Mr Poltroon Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 When I put in that I lived in the USA they also asked my ZIP code, so...that was a little creepy. Took your advice and faked everything that I didn't feel comfortable putting in. 28,200 words. Yay, I'm in the 90th percentile! How peculiar. USA is the only country that asks for this extra information. I wonder why that is? Edit: "No cognates or false-friends with Portuguese." That's a strange condition for selecting words. And there's an awful lot of thosee actually. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OriginalRen Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 Ren, how do you know so much? AP English back in high school. Also, I play a lot of trivia and do a lot of crosswords. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flutterz Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 How peculiar. USA is the only country that asks for this extra information. I wonder why that is? Probably because most of the people taking the test are in the US, so they can get more accurate data from a larger sample. Whereas the 3 people taking the test in Madagascar or something won't give you any accurate data. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipsed Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 Wow 16,100 I suck. Who the heck's supposed to know words like 'portmanteau' and 'imbroglio' Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
corntastic Posted September 17, 2014 Author Share Posted September 17, 2014 Wow 16,100 I suck. Who the heck's supposed to know words like 'portmanteau' and 'imbroglio' No one. Go look at ESL averages, 2000-9000. You can probably take that as "workable english". Everything more is just bonus for literature. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zenophilious Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 How peculiar. USA is the only country that asks for this extra information. I wonder why that is? I feel so loved. Probably because most of the people taking the test are in the US, so they can get more accurate data from a larger sample. Whereas the 3 people taking the test in Madagascar or something won't give you any accurate data. Valid point, but I just don't like people knowing my ZIP code unless they actually need to know it, like if I'm buying something that's going to be shipped to me. I dislike giving out personal info that can be used to pinpoint my approximate location, even if it's in a fairly wide area like a county. Now, if it was for a study that I could take legal action against if they revealed or sold my info, I'd be more comfortable since that way they'd be heavily encouraged to keep it safe. I know I sound a little paranoid, but I really don't like spreading my info around. Wow 16,100 I suck. Who the heck's supposed to know words like 'portmanteau' and 'imbroglio' Examples of portmanteau words are the words "brunch" and "liger". Two or more words shoved together that have a combined meaning that's different from the words they originated from. That's the definition in terms of linguistic portmanteaus, anyway. Apparently it's also a suitcase, but I'd never heard of that before. I do a lot of reading, and when I see a word I don't know I almost always immediately look it up :3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flutterz Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 I feel so loved. Valid point, but I just don't like people knowing my ZIP code unless they actually need to know it, like if I'm buying something that's going to be shipped to me. I dislike giving out personal info that can be used to pinpoint my approximate location, even if it's in a fairly wide area like a county. Now, if it was for a study that I could take legal action against if they revealed or sold my info, I'd be more comfortable since that way they'd be heavily encouraged to keep it safe. I know I sound a little paranoid, but I really don't like spreading my info around. Examples of portmanteau words are the words "brunch" and "liger". Two or more words shoved together that have a combined meaning that's different from the words they originated from. That's the definition in terms of linguistic portmanteaus, anyway. Apparently it's also a suitcase, but I'd never heard of that before. I do a lot of reading, and when I see a word I don't know I almost always immediately look it up :3 I redid the test for curiosity's sake. I looked up all the words I didn't know, marked them all as known and said I was in the US. The maximum you can get on the test is 45,000, and apparently the personal information is optional - I just pressed continue without entering any of it and it gave me the result. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Poltroon Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 apparently the personal information is optional - I just pressed continue without entering any of it and it gave me the result. As stated by the page itself and by me in reply to his insecurities. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joris914 Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 20,300.... not bad, but I expected to be above-average for a foreigner, TBH. But, as some other people have noted, some of those words are quite ridiculous. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eclipsed Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 The maximum you can get on the test is 45,000 I wonder which words Ren didn't know Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Poltroon Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 20,300.... not bad, but I expected to be above-average for a foreigner, TBH. http://testyourvocab.com/blog/2013-05-10-Summary-of-results What are you complaining about? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stray Cat Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 AP English back in high school. Also, I play a lot of trivia. So did I but I never learned that much. Well at least I'm an acceptable native. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crunchytaco Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 23,900. As a native speaker I can say no one uses those words, ever. ^ Mines at an average estimate of 23,300. You'd sound pretty ridiculous using those words here. I am impressed by our foreign friends here. However, I wouldn't be too embarrassed about not knowing words that have little practical use here( e.g. Bugbear - I remember reading about those in an RPG once). As someone who reads everyday, I can pick up any book, online article or newspaper; and skim through it faster than most readers. Rarely does a vocab send me off to Google for research. This website was a first to send me running. Actually if I think about it, a lot of these words have commonality with Latin, so if you speak one of the romance languages you could figure out their meanings using the root knowledge. