their vocabulary knowledge. The Word Associates Test, like many other
productive vocabulary tests, is mainly based on the concept of word association.
According to Read (1993), second language learners, unlike native speakers who have
“remarkably stable patterns of word association”, get better in their responses
regarding word associations as their proficiency levels increase and their pattern of
responses “ develops towards native speakers norms” (p. 358). Read (1998) created
this test according to word associates format. The approach in this case is to provide
the learners with a stimulus word along with other lexical items, some of them related
to the target word and some of them not (see Appendix A). The aim of the activity is
to recognize the words which are associated with the stimulus word. According to
Read (1993), “it is assumed that learners with a deeper knowledge of the word will be
better able to pick the associates (which should represent different aspects of the
meaning of the word) than those whose knowledge is more superficial” (p. 359).
Word Associates Test is easily accessible online and the instructions, which are in
English, are provided online as well, before the learner takes the test.
In consideration of the participants’ background, a short survey was set up, in
order to gather data about various aspects of the subjects’ linguistic environment (see
Appendix B). The language used to formulate the questions was in English, since the
productive vocabulary test was also in English as the Greek language was not
available in the chosen survey platform (www.surveymonkey.com). For the rest of the
experiment, though, the Greek language was used. The background questionnaire
provides a deeper insight into basic information regarding the participants’ age,
linguistic knowledge as well as L2 proficiency. The interesting part of it is that
answers given are based on the subjects’ own opinions about how well they know a
language and experiences. Moreover, the questions related to the participants’
knowledge of foreign languages are important, since they give an indication about
their motivation concerning language learning. In the Greek educational system,
students are required to attend English courses as well as to choose between German
and French as foreign languages. Therefore, the fact that some participants know
more languages than these shows their willingness in foreign language learning.
3.2.2 Film fragment
The actual experimental consists of 4 parts. One pre-test, a film fragment, and
two post-tests. The selection of the audiovisual material will be discussed in this sub-
chapter.
The selection of the film was a quite complex process, since it had to meet
specific requirements. First of all, the content of the film should be appealing both to
male and female viewers, due to the fact that the sample of the participants was of
mixed gender. Furthermore, there was the need of a film in which a respective amount
of words are not known by most of the participants. Moreover, watching the film
should be a pleasant experience for the viewers, as the film length had to be about 10
minutes. Although, due to the fact that it was difficult to find audiovisual material in
which the target words are repeated more than once, it was decided to show the same
9 minutes video fragment to both groups twice, to achieve the effect of repetition. On
that account, the film “Our chemical lives” was used for the experiment. This is a new
documentary film, in which the safety of various chemical substances is investigated
as well as their effects on the human system. The reason why a scientific documentary
film was chosen is due to the fact that the vocabulary used is advanced enough in
order to fit and even exceed the proficiency level of the participants. Moreover, the
content of the documentary is interesting, addressing both males and females. The
spoken language of the film is English, which was the most important requirement.
After the film was downloaded (www.abc.net.au) and a 9 minutes fragment
was picked out, the need for creating the two different types of subtitles emerged,
since there were no embedded subtitles in the original film. For that purpose, the
Subtitle Workshop program was used, which is very simple to handle (Softonic,
2006). Both the interlingual and intralingual subtitles were created by the researcher,
who is a native speaker of Greek and highly proficient in English and embedded to
the film according to the commonly accepted rules mentioned in Bos (2014), which
were adapted from d’Ydewalle, van Rensbergen, and Pollet (1987):
“A subtitle cannot contain more than two lines;

