Table of Contents
Start of Chapter : Increase your vocabulary
Previous : Chapter 2 - Optimize your alphabetics
Increase your vocabulary
Often ignored by many speed-reading courses, vocabulary holds many people back from fast reading speeds. You improve your vocabulary simply by increasing how many words you understand. By doing so, you also improve the likelihood of greater success in your life. Read on to learn how to increase and improve your vocabulary.
Your vocabulary is the collection of words you recognise and understand. The English language has the largest vocabulary of all languages - over 1,000,000 defined words. English-speaking adults use approximately 3,000 different words in everyday conversation, however they know the meaning of around 50,000 words on average.
What's impressive is that a child between the ages of six and ten learns, on average, more than 5,000 new words a year. What's not so impressive is that the average adult learns, on average, 50 new words a year.
Why is vocabulary important? It's important because the size of your vocabulary has a significant influence on your reading speed. The better your vocabulary, the faster you read. Many speed-reading courses don't provide much guidance on this topic. However, improving your vocabulary can have as much an impact on your reading speed as any of the other techniques. This is especially true when learning new topics.
Here's why: Every time you come across a word you don't know, your brain automatically focuses on it. Your brain tries reading the words around it to figure out the meaning. Even if you give up and move on, the next time you come across the word, the same thing happens. Every time you see a word you don't know, your fluency (speed) and comprehension suffer. When you are learning new topics, it's likely you will come across more words that are new. Your reading performance suffers even more if you don't take the time to find out their meanings.
If that isn't enough motivation for you to improve your vocabulary, here's another reason. Look at these test results from employees of over 40 large organizations in the USA. What do you think they represent?
| Level |
Average Result |
| Presidents, vice presidents |
236 |
| Managers |
168 |
| Superintendents |
140 |
| Overseers |
114 |
| Floor bosses |
86 |
These are scores from a vocabulary test, out of a possible score of 272 points. It's clear that those in higher positions have command of more words. In another study, the only consistent factor across thousands of people was that successful people scored high in vocabulary tests. Other studies link a strong vocabulary to strong scores in IQ tests.
| 
