Language Comprehension

We were asked this same question in the first week of class and I said that i thought that vocabulary was the mot important feature in language comprehension. I still agree with that, although I now have a much better grasp of why that is. Originally, it just seemed intuitive to me that vocabulary differences would be more difficult to overcome than sound and syntax differences. Now after learning about language perception for the past quarter, I know that what I suspected is true. The human brain is an extremely complex and amazing thing. Even with people of completely different, thick accents, I am able to understand their English with only minimal difficulty. The difficulty is much more insurmountable when it comes to vocabulary differences, however. When someone does not share the same vocabulary as you, it is nearly impossible to know what they mean. Even when speaking with non-native speakers of English that have different syntax structure than I am used to, after conversing with the for some amount of time, I am able to understand them very well.
The idea that the most important feature in language comprehension is vocabulary has been backed up on numerous occasions by experiences I've had in my dorm. My friend down the hall is from Bermuda, and his English has many vocabulary differences from mine. On numerous occasions, I've had trouble understanding what he was talking about because I had never been exposed to the vocabulary that he was using.
We were learning last week and the week before about how people's perceptual systems adapt to understand even those people with the most extreme accent differences. This is why I think that vocabulary is the most important feature. Even if it is difficult to understand someone with an accent at first, chances are that it will get easier with time. With vocabulary, however, there is no adjusting. You either know the words or you don't.