 There cannot be less than three characters in a subtitle;
 A line of subtitles can hold no more than 36 characters (spaces included);
 Each subtitle must be displayed for at least 1.5 seconds;
 Between two subtitles, a blank of at least .25 seconds should be displayed;
 One-line subtitles cannot be displayed for more than 3.5 seconds;
 Two-line subtitles cannot be displayed for more than six seconds” (p. 22).
After the integration of the subtitles into the two film fragments, two separate links to
the fragments were created online.
3.2.3 Vocabulary test
In order to investigate which subtitling condition is more effective for
vocabulary acquisition, there was the need to examine whether the participants have
learned a word after seeing and hearing it repeatedly. Due to this fact, a vocabulary
test was created to define the viewers’ knowledge of the target words (the less
frequent in the English language) both before and after watching the video. The
reason why the same test was taken from the participants prior to the presentation of
the video is because it is not possible to understand if there is any learning effect
judging only by the test results after watching the video. The participants, therefore,
had to be tested in their knowledge on the same words both before and after watching
the video, to make it possible for the researcher to compare their performance prior
and after the film fragment. The only drawback of this design is that, after completing
the prior to the video vocabulary test, the participants will anticipate listening to the
particular vocabulary items in the video, since they have faced them during the test.
Thus, in order to eliminate the danger of priming them for what was about to follow,
the vocabulary test was consisted of 15 target words, included in the video fragment
and another 10 randomly chosen words, which were used as fillers. All of the 25
words belong to different lexical categories (nouns, verbs as well as adjectives) and
some of them are quite common, while others are related to the science field, thus
they are less common. Definitions of each of the words were added and mixed to the
test, with the help of an English dictionary (see Appendix C). The aim was to match
each word with the correct definition. Both word and definition lists were given in
random order. The overview of the word list is given in table 1 below:
Table 1
Target words Fillers
Pesticide Vanity
Compound Conspiracy
Susceptibility Derive
Escape Obnoxious
Requirement Obsessed
Womb Cultivate
Gland Projection
Adequate Amplify
Receptor Inherently
Magnitude Prevail
Vulnerable
Concern
Perturb
Foetus
Establish
The vocabulary test was placed to the coursesites platform, in a link which was
created specifically for the experiment purposes.
3.2.4 Comprehension test
In order to examine the effects of the two different subtitling conditions on the
viewers’ understanding of the film content, a comprehension post-test was created and
administered to them after they had watched the film fragment. Nine multiple-choice
and one open-answer questions were given to the viewers, regarding the content of the
short documentary fragment. The questions included information about almost every
aspect of the video and they were created according to two most common of the six
reading comprehension types, mentioned by Day and Park (2005) and modified to fit
video comprehension aspects. The first one is called ‘literal comprehension’ and it is
referred to the direct meaning of the text, “such as facts, vocabulary, dates, times, and
locations” (Day and Park, 2005, p. 62). These types of questions can be answered
explicitly and the purpose is to check the understanding of the “basic or surface
meaning of the text” (p. 62). The other comprehension type is called ‘inference
comprehension’ and it is referred to an understanding of the content which is
expanded beyond the literal meaning. The answers of these questions are based on
information from the text which is implicitly stated. According to Day and Park
(2005), “An inference involves students combining their literal understanding of the
text with their own knowledge and intuitions” (p. 63). The comprehension test was
placed in the coursesites platform along with the two vocabulary tests and it is
presented in Appendix D.
3.3 Procedures
The experiment took part in two separate stages. Before the actual experiment
though, a pilot study was conducted, in order to examine some technical details about
the experiment. There was the need to inspect how much time is needed for the whole
procedure and if there were any unexpected problems regarding the instructions, the
design of the tests as well as the video function. The procedures of the final
experiment are discussed in further details below.
Due to the fact that the participants were all living in Greece at the moment
when the present study was conducted, the experiment was designed exclusively
online. In the first stage, the participants were individually contacted through SKYPE,
after a good connection quality was assured. They were asked to be alone without any
external distractions, in a quiet room and fully focused. Consequently, a link was sent
to them entailing the productive vocabulary pretest. The instructions of the test were
explained verbally in Greek and any aroused questions were answered thoroughly.
Instructions were also available on the test’s website, in English this time. The
participants were explicitly asked to choose for each target word 4 related associates,
not more not less, even if they were not completely sure about their meaning. After
the provision of the instructions, the ‘share screen’ option of SKYPE was chosen by
the participants, in order to monitor every action on their computer screen. They were
also informed that there was no time limit; therefore they could take their time in
completing the test. Each participant spent approximately 15-20 minutes in doing it.
After they were done, they were asked to press the score button on the left top of the
website. The score appeared on their screen and afterwards was noted down from the
researcher on a paper. In the next step of the first stage the link of the survey with the
personal linguistic background questions was sent to them. After they were informed
of the content of the survey, they were asked to complete it, monitored again through
skype, without the ‘share screen’ option this time. In case any of them needed further
explanations regarding the questions, he or she was allowed to ask while completing
the survey. When they were done with this part, the SKYPE call was terminated and
the participants were informed about the date of the next call concerning the second
stage of the experiment. This stage was completed when all of the participants had
taken both the Word Associates Test as well as the survey.
The second stage of the study was longer and more demanding than the first
one. Each of the participants was contacted again through SKYPE, using the ‘share
screens’ option. They were asked for one more time to be alone, without any
distractions (e.g. mobile phone, TV, etcetera), in a quiet room and fully concentrated.
In the beginning, a general explanation of the experiment was given, to prepare them
for the nature of the study. First of all, each of the participants had to give their e-mail
address in order to be invited to the online platform in which the experiment was
placed (Coursesites). After the invitation, they were guided step by step in order for
the tests to be available to them. When they were ready and before they open the
vocabulary pre-test, instructions were given to them verbally in Greek. They were
specifically told that there was a time limit of 15 minutes for the test, which would be
shown on the top of their screen. Once the 15 minutes were passed, the test was
designed to be submitted automatically. Written instructions were also available in the
beginning of the test.
In the next step of this stage, the participants had to watch the video fragment
immediately after the pre-test. Half of them had to watch the fragment with the
interlingual subtitling condition and the other half with the intralingual. A link
containing either the one or the other condition was sent to them through SKYPE, and
they were asked to watch it twice in a row. The participants were again monitored
through the ‘share screen’ option, having muted their microphones though. When they
were done, they were again asked to go back to the Coursesites page, in order to take
the vocabulary post-test. Since it was exactly the same with the pre-test, no further
instructions were provided, apart from the original ones.
In the final part of the experiment, the participants had to take the
comprehension test. The design of it was similar to the vocabulary test, with a 15
minute time limit. The instructions were given to them verbally in Greek and they
were again monitored through SKYPE while they were taking the test. Once every
participant had taken all of the tests and after all of the data were collected, they were
informed one by one through a written message about their performance.
Although the total experiment lasted for a long time, approximately 1 hour and
30 minutes, and there was no cash prize, all of the participants showed up and no one
of them quit during the procedure. All of them found it an interesting experience,
since the subject of the study is related to a very popular hobby, the one of watching
foreign movies. Moreover, they were very interested in learning about their level of
proficiency in English.
3.4 Data analyses
The three research questions (does audiovisual material positively affects
vocabulary acquisition; is there a different effect of standard and intralingual
subtitling in the acquisition of new lexical items; is there a different effect of standard
and intralingual subtitling in meaning comprehension?) and their data analyses will be
discussed in this section in further details.
In the first part of the data analyses the aim was to examine if there was any
vocabulary learning effect from the use of audiovisual material, in both subtitling
conditions. For that reason, the data were analysed in order to examine if there were
any significant differences in the participants’ performance before and after watching
the video, regarding their vocabulary improvement. Therefore, two paired samples t-
tests were carried out in SPSS in order to compare the overall means of the samples
before and after watching the video. The hypothesis was that the subjects will perform
better in terms of vocabulary acquisition after having watched the film fragment.
After the paired samples t-tests were done, the improvement of each participant’s
performance in both groups was measured, by simply calculating the difference
between the scores of the pre-test and the post-test. Consequently, using the
improvement scores of both groups, the second research question will be analysed.
The aim in this case is to examine if any of the two groups performs better regarding
the acquisition of new lexical items, depending on the different subtitling conditions
(intralingual and interlingual). A Mann-Whitney U test was performed this time in
SPSS, in order to examine if there is any significant difference between the two
groups. The hypothesis tested here was that the participants of the intralingual
subtitling group will perform better. As far as the final research question is concerned,
another Mann-Whitney U test was carried out, in order to investigate if there was any
significant difference between the performances of the two groups regarding the
meaning comprehension. The hypothesis was similar to the previously mentioned one,
that the participants of the intralingual subtitling group will perform better in terms of
understanding the video content.
4. Results
4.1 Learning effect
In order to examine the general learning effect of the use of audiovisual
material, a paired-samples t-test was conducted in SPSS for both the interlingual and
intralingual conditions. The null hypothesis (H0) in each case is that subtitles do not
affect vocabulary learning and the level of significance that was set in each case is
a=0.05, since it is not a case of life or death and due to the fact that language related
studies usually set the level at 5%. Before the paired-samples t-test for the interlingual
subtitling condition group was conducted, a Shapiro-Wilk Test was carried out, to
check for the normal distribution of the data. When the value is bigger than .05 it can
be assumed that the data is normally distributed. For the pre-test, the Shapiro-Wilk
test of normality (S-W = 0.94, df = 15, p = 0.40) suggests that normality is a
reasonable assumption. For the post-test, the Shapiro-Wilk test of normality (S-W =
0.91, df = 15, p = 0.17) suggests again that normality is a reasonable assumption.
Consequently, in both cases the data was normally distributed, as it is demonstrated in
the boxplot below (Figure 3). Accordingly, a paired-samples t-test was carried out to
compare the participants’ performance before and after watching the video regarding
vocabulary learning. The results showed that there was a significant difference in the
scores for the pre-test (M=18.8, SD=2.27) and the post-test (M=22.8, SD=1.85); t (14)
=-12.9, p<0.01. These results suggest that the use of interlingual subtitles positively
affects vocabulary acquisition and therefore, the H0 can be rejected.

