Presenting English polysemous phrasal verbs with two metaphor-based cognitive methods to Chinese EFL learners

The present study examined whether cognitive linguistic methods facilitate Chinese EFL learners' acquisition of English polysemous phrasal verbs. 120 participants were tested in a 2 (method: traditional v. cognitive) × 2 (English proficiency: intermediate v. high) between-subjects design in which the control group was presented English polysemous phrasal verbs in the traditional method and to the experimental group there were presented in a cognitive method. Both groups were then asked to take an immediate test to test their short-term memory, and a delayed post-test was conducted one week later to test long-term memory. Results show that compared with the traditional method 1) presenting polysemous phrasal verbs with metaphor association is beneficial to participants' long-term memory and English proficiency influences the understanding and retention of the learning materials; 2) presenting polysemous phrasal verbs based on orientational metaphor cannot efficiently facilitate participants' meaning retention of the phrasal verbs, neither in the short-term nor in the long-term test. The study confirms that cognitive methods are much more suited for EFL learners in the learning of polysemous phrasal verbs and appropriate L1 input is necessary when a new teaching method is introduced.