The Effects of Age on Korean Word Recognition and Vocabulary Retention

Abstract

This research examines how vocabulary knowledge
and recognition of Korean words differ by age, focusing on word
frequency and morphological structure. Individuals from three
age cohort’s children, young adults, and older adults completed
tasks involving recognizing and delayed recalling simple and
complex Korean words of high and low frequency. Results
showed pronounced age-related differences: young adults
outperformed children and older adults in recognition and
recall. Across groups, high-frequency and simple
morphologically structured words were recognized and recalled
better. However, all participants exhibited the most significant
effects of frequency and complexity during recall and
recognition in younger and older adults. Analysis revealed
robust interaction effects between age and certain linguistic
parameters, suggesting that cognitive processing strategies
differ with age. These results highlight a particular gap in lexical
access and retrieval models that account for age, alongside
educational and cognitive intervention frameworks. The
findings are the first to provide evidence of the interplay
between age-related factors and the processing of words in an
agglutinative language.