Figure 3. Distribution of the pre and post-tests scores for the interlingual subtitling condition.
Another paired-samples t-test was carried out for the intralingual subtitling
group, in order to compare the participants’ performance before and after watching
the video regarding vocabulary learning. Before that, though, a Shapiro-Wilk Test
was carried out, to check for the normal distribution of the data. In both the pre-test,
the Shapiro-Wilk Test of normality (S-W = 0.94, df = 15, p = 0.46) and in the post-
test (S-W = 0.93, df = 15, p = 0.30) suggest the data was normally distributed, as is
also demonstrated in the boxplot below (Figure 4). The results of the t-test showed
that there was a significant difference in the scores for the pre-test (M=18.0,
SD=2.32) and the post-test (M=21.9, SD=2.08); t (14) =-19.0, p=0.01. These results
suggest that the use of intralingual subtitles positively affects vocabulary acquisition
and therefore, the H0 can be rejected.

Figure 4. Distribution of the pre and post-tests scores for the intralingual subtitling condition.
4.2 Comparison of interlingual and intralingual conditions concerning vocabulary
learning
In order to investigate if there is any significant difference in the performance
of the two different subtitling condition groups regarding vocabulary acquisition, an
independent-samples t-test was conducted. The H0 in this case is that there is no
significant difference and the level of significance set is again 5% (a=0.05). In the
first step, homogeneity of variance had to be examined, to examine if the two groups
were equal in variance. Levene’s test for equality of variance showed that the groups
were equal, F (0.49) = 0.48, p = 0.85. Consequently, a Shapiro-Wilk Test was carried
out, to check for the normal distribution of the data. In the case of the interlingual
group the data was normally distributed (S-W = 0.90, df = 15, p = 0.10), whereas in
the case of the intralingual group the distribution deviates from normality (S-W =
0.81, df = 15, p = 0.006), as is also demonstrated in the boxplot below (Figure 5).
Therefore, a non-parametric test should be conducted, since there is no normality in

the data. A Mann-Whitney U test indicated that there was no significant difference
between the interlingual (Mdn=15) and the intralingual condition (Mdn=15), U=112,
p=0.98 and that the effect size is small, r=0.03<1%.
Figure 5. Distribution of the two groups regarding the performance on the vocabulary test.
4.3 Comparison between interlingual and intralingual conditions concerning meaning
comprehension
In order to examine if there is any significant difference in the performance of
the two different subtitling condition groups regarding how well they understand the
meaning of the video, another Mann-Whitney U test was conducted on the
comprehension scores. The H0 in this case is that there is no significant difference
between the two conditions and the level of significance set is again 5% (p<0.05).
The initial concern is to secure that there is homogeneity in the variance of the two
groups; thus, Levene’s test was carried out. The results showed that the groups were
equal, F (1.15) = 0.29, p = 0.01. Consequently, a Shapiro-Wilk test was conducted to
check for the distribution of the data in each group. The results showed that the
distribution of the data in both groups deviates from the norm (interlingual: S-W =
0.01, df = 15, p = 0.005; intralingual: S-W = 0.01, df = 15, p = 0.003), as is also
demonstrated to the boxplot below (Figure 6). The outcome of the Mann-Whitney U
test revealed that on average, the intralingual subtitling group performed better
(Mdn=15) than the interlingual subtitling group (Mdn=15), U= 35.0, p=0.001<0.05.
The difference was significant (p = 0.01 < 0.05). The effect size in this case is large, r
= 0.60 > 25%.
Figure 6. Distribution of the two groups.
5. Discussion
The aim of this study was to find if there is any effect due to the use of
subtitles regarding second language learning, and if so, if the two particular subtitling
conditions used affect differently the acquisition of new lexical items as well as the
comprehension of the video content. This chapter, therefore, offers an interpretation
of the previous chapter’s results and their implications, in the context of previously
done research on this field. In the end of this chapter, and after all of the research
questions have been adequately addressed, suggestion for further research will be
provided.
5.1 General learning effect
The analysis of the results should point out whether there was a significant
difference in the participants’ vocabulary test scores before and after watching the
subtitled video fragment, for both interlingual and intralingual conditions. It was
hypothesized, in chapter 2.4, that the use of subtitles, regardless the condition,
enhances second language vocabulary learning. Such an outcome was expected due to
several reasons. First of all, the positive effects of the use of audiovisual materials on
incidental vocabulary learning in general, are widely accepted in the linguistics field
(e.g. Bates, 1985). More specifically, many researchers have reported that the use of
subtitled or captioned video as a teaching method promotes vocabulary learning
(Baltova, 1999; d’Ydewalle and Poel, 1999; Fazilatfar, Ghorbani, and Samavarchi,
2011; Guichon & Mclornan, 2009; Hayati and Mohmedi, 2009; Koolstra and
Beentjes, 1999; Markham, 1999; Neuman and Koskinen, 1992; Yuksel and
Tanriverdi, 2002). Moreover, a positive learning effect was assumed, since the human
brain is designed to automatically read the subtitles on a screen. According to several
cognitive experimental studies, the reading of subtitles occurs uniformly, regardless
audio sound or the viewers’ proficiency level of the spoken language. Therefore, it
was quite safe to expect that the learning effect will take place unconsciously.
Results showed that there was a significant vocabulary learning effect indeed:
watching the documentary video fragment enhanced vocabulary knowledge. Although

