The Authentic Voices of Dictionary Users – Viewing Comments on an Online Learner’s Dictionary Before and After Revision

By November 17, 2016,
Page 237-247
Author Ann-Kristin Hult
Title The Authentic Voices of Dictionary Users – Viewing Comments on an Online Learner’s Dictionary Before and After Revision
Abstract This paper deals with comment field data from two web questionnaire surveys, performed in 2007 and 2011, about the use and users of the Swedish Lexin Dictionary (SLD), an online monolingual learner’s dictionary. The SLD underwent comprehensive revision in between the two studies. In order to evaluate the update I compare the respondents’ comments on SLD before and after the revision. The two sets of comment field data are categorised by the types of comments expressed and by the information categories mentioned. As it turns out, respondents do seem happier with the new version of SLD. Generally, there are more positive comments after the revision than before and the information categories mentioned are more often set in positive contexts in the latter data. In addition, the majority of respondents in 2011 belong to the dictionary’s target group, which was not the case in 2007. Although respondents seem more satisfied with the new version of SLD, the two sets of comment field data contain largely the same kind of criticism, as for example in comments concerning (usually the lack of) lemmas and examples.
Session Research on Dictionary Use
Keywords dictionary use; learner´s dictionary; user comments
BibTex 
@InProceedings{ELX2014-016,
	author={Ann-Kristin Hult},
	title={The Authentic Voices of Dictionary Users – Viewing Comments on an Online Learner’s Dictionary Before and After Revision},
	pages={237-247},
	booktitle={Proceedings of the 16th EURALEX International Congress},
	year={2014},
	month={jul},
	date={15-19},
	address={Bolzano, Italy},
	editor={Abel, Andrea and Vettori, Chiara  and Ralli, Natascia},
	publisher={EURAC research},
	isbn={978-88-88906-97-3},
	}
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