About the myVocab Project
Hello! I'm Grigory Golovin, and myVocab is my pet project. It grew out of a simple question: "How many words do people actually know?" This project combines my passion for linguistics, psychometrics, and web technologies. My goal is to develop a scientifically validated vocabulary assessment tool that's valuable for both researchers and the general public.
Core Principles
- Scientific rigor. Built upon the extensive history of vocabulary assessments, myVocab combines established methodologies with innovative approaches.
- Technological efficiency. Leveraging modern psychometric methods (Item Response Theory and Computerized Adaptive Testing) enables precise, rapid assessments (in just minutes!).
- Test taker-friendly design. Intuitive, low cognitive-load interface. No pen-and-paper hassle—just simple, clear instructions and a seamless testing process.
- Researcher-friendly data management. Test results are securely stored and easily accessible for later processing and analysis in research projects. Contact me to find out more.
- Free. Free for test takers, free for researchers. No registration needed.
Languages Supported
Language assessment is a mature field, but primarily for English. myVocab started as the first vocabulary test available in Russian. It has since grown to include several other languages, and is now available in:
- Russian
- English
- German
- Ukrainian
- Hebrew (developed in collaboration with Alexandra Shumakova)
- Polish (developed in collaboration with Danil Fokin)
- Tatar (developed in collaboration with Илдар Әюпов)
Although all the tests utilize the same underlying psychometric framework (IRT and CAT), each one is developed independently in close collaboration with language experts.
Publications
Peer-reviewed Papers
- Л. Ашкинази, Г. Головин (2018) Исследование пассивного словарного запаса носителей русского языка посредством интернета, Вестник общественного мнения, 3-4(127)
- Е. Масленникова и др. (2017) Словарный запас как показатель вербального интеллекта, Вестник ЮУрГУ, 10(3)
- Г. Головин (2015) Измерение пассивного словарного запаса русского языка, Социо- и психолингвистические исследования, 3
Popular Articles
- Л. Ашкинази, Г. Головин, Человек и его словарь, Химия и жизнь, Март 2019.
- Л. Ашкинази, "Сколько слов мы знаем", Знание-Сила, Сентябрь 2016.
myVocab as a Research Tool
The myVocab tests have been used in the following research:
- Parshina, O. et al. (2024). Predictive Language Processing in Russian Heritage Speakers: Task Effects on Morphosyntactic Prediction in Reading. Languages, 9(5), 158.
- Chernova, D., Bakhturina, P. (2024). Method of print exposure assessment: Application in psycholinguistics and adaptation for the Russian language. Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University, 20(4), 872–887.
- Likhanov, M. et al. (2022). This is the way: Network perspective on targets for spatial ability development programmes. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 92, 1597–1620.
- Titov, S. et al. (2019). Full-scale Personality Prediction on VKontakte Social Network and its Applications. 25th FRUCT Conference, Helsinki.
- Esipenko, E. et al. (2018). Comparing Spatial Ability of Male and Female Students Completing Humanities vs. Technical Degrees. Psychology in Russia, 11(4), 37–49.
Let's Collaborate!
If you are a researcher looking to include a robust vocabulary test in your test battery, interested in developing a test for another language, or have comments or suggestions about the tests, please feel free to reach out!
Contact me at gregorygolovin@gmail.com.
Warm regards,
Grigory Golovin