there was not a control group as a reference point, due to the lack of sufficient number
of participants, the paired-samples t-test compared the performance of the participants
in the vocabulary test before and after watching the film in both subtitling conditions.
Both groups, therefore, knew more lexical items after the provision of the subtitled
film fragment, regardless the subtitling type. This positive result might have been
affected by the existance of subtitles but it might have also been the result of audio
track as well as the film’s content. These results are not surprising, since they are
compatible with other similar studies, which among other elements; they also
examined their subjects’ vocabulary knowledge before and after the provision of
videos. For example, Bos (2014) found that her participants performed significantly
better on the post-test than on pre-test, in all four video conditions. Accordingly, Zarei
(2011) tested his participants’ knowledge of the target words before and after
watching the video and found that, regardless the subtitling condition, they performed
better on the post-test. Generally, the results of this particular test are consistent with
other studies, which however compared several subtitling conditions to a no subtitling
control group and had concluded that subtitles improve language learning (Hayati and
Mohmedi, 2011; Kootstra, Johannes & Beentjes, 1999; Neuman and Koskinen, 1992;
Yuksel and Tanriverdi, 2002). A major concern, though, regarding the results, is that
both the pre as well as the post vocabulary tests were consisted of the same lexical
items, most of them having been extracted from the film fragment. There is always
the danger, therefore, to have predisposed the participants to the target words of the
video to be learned, although fillers were also added to the vocabulary tests. In any
case, the results were in line with the expectations, contributing to the general idea
among the linguistic research community, that audiovisual material enhances foreign
language acquisition, and more specifically, the learning of new lexical items.
5.2 Vocabulary learning effect between the two conditions
The second research question was about the comparison between the
intralingual and the interlingual subtitling condition regarding the vocabulary
acquisition. In this case, it was hypothesized that the participants in the intralingual
subtitling group will score higher in the post vocabulary test than the ones in the
interlingual subtitling group. Such an assumption was made due to the fact that all of
the participants had a high level of proficiency in English (advanced) according to
their IELTS certificates and to the Words Associates Test’s scores, and people with a
high level of proficiency do not usually use their native language to understand the
meaning of a foreign language (Weinrich, 1953). It is a common sense that the
intralingual condition does not create any connections to the participants’ native
language; thus, it was expected that they would benefit more under this particular
subtitling type in noticing and acquiring new lexical items. Furthermore, it was
believed that the interlingual condition could distract the participants from paying
attention to the second language’s lexical items, since it is essentially the translation
in their native language. Therefore, intralingual subtitling was expected to be more
beneficial since it did not require from the participants to switch between two
languages. Moreover, the research question’s assumption was additionally supported
from the findings of other studies on this matter, which found that viewers who
received intralingual subtitles performed better than others receiving different
subtitling treatment in terms of vocabulary learning (Baltova, 1999; Jones, 2004;
Koolstra and Beentjes, 1999; Zarei, 2011).
The results for this particular test showed that there was no significant
difference between the performances of the two groups regarding vocabulary
acquisition. Surprisingly, the interlingual group performed slightly better than the
intralingual, without however, their scores to be significantly higher compared to the
scores of the other group. One possible explanation for these results is that
intralingual subtitling requires the reader to implicitly find the meaning of the words,
whereas with L1 subtitling, the meaning is given directly. The standard subtitling
condition, therefore, might be more beneficial for beginners, since they are not very
experienced with the second language yet. Even though previous studies have pointed
out the effectiviness of the intralingual condition on high proficient learners, in this
study such an outcome was not apparent. For example, Zarei (2011) in his study,
highlighted the superiority of intralingual subtitles to the interlingual ones. One reason
for that, according to Zarei, is that “intralingual subtitles provide the opportunity for
language learners to have access to the written forms of new words”; this exposure,
therefore, leads to a better performance concerning language acquisition. The results
of this study, though, are not compatible with the aforementioned finding. However,
they resemble to a certain extend the conclusion made by a number of other studies
(e.g Aurstad, 2013; Bianchi & Ciabattoni, 2008). The former found that there were no
effects of the two subtitling conditions (interlingual and intralingual) on the word
definition knowledge and the performance on the lexical decision task. Similarly,
Bianchi and Ciabattoni (2008) discovered that there was no significant difference in
the performance of the advanced participants, comparing the two subtitling conditions
(interlingual and intralingual) in terms of vocabulary acquisition. Moreover, another
study carried out by Bisson, van Heuven, Conklin and Tunney (2012); found that
there was no difference between the same subtitling conditions in incidental
vocabulary acquisition, based on eye tracking data.
There can be several reasons explaining why none of the subtitling conditions
is more effective than the other in online classroom settings. One evident explanation
is that the participants’ sample is not completely representative of the population.
First of all, the sample’s size is quite small. Normally, meaningful results arise when
the number of the subjects is large enough, approximately 20 to 25 people per group.
In the current study, only 15 participants took part in the experiment in each group.
Moreover, the sample cannot be considered representative regarding the age groups
that it’s addressed to. The viewers’ age varied only between 18 and 27 years old; thus,
other age groups were not taken into account. It is very possible that young children,
for example, would have a different reaction towards the film fragment, since their
experience regarding exposure to intralingual subtitling is assumed to be limited and
they are often not skilled readers. Another disadvantage regarding the sample is that
there is not enough information about the English instructional background of the
participants. Although their level of proficiency was approximately the same, the
skills which they had developed in a greater extent during learning English were not
controlled. For this study specifically, exceptional developed listening and reading
skills are quite important regarding the viewers’ performance. Therefore, this
insignificant outcome might have resulted from the fact that the participants had not
practiced these two skills to a sufficient degree during their English language
instruction.
Another complication related to the null results is the choice of the video. The
problem in this case might have the fact that the target vocabulary items were not
repeated enough times, since the viewers saw and heard the words only twice.
Frequency of input has been discussed by L2 researchers for a long time. During the
recent years, the significance of the role of frequency has been mentioned by many
linguists. Ellis (1994), argued that:

