Pictures in online dictionaries : shall we see them?

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to examine the influence of different access paths to pictures in online English learners’ dictionaries on meaning reception and retention. The article also explores the influence of pictures on the time of meaning comprehension. The following aspects of access to pictures in online learners’ dictionaries are investigated: making pictures instantly visible in entries, hyperlinking pictures, providing no pictures. In an online experiment, upper-intermediate foreign learners of English took part. They explained infrequent English concrete nouns based on reference to purpose-built monolingual dictionary entries. Three experimental conditions were created, depending on access to pictures in the entries: definitions with pictures visible by default (instantly visible pictures), definitions with pictures available upon clicking a hyperlink (hyperlinked pictures), definitions only (no pictures). Meaning comprehension and retention were evaluated based on L1 equivalents of the target nouns provided by the participants. The results reveal that instantly visible pictures and hyperlinked pictures improve meaning comprehension to a similar extent in comparison with the no-picture condition. However, meaning retention checked immediately after exposure is the most successful when pictures are visible by default in entries. Hyperlinked pictures prove to be no more useful for learning meaning than definitions without any pictorial support. They also extend comprehension time the most. Instantly visible pictures, in turn, neither speed up the comprehension of meaning nor slow it down compared to entries with no pictures. Considering their significant contribution to meaning comprehension and retention, instantly visible pictures seem to be the most recommendable in online dictionaries for learners of English.