Estimate your English vocabulary size • Hacker News Board

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#121

Post by maqr » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:44 AM UTC

onan_barbarian wrote: post #63

johnfn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got just under the median on this test, but I scored around the 99th percentile in the SAT verbal, and I feel it's reasonable to say the two test approximately the same things. It seems unlikely that I've slipped so far in just two years :) I never really considered Hacker News to be full of overconfident people. If anything, to me being part of HN is a humbling experience. It reminds me that there are so many peop…

Hacker News is _very_ full of over-confident people, believe me. During a discussion of 'whether open source contributions were being overly important to job seekers' a while back, a surprising number of HN commenters automatically put themselves in the role of employer, peering dubiously over their glasses at me. Many of these commenters were hilariously under-qualified to be taking on that kind of role with respect…

> Hacker News is _very_ full of over-confident people, believe me.

Heh.

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#122

Post by MaysonL » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:47 AM UTC

thret wrote: post #100

40,300 and I am astounded that there were words I hadn't seen before. Funambulism is my new favourite word.

Yes, funambulist, and sparge. 42K

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#123

Post by microtonal » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:49 AM UTC

gimpf wrote: post #108

I'd be really interested in the percentiles of the non-native speakers. With an alarmingly low 10.700 words, there is not even a percentile for me... And I know that my fluency of English is at least above the median around here (edit: here = where I live). This also shows how extremely time-consuming it is to learn a second language. I started in school, 10 years old, am moderately well educated (some college drop-o…

I am Dutch, and the estimated vocabulary is 15,600 words. It's really humbling, but on the other side surprising that one can participate in scientific discussion with such a small vocabulary. But I bet the distribution is not very similar to an American kid with a vocabulary of that size ;).

It's easy to notice the difference in vocabulary in practice. Native speaker's speech is much more varied.

Also, it's maybe good for native speakers to realize that someone who may seem a bit rude or dumb on the Internet may be a non-native speaker who has difficulty expressing him/herself.

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#124

Post by fedd » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:50 AM UTC

soundsop wrote: post #44

Eliezer wrote: post #29

I got 37,300. They claim this is not quite 95th percentile, which I am a tad skeptical accurately represents my vocabulary-size percentile relative to the general population. Perhaps this survey is being forwarded around unusually literate people at the top end, or more than 5% of responders are cheating. Where are the fake words to catch cheaters? I Googled a lot of what I didn't recognize, and everything I checked…

They could also test you on some of the less-recognized words you selected to help identify cheating.

they could add some non-existent words! some people just check all checks i think! (and i was honest and got 8,560)

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#125

Post by rb2k_ » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:50 AM UTC

gimpf wrote: post #108

I'd be really interested in the percentiles of the non-native speakers. With an alarmingly low 10.700 words, there is not even a percentile for me... And I know that my fluency of English is at least above the median around here (edit: here = where I live). This also shows how extremely time-consuming it is to learn a second language. I started in school, 10 years old, am moderately well educated (some college drop-o…

German, 26 Years, 8 Years of English in school. Working for a US company, lived in the US for 3 months, American GF, lots of pirated american TV shows:

15,500 words

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#126

Post by tmatos » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:54 AM UTC

rg3 wrote: post #116

gimpf wrote: post #108

I'd be really interested in the percentiles of the non-native speakers. With an alarmingly low 10.700 words, there is not even a percentile for me... And I know that my fluency of English is at least above the median around here (edit: here = where I live). This also shows how extremely time-consuming it is to learn a second language. I started in school, 10 years old, am moderately well educated (some college drop-o…

I am in a similar situation and my estimated vocabulary size is 10100 words. Doh! :D

I am at 10.200 being studying Enlgish for 8 years and using it on a daily basis for social and professional life. My level of English is above almost all my pears from I come from.

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#127

Post by evilswan » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:56 AM UTC

Too much clicking.

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#128

Post by Murkin » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:57 AM UTC

gimpf wrote: post #108

I'd be really interested in the percentiles of the non-native speakers. With an alarmingly low 10.700 words, there is not even a percentile for me... And I know that my fluency of English is at least above the median around here (edit: here = where I live). This also shows how extremely time-consuming it is to learn a second language. I started in school, 10 years old, am moderately well educated (some college drop-o…

Some studies I have seen, showed that the average newspaper has a 6000-8000 word vocabulary.

Add another 2000 to cover technical/domain specific/slang words. And you should have no reason not to be able to communicate freely on day to day basis.

I got 26K (English is my 3rd language) and most of the 'strange' words are from reading too much science fiction as a kid.

+ on showing percentiles of non-native speakers tho

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#129

Post by swehner » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 8:58 AM UTC

Toucan wrote: post #120

43,300. I strongly suspect learning Latin and Greek at school helped more than a little with this particular test.

At http://testyourvocab.com/details.php#which_sample they hint at omitting a lot of Latin words:

Quote:

No cognates or false-friends with Portuguese. This probably knocks out at least half the dictionary, since Romance languages have plenty in common with English. False friends need to be avoided as well, since a Brazilian beginner will see "pretend" and assume he knows it means pretender, which actually means "intend." Interestingly, the no-Portuguese rule leaves the test with a strongly pronounced short Anglo-Saxon flavor.

Re: Estimate your English vocabulary size

#130

Post by swehner » Sun, Jul 17, 2011, 9:01 AM UTC

cduan wrote: post #81

I didn't see any science-related words when I took the test. Not sure if this is because of the process by which they made the word lists, or because there truly are not many common science-related words.

At http://testyourvocab.com/details.php#which_sample they explain how they chose the words the test is based on:

Quote:

Too limited. Words that are specifically American or British (in meaning or spelling), or slang, or scientific/medical, or anything labeled archaic, or anything else that isn't part of broad, general English. Also, no animals or ingredients, which depend too much on where you live.