“Overall there is very little evidence to support the claim that input frequency
affects L2 acquisition but there is very little evidence to refute it. Perhaps the
safest conclusion is that input frequency serves as one of the factors
influencing development, often in association with other factors such as L1
transfer and communicative need” (p. 273).
Therefore, it could be assumed that, due to the fact that the factor of frequency in the
target input is absent, no significant results could be found in the learners’
performance on the vocabulary test.
A final possible explanation for the lack of significant results is what the
participants had mentioned after the end of the experiment. Almost all of them stated
that they were anticipating the final word list of the post-test, due to the fact that they
had seen the same list in the pre-test shortly before they watched the video. They
pointed out that they tried to notice the target words included in the tests in the film
fragment. In the case of barely testing incidental language acquisition through
subtitles, this priming effect would have been an obstacle; the experiment could not
have been about random acquisition of new lexical items, since the participants were
already primed to pay specific attention to the target words of the video. However,
this particular study aimed to examine another aspect of language acquisition,
accordingly to previous similar studies (Bos, 2014; Rutherford, 1987; Smith, 1991):
how subtitled audiovisual material affects the learning of confronted lexical items by
learners who were already aware of this fact, leading them to notice, remember and
even learn new words. Apparently, the subtitling condition plays no crucial role when
learners are prompted to pay attention to new vocabulary items. The important detail
in this case is that, due to the participants’ high level of proficiency, it is very possible
that they had already encountered many of the target words in the past; thus, the
vocabulary of the film fragment proved to be not very new for most of the viewers.
5.3 Meaning comprehension effect between the two conditions
The last research question was set up to investigate the potential difference in
the performance between the interlingual and intralingual subtitling groups in terms of
the video’s meaning comprehension. The hypothesis for this particular aspect was that
people exposed to the intralingual subtitling condition will achieve higher scores in
the multiple-choice comprehension test than the ones exposed to the interlingual
subtitles. Such an assumption was reasonable, first of all, due to the aforementioned
case of the high proficiency level of the participants in the English language. People
with a good knowledge of English do not need to make connections in their native
language in order to understand the general meaning of the content. Therefore, it was
anticipated that the interlingual subtitling condition would prove to be less helpful for
this purpose. Practically, the viewer’s receiving the interlingual condition had to
mentally translate the English information to their native language (Greek) while
reading the subtitles. Hayati and Mohmedi (2011) in their study examining the same
conditions upon listening comprehension stated that due to the difficulty of the
translation process and because of the fact that it surpasses the viewers’ processing
ability, ”factors such as the presentation speed or the difficulty level of the text may
lower the effectiveness of L1 subtitling” (p. 189). Accordingly, Markham (1989)
mentioned, regarding the interlingual subtitles, that “the additional process of
translation may sometimes hinder understanding” (p. 40). All these factors as well as
results from several studies pointing out the effectiveness of the intralingual subtitling
condition on the successful meaning comprehension contributed to the assumption

that in the current study, subtitles in the second language will enhance content’s
information understanding (e.g. Lavaur and Bairstow, 2011).
As it was anticipated, the results regarding the two treatment groups’
performance in the comprehension test were significant, pointing out the superiority
of the intralingual condition over the interlingual. One obvious reason for that, along
with the aforementioned expected ones, is what the learners stated. Based on the data
collected by their opinions after having watched the video, most of them mentioned
that exposure to the target language’s subtitles helped them to mentally connect both
the written and the audio forms of the words with their meaning, more than the
participants exposed to the interlingual condition. This factor was also apparent in
Hayati and Mohmedi’s (2011) experiment on listening comprehension. Additionally,
the viewers of the film fragment with the Greek subtitles explained that they were
distracted a lot by the translation. As it was mentioned in chapter 2.3, interlingual
subtitling is practically “a condensed translation”, which usually undergoes changes
in form and meaning or even omissions of several parts of speech in order to make
sense in the native language (Dries, 1995). It is reasonable, therefore, to conclude that
the subjects belonging in the interlingual group experienced some loss of information
in their effort to understand the meaning spoken in the video while processing the
Greek translation. It was also mentioned that the interlingual subtitles distracted the
viewers and they were not able to pay attention to the soundtrack.
Although the results were the desirable ones, there might have been some
factors influencing this outcome regarding the participants’ sample. First of all, the
subjects did not have the same educational background, which is a factor that could
negatively affect the experiment’s outcome. Most of them belong to the educational
and linguistic field, whereas the rest of them were coming from different educational
backgrounds, such as chemistry, medicine and physics. It is possible, therefore, that
many participants were already familiar with the lexical items of the documentary.
Since all of them were randomly assigned to the two subtitling groups, it was
unknown how many participants per group were familiar with the language of the
video. It was discovered, from the participants’ statements after the experiment, that
the intralingual group contained learners who had been previously introduced to the
target vocabulary, knowing the meaning of it. Another complication in terms of the
sample is that it is unclear when was the last time that the participants were frequently
exposed to the English language before the experiment. Although all of them had a
high level of proficiency, some of them may have practiced the language more often
than others. According to the data extracted from the psycholinguistic survey, in the
questions ‘What percentage of reading is in English’ and ‘What percentage of media
exposure is in English’ the answers differed. Some of the subjects were more exposed
than others to the English language through these means. Moreover, in the question
how often do you use English, 17 out of 30 subjects answered ‘weekly’ while the rest
of them fluctuated between ‘daily’ and ‘monthly’. Therefore, the results might have
been significant due to the fact that the subjects with the most frequent exposure to
English have fallen under the intralingual condition.
One final concern that should be noted about the results is that for this
experiment no scientific tools were used in order to measure how active or
concentrated the participants were during watching the video. Therefore, it is not
possible to have a deeper insight to the concentration levels of each group as well as
to the way each participant processed different modalities.
5.4 Suggestions for further research

