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The purpose of this study is to contribute to the methodology of research on difficult vocabulary in mathematics tasks. The contribution consists of a framework for the study of difficult vocabulary in mathematics tasks and a literature review of empirical research in the area. The framework includes five main aspects of word difficulty that have been examined in empirical studies and discuss these in the light of theories on reading comprehension. In addition, methodological issues are presented in relation to each main aspect. The literature review examines both methodological aspects of 36 reviewed articles, and synthesizes results on difficult vocabulary. The literature review shows that a commonly used method—to study several word aspects together—is very unfortunate from the perspective of building accumulative knowledge about difficult vocabulary in mathematics tasks. The only well-supported conclusion possible to draw from the synthesis of results from the empirical studies, is that some word aspects are not related to task difficulty.

This study reports on the relation between commonness of the vocabulary used in mathematics tasks and aspects of students’ reading and solving of the tasks. The vocabulary in PISA tasks is analyzed according to how common the words are in a mathematical and an everyday context. The study examines correlations between different aspects of task difficulty and the presence of different types of uncommon vocabulary. The results show that the amount of words that are uncommon in both contexts are most important in relation to the reading and solving of the tasks. These words are not connected to the solution frequency of the task but to the demand of reading ability when solving the task.

One part of being proficient in mathematics is to be able to read and solve mathematics tasks where mathematics is represented using different semiotic resources (i.e. natural language, mathematical notation, and different types of images). In the current study, statistical methods are used to investigate the potential meaning that the presence and co-occurrences of semiotic resources have for how demanding a mathematical task is to read and solve. The results reveal that the number of different semiotic resources in a mathematical task is not related to difficulty, but that difficulty is related to the particular combinations of semiotic resources where pictorial images are one of the resources. The results also indicate that the difficulty related to these semiotic characteristics is not related to an unnecessary reading demand.

Tackling mathematics tasks often involves reading and interpreting different semiotic resources such as natural language (words), mathematical notation, and images. This study aims to enhance knowledge of how meaning relations, in the form of “cohesive ties” between and within different semiotic resources, are related to how difficult it is to read and solve mathematics tasks. Using 133 tasks from PISA mathematics tests and 354 tasks from the annual Swedish National Test in mathematics, statistical analyses found relations between the presence of different types of cohesive ties and measures of how difficult the tasks were to read and solve. The results reveal a difficulty aspect related to the extent to which a task has cohesive ties, of any kind, and that non-mathematics-specific reading demand is not part of this difficulty aspect. An implication is that mathematics teaching should also focus on the identification of cohesive relations in the text of tasks.