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arakura Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 lol, idk why I knew imbroglio, but I didnt know a lot of other ones xD (I know a dutch word 'strop' I believe, but no english one t.t) Second try I got 26,100 which is 400 more than last time (and I excluded words I had learned from taking it the first time). So thta's decently accurate I guess ^^. As far as 2 samples can tell you ~.~ Ren knows a lot of words 0.0 Did you play the dictoinary game a lot as a child?? xD also these non-native speakers are so good in here Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaguya Posted September 17, 2014 Share Posted September 17, 2014 24,000 words. Not bad for a foreigner apparently. That test still made me feel like I knew nothing though --" I made a friend that knows much more obscure english vocab then I do take it and he went up to 33,000. I wonder what a native english speaker with extensive vocab can get. Also a non-native, got 24,100. Take that, down! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stray Cat Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 ^ Mines at an average estimate of 23,300. You'd sound pretty ridiculous using those words here. I am impressed by our foreign friends here. However, I wouldn't be too embarrassed about not knowing words that have little practical use here( e.g. Bugbear - I remember reading about those in an RPG once). As someone who reads everyday, I can pick up any book, online article or newspaper; and skim through it faster than most readers. Rarely does a vocab send me off to Google for research. This website was a first to send me running. Actually if I think about it, a lot of these words have commonality with Latin, so if you speak one of the romance languages you could figure out their meanings using the root knowledge. I read enough scholarly articles to say that no one writes like that professionally, at least not since the 1970s. I would rock a science vocab test though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Down Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 Also a non-native, got 24,100. Take that, down! It was actually 24,500, I rounded it down Still, a lot of the weird words I just know because they're plain french words exported into english. Also, knowing 2xxxx words is nice and all but being able to draw from that vocabulary to write/speak is another thing entirely. I'm pretty sure native speakers here get 2xxxx scores but can actually use most of those words, whereas foreigners get the same kind of scores but aren't able to do that well at actually speaking/writing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeftai Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 28700. to me its like a given that you can speak english at atleast broken level. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clephas Posted September 18, 2014 Share Posted September 18, 2014 42,200 words... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arakura Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 The king. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crunchytaco Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 It calculates 44,400 words out of 3 pages of words though. I wonder what if you spent 4-6 years of your life learning a language that drunk people speak would count. Also memorizing names of every bottle, can and mixed drink. Probably not. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OriginalRen Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 Again, it's all related to exposure. Clephas and I know these words because we were exposed to them. Would we ever use the utterly ridiculous ones? No. I know these words because of crosswords and trivia. In Clephas' case, I am sure he knows them for the same reasons (that or he read a dictionary, because he's that kind of person). Still, it should be noted that having a large English (or any language for that matter) vernacular does not make you are an intelligent person. I had a Japanese student (it was probably Sakura-chan) who asked me what the difference between dislike, hate, abhor, and detest were. While I was able to explain the subtle differences, I let them know that if you were to ever use the word abhor in a spoken English sentence, it wouldn't feel normal. Again, having a large vocabulary doesn't mean you are a smart person. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
crunchytaco Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 I think you'd have to possess a certainly good enough memory to remember all those, even if they're just trivia, and/or a certain enough intelligence to pursue fields in which you are exposed to them. There is a research that measures IQ with vocabulary size; but whether or not IQ is a good indicator of overall intelligence is up for debate. On the other hand I'm not convinced if this test was an accurate measure of that. I think you'd have to go through all of those words to really test if a person possess that knowledge or not. I agree, it doesn't mean you're stupid if you don't know those words... *Queue in tomato tossing and stupid American jokes* Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chocolat Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 6.400 words... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr Poltroon Posted September 19, 2014 Share Posted September 19, 2014 Again, it's all related to exposure. Clephas and I know these words because we were exposed to them. Would we ever use the utterly ridiculous ones? No. I know these words because of crosswords and trivia. In Clephas' case, I am sure he knows them for the same reasons (that or he read a dictionary, because he's that kind of person). Still, it should be noted that having a large English (or any language for that matter) vernacular does not make you are an intelligent person. I had a Japanese student (it was probably Sakura-chan) who asked me what the difference between dislike, hate, abhor, and detest were. While I was able to explain the subtle differences, I let them know that if you were to ever use the word abhor in a spoken English sentence, it wouldn't feel normal. Again, having a large vocabulary doesn't mean you are smart person. How dare you deny my existence! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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