As far as the second research question about vocabulary acquisition is
concerned, this study cannot provide a definite answer, due to the fact that no
significant results were found regarding the potential difference between the two
subtitling conditions. The sample of the participants was not completely
representative of the entire population; it was fairly small and within only one age
group. Therefore, it is suggested that further research should be conducted with a
larger number of participants, from various age groups. Additionally, participants
should be of various levels of proficiency, in order to examine if there are different
effects depending on the level of proficiency as well as to avoid the complication of
the current study: high level proficiency students had already come across with some
of the target lexical items. Moreover, more research should be done, examining in
greater detail the listening and reading skills of the participants regarding the English
language, in order to have a deeper insight to the way these skills were trained.
Furthermore, the choice of the video fragment should be made taking several factors
into account. For example, the film should entail more unkown words, occuring more
than once or twice, in order to avoid projecting it two times in a raw, which might
prove to be tedious. According to Elley (1989), frequency is a crucial factor, among
others, which best predicts “whether a particular word would be learned” (p. 174).
Another suggestion, first mentioned by Bos (2014), is that in order to
overcome problems that arise while testing for learning effects, a completely unkown
to the learners language should be used in the video as a foreign language, or even a
fantasy language. One problem that may appear in administering learning effects is
that, instead of the participants actually learning a word, they might simply retrieve it
in the post-test, after they had already been exposed to it in the pre-test. Therefore,
when a learning effect takes place by using a fantasy language that can be defined as
acquiring new knowledge and not as retrieving already exisisting knowledge.
However, it should be expected that creating subtitles in a fantasy language acquires
particularly developed skills as well as plenty of time.
As far as the last research question regarding meaning comprehension is
concerned, this current study successfully managed to give an answer: intralingual
subtitles enhance the understanding of the content more than the interlingual ones.
Nevertheless, further research is suggested even in this case, in terms of several
aspects. First of all, larger diversity in terms of educational backgrounds is needed.
For example, most of the participants should not come from only one particular
educational field. There should be a balance in the number of the subjects belonging
to each educational category, in order the results to resemble the reality and to avoid
already existing familiarity with the subject matter. Furthermore, the participants
should carefully be chosen according to their frequency of exposure to the target
language. The outcome will be more objective if all of the learners use the foreign
language at the same extent and the amount of time between the last exposure and the
experiment is equal for all of them. One final suggestion is that apart from the
vocabulary and comprehension, it should also be taken into account the use of
scientific instruments which measure the engagement of the participants while
watching the video, such as EEG analyses, as well as eye tracking and pupil dilation
tools. In this way, the results will have a more scientific validity as well as they will
be more objective.
6. Conclusion
This current study aimed to provide a deeper insight to the already complex
matter of the role of subtitling in language acquisition. Two subtitling conditions were
chosen to be examined in terms of vocabulary acquisition and meaning

comprehension. Previously conducted research and many different opinions on this
issue were taken under consideration, concluding to the need for further research. A
large number of studies has indicated the importance of the role of subtitling as a
language teaching tool as well as their success in improving vocabulary learning and
meaning comprehension. Additionally, it is widely accepted that subtitles can convert
incomprehensible input into comprehensible input, which is very important for
implicit language learning (Bos. 2014). The notion of subtitles, however, should not
be seen as merely providing the translation in the native language. There are many
different types of subtitles, each one of them with a different effect upon the process
of foreign language learning. Therefore, and especially due to the fact that the use of
film in second language classroom environment has become increasingly popular as a
teaching mechanism, subtitled based instruction can be considered a powerful
teaching tool as well as a source of authentic language input. The crucial question
which was addressed in this study, is which of the existing subtitling conditions is
more effective for learning new lexical items as well as understanding the meaning of
the input.
In order to provide the answer about which subtitling condition is more useful
in language learning, a small scale experiment was set up to examine the effect of the
two conditions in the acquisition of new lexical items as well as in the understanding
of the comprehensible input. The experiment contained one vocabulary pre-test, one
film fragment, one vocabulary post-test and one multiple-choice comprehension test.
The data of the two vocabulary tests were compared to see if there was any significant
difference in vocabulary knowledge before and after watching the excerpt. The results
showed that there was a significant learning effect after the provision of subtitles,
regardless the type. However, none of the two subtitling conditions proved to be more
effective than the other in terms of vocabulary acquisition. The most plausible
explanation for that is that the participants’ sample was small. Therefore, it was
suggested further research is done, using a larger sample of subjects, since previous
studies have pointed out the effectiveness of intralingual subtitling in vocabulary
acquisition (Zarei, 2011). However, this study managed to give a conclusive answer
regarding meaning comprehension. The results of the test comparing the performance
of the two groups in the comprehension tests showed that intralingual subtitles indeed
enhance meaning understanding, as it was expected. This outcome was compatible
with other studies’ results, which proved the superiority of the provision of subtitles in
the target language (Hayati and Mohmedi, 2011; Lavaour and Bairstow, 2011).
Nevertheless, suggestions for further research were made, requesting again the use of
a more representative participants’ sample as well as the use of scientific tools, in
order to verify and duplicate these results using even more methods.
In conclusion, although this study was not able to find significant differences
between the two subtitling conditions regarding vocabulary acquisition, it maintained
to demonstrate other differences, such as the general learning effect of subtitling as
well as the efficacy of the intralingual subtitles in content comprehension. In both
cases, further research is strongly suggested, in order to assist teachers, who desire to
use film as a teaching tool in the classroom, select the most effective subtitling
condition meeting the learners’ needs.

