The Kent-Rosanoff Word Association List
A lot of the early work on L2 word associations used the Kent-Rosanoff word list as stimuli. The list is a set of 100 words commonly used in studies of L1 word associations. They first appeared in: GH Kent and AJ Rosanoff, A Study of Association in Insanity. American Journal of Insanity 67,(1910) 37-96 and 317-390.
1 table | 2 dark | 3 music | 4 sickness |
5 man | 6 deep | 7 soft | 8 eating |
9 mountain | 10 house | 11 black | 12 mutton |
13 comfort | 14 hand | 15 short | 16 fruit |
17 butterfly | 18 smooth | 19 command | 20 chair |
21 sweet | 22 whistle | 23 woman | 24 cold |
25 slow | 26 wish | 27 river | 28 white |
29 beautiful | 30 window | 31 rough | 32 citizen |
33 foot | 34 spider | 35 needle | 36 red |
37 sleep | 38 anger | 39 carpet | 40 girl |
41 high | 42 working | 43 sour | 44 earth |
45 trouble | 46 soldier | 47 cabbage | 48 hard |
49 eagle | 50 stomach | 51 stem | 52 lamp |
53 dream | 54 yellow | 55 bread | 56 justice |
57 boy | 58 light | 59 health | 60 bible |
61 memory | 62 sheep | 63 bath | 64 cottage |
65 swift | 66 blue | 67 hungry | 68 priest |
69 ocean | 70 head | 71 stove | 72 long |
73 religion | 74 whiskey | 75 child | 76 bitter |
77 hammer | 78 thirsty | 79 city | 80 square |
81 butter | 82 doctor | 83 loud | 84 thief |
85 lion | 86 joy | 87 bed | 88 heavy |
89 tobacco | 90 baby | 91 moon | 92 scissors |
93 quiet | 94 green | 95 salt | 96 street |
97 king | 98 cheese | 99 blossom | 100 afraid |
There are a number of reasons why this list isn't very good for research on L2 speakers. You will find a discussion of this problem in
Chapter 3 of Paul Meara's book Connected Words, and in Tess Fitzpatrick's Word Association Patterns: unpacking the assumptions (InJAL 17, 3 2007). Unfortunately no standard alternative stimulus list has yet emerged.