Abstract Numerous studies have examined the relationship between lexical features of students’ compositions and judgements of text quality. However, the degree to which teachers’ judgements are influenced by the quality of vocabulary in students’ essays with regard to their assessment of other textual characteristics is relatively unexplored. This experimental study investigates the influence of lexical features on teachers’ judgements of English as a second language (ESL) argumentative essays. Using analytic and holistic rating scales, English pre-service teachers (N = 37) in Switzerland assessed four essays of different proficiency levels in which the levels of lexical diversity and sophistication had been experimentally varied. Coh-Metrix software was used to manipulate the level of lexical diversity, as measured by MTLD and D, and the Tool for the Automatic Analysis of Lexical Sophistication (TAALES) software was used to obtain differing levels of lexical sophistication, as measured by word range. The results suggested that texts with greater lexical diversity and sophistication were assessed more positively concerning their overall quality as well as the analytic criteria ‘grammar’ and ‘frame of essay’. The implications of this study for classroom practice and teacher education are discussed.

中文翻译：

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词汇特征对ESL议论文教师判断的影响

摘要 大量研究考察了学生作文的词汇特征与文本质量判断之间的关系。然而，教师的判断在多大程度上受学生论文中词汇质量的影响，以及他们对其他文本特征的评估相对而言还没有得到探索。本实验研究调查词汇特征对教师对英语作为第二语言 (ESL) 议论文的判断的影响。瑞士的英语职前教师 (N = 37) 使用分析和整体评分量表评估了四篇不同熟练程度的文章，其中词汇多样性和复杂程度的水平在实验上有所不同。Coh-Metrix 软件用于操纵词汇多样性水平，由 MTLD 和 D 衡量，词汇复杂度自动分析工具 (TAALES) 软件用于获得不同级别的词汇复杂度，以词范围衡量。结果表明，具有更大词汇多样性和复杂性的文本在其整体质量以及分析标准“语法”和“论文框架”方面得到更积极的评估。讨论了这项研究对课堂实践和教师教育的影响。