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Appendix A
Word Associates Test
1. beautiful
enjoyable expensive education face music
free loud weather

2. bright
clever famous happy colour hand poem
shining taste
3. calm
open quiet smooth cloth day light
tired person
4. natural
expected helpful real foods neighbours
short parents songs
5. fresh
another cool easy cotton heat language
raw water
6. general
closed different usual country idea reader
whole street
7. bare
empty heavy cupboard feet school
uncovered useful tool

8. acute
hidden often rich angle hearing illness

sharp stones
9. common
complete light boundary circle name
ordinary shared party

10. complex
angry difficult argument passengers
necessary sudden patterns problem

11. broad
full moving quiet night river shoulders
wide smile
12. conscious
awake healthy face decision effort
knowing laughing student
13. convenient
easy fresh near experience sound time
suitable vegetable
14. dense
crowded hot noisy forest handle smoke
thick weather
15. curious
helpful interested accident child
missing strange computer steel

16. distinct
clear famous separate advantage meanings
true news parents

17. dull
cloudy loud nice colour knife place
secret rock
18. direct
honest main straight fence flight heat
wide river
19. favorable
helpful legal possible habit response teacher
positive weather
20. secure
confident enjoyable game job meal
fixed safe visitor
21. tight
close rough bend pants surface
uncomfortable wet wood

22. violent
expected smelly anger death rubbish
strong unlucky storm

23. chronic
continuing local accident examination
serious unplanned illness shortage

24. compact
effective small solid group kitchen medicine
useful string
25. crude
clever fair rough behaviour drawing oil
valuable trade
26. domestic
home national animal movement
regular smooth policy speed

27. profound
bright deep exact effect machine taste
great thought
28. fertile
dark growing private business egg mind
special soil
29. formal
fast loud organised bomb education
serious growth statement

30. independent
changed equal child country ideas
important separate prices
31. original
careful closed first condition mind plan
proud sister
32. sensitive
feeling interesting clothes instrument skin
sharp thick topic

33. professional
paid public regular advice manner

religious musician transport

34. critical
clear dangerous festival illness time
important rough water

35. synthetic
artificial electronic drug meal radio
expensive simple sound

36. liberal
free moderate plenty crops furniture parents
valuable transport
37. dramatic
exciting official adventure change
surprising worried patient salary
38. conservative
cautious hopeful clothes estimate
traditional warm meeting signal

39. coherent
clear normal recent crime health speech
together theory
40. ample
heavy large plentiful amount climate
windy feelings time

Appendix B
Sociolinguistic survey
1. Have you ever lived in another country?

Yes
No
If so, for how long?
2. What language(s) did you acquire before starting school?

English
Other (please specify)
3. How well do you speak English?

Very bad
Bad
Reasonable
Good
Very good
4. How often do you speak English?

Hardly ever
A few times a year
Monthly
Weekly
Daily
5. What languages did you acquire at school or at work? And how

proficient are you in those languages? Please give a number:
1 = very bad, 2 = bad, 3 = average, 4 = good, 5 = very good
English
German
French
Other (write the language and the number)
6. What percentage of time (estimate) do you speak English with

friends? (in %)
7. What percentage of time (estimate) do you speak English with

colleagues? (in %)
8. What percentage of media (radio/television) is in English? (in %)
9. What percentage of reading (books/newspapers) is in English? (in %)

Appendix C
Vocabulary test
Αντιστοιχιστε καθε εναν απο τους παρακατω ορισμους με την καταλληλη λεξη. Μονο
μια λεξη
αντιστοιχει σε καθε ορισμο.
1) ______ an estimate or forecast of a future
situation or trend based on a study
of present ones
2) ______ excessive pride in or admiration of
one's own appearance or
achievements
3) ______ the great size or extent of
something
4) ______ worry, solicitude, or anxiety
5) ______ a thing that is composed of two or
more separate elements; a mixture
6) ______ susceptible to physical or emotional
attack or harm
7) ______ an unborn offspring of a mammal,
in particular an unborn human baby
more than eight weeks after
conception
8) ______ highly objectionable or offensive;
odious
9) ______ set up (an organization, system, or
set of rules) on a firm or permanent
basis
10) ______ the uterus of the human female and
certain higher mammals
11) ______ an organ in the human or animal
body that secretes particular
chemical substances for use in the
body or for discharge into the
surroundings
12) ______ to make larger, greater, or stronger;
enlarge; extend
13) ______ a thing demanded or obligatory
14) ______ an organ or cell able to respond to
light, heat, or other external
stimulus and transmit a signal to a
sensory nerve
15) ______ fully sufficient, suitable, or fit
16) ______ to slip away from or elude
17) ______ a secret plan by a group to do
something unlawful or harmful
18) ______ the state or fact of being likely or
liable to be influenced or harmed by
a particular thing
19) ______ to be or prove superior in strength,
power, or influence
20) ______ to disturb or disquiet greatly in
mind; agitate
21) ______ try to acquire or develop a quality,
sentiment, or skill
22) ______ a substance used for destroying
insects or other organisms harmful
to cultivated plants or to animals
23) ______ existing in someone or something
as a permanent and inseparable
element, quality, or attribute
24) ______ to receive or obtain from a source
or origin
25) ______ preoccupy or fill the mind of
someone continually, intrusively,
and to a troubling extent
.
a) escape
b) concern
c) requirement
d) adequate
e) womb
f) foetus
g) establish
h) perturb
i) vulnerable
j) susceptibility
k) pesticide
l) magnitude
m) compound
n) receptor
o) gland
p) derive
q) vanity
r) cultivate
s) amplify
t) inherently
u) prevail
v) obnoxious
w) projection
x) obsessed
y) conspiracy
Appendix D
Comprehension test
Επιλέξτε τη σωστή απάντηση για κάθε μία από τις παρακάτω ερωτήσεις. Μόνο μία
απάντηση είναι σωστή κάθε φορά.
QUESTION 1
1. Which of the following most accurately states the main idea of the video?
A. People should be careful of the products they use.
B. People make use of chemicals unconsiously.
C. Chemicals are dangerous.
QUESTION 2
How are the chemicals reach the human organism?
Through the placenta.
Through the food we eat.
Through the air we breathe.
QUESTION 3
According to the video, which of the following statements is true?
Our endocrine system controls who we are.
Our endocrine system plays a minor role to our development.
Our hormone system controls who we are.
QUESTION 4
The video mentions each of the followin EXCEPT:
BPA chemical imitates the female hormone oestrogen.
BPA and oestrogen have very similar effects.
BPA chemical is easy to detect.
QUESTION 5
Why is the placenta not able to detoxify the chemicals?
Because they have endocrine and oestrogen activity.
Because they are not very dangerous.
Because they are not recognized as chemicals.
QUESTION 6
The water in the rivers of the south-east of England,
was affecting the sexual differentiation of alligators.
was affecting the sexual differentiation of the fish.
was causing cancer to the fish.
QUESTION 7
According to the video, animal testing is important because:
human testing is illegal.
the results are similar to those of human testing.
it can offer an insight to the effects of chemicals.
QUESTION 8
What is hypospadias?
QUESTION 9
The video mentions each of the following EXCEPT:
Chemicals can cause sterility.
Chemicals have a negative impact on the human skin.
Some chemicals are able to pass through the placenta.
QUESTION 10
According to the video, which of the following statements is true?
Humans have not yet developed mechanisms in order to deal with specific kinds
of chemicals.
In the past years, the incidence of testicular cancer in England has increased.
All chemicals are unsafe.

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Running head: The efficiency of subtitles in Second Language Acquisition 1

The efficiency of subtitles in Second

The present study attempts to answer the questions whether there is a

subtitling condition that is more effective in second language vocabulary acquisition

multimodality in language processing, as well as the efficacy of subtitles in second

language acquisition. Therefore, an experiment was set up in order to examine the

efficacy of two different subtitling conditions: standard and intralingual. The

participants were native speakers of Greek and L2 speakers of English with an

advanced level of proficiency. Participants were exposed to a video containing one of

further research is suggested concerning the efficacy of subtitling and different

subtitling conditions for the aforementioned language aspects.

serve as more than just a hobby.

Throughout the history of applied linguistics, an important part of research has

investigated various learning strategies which contribute to the process of language

explicit language teaching, such as grammar translation, is a more effective way of

facilitating second language learning. According to Hulstijn (2005), explicit learning

language knowledge can be facilitated unconsciously, through noticing, without

awareness of what is being learned. A very interesting method of implicit learning,

failed to adequately and consistently prove video subtitling to be an effective strategy

of language learning to a certain extent.

The present study, therefore, aims to examine whether audiovisual input,

acquisition as well as comprehension of second language input. More specifically,

According to d’Ydewalle & van de Poel (1999), vocabulary acquisition is one

as vocabulary acquisition in the process of language learning. According to

Vandergrift (1999), listening comprehension is a complex activity in which the

listener is required to “discriminate between sounds, understand vocabulary and

a specific type of subtitling enhances vocabulary acquisition and input comprehension

different subtitling conditions; standard subtitling (providing subtitles in the

participants’ native language) and intralingual subtitling (providing subtitles in the

second language). It is expected that, audio-visual material combined with subtitles

language learning, as the learners receive input through both modalities

fragment on their knowledge of target words present in the fragment in order to

condition. On that account, three research questions were addressed:

1. Does audio-visual material positively affect vocabulary acquisition?

2. Is there any different effect between standard and intralingual subtitling in

the acquisition of lexical items?

3. Is there any different effect between standard and intralingual subtitling in

In the following chapters, an overview of research regarding different types of

investigation on the efficacy of the use of film in classroom is apparent. In this

specifically, on the complex issue of the efficacy of different subtitling conditions.

regarding the use of subtitles in second language classroom environment.

2.1 Comprehensible and authentic language

There have been different approaches towards language teaching in the

language learning, is described by the terms ‘explicit’ and ‘implicit’ learning.

According to Ellis (2005), explicit knowledge is achieved through conscious

awareness of what is being learned, can be facilitated only in non-time-pressured

circumstances, demands a focus on form and can be verbalized using ‘metalanguage’.

explanations (Lichtman, 2013). According to Reber, Allen and Reber (1999):

“Implicit learning (a) operates largely independent of awareness, (b) is

subsumed by neuroanatomical structures distinct from those that serve

explicit, declarative processes, (c) yields memorial representations that can be

either abstract or concrete, (d) is a relatively robust system that survives

psychological, psychiatric, and neuroanatomical injury, (e) shows relatively

little interindividual variability, and (f) is relatively unaffected by ontogenetic

factors” (p. 504).

combined with explicit classroom instruction. According to Ellis (2004), explicit

knowledge can contribute indirectly “to the acquisition of implicit knowledge by

researchers see “explicit knowledge as a component of L2 proficiency: It is needed to

engage effectively in context-free language use” (Cummins, 1983, as cited in Ellis,