This study modeled the effects of essay length and language features on the rated quality of second language (L2) expository and argumentative essays composed by Chinese university students. Latent variables were writing quality captured by essay scores, and lexical sophistication, syntactic complexity and cohesion, each of which was measured by…

Exploring the relationships between different linguistic skills is essential for linguistics and interventional studies on language disorders. This study aimed to investigate the relationship between phonological skills, non-phonological skills (including vocabulary, morphological and syntax awareness), and basic literacy ability (including letter…

Recent studies have shown that fluent reading of word lists requires additional skills beyond efficient recognition of individual words. This study examined the specific contribution of between-word processing (sequential processing efficiency, indexed by serial digit RAN) and subskills related to text-level processing (vocabulary and syntactic…

The present study examined elicited written English as a foreign language (EFL) narratives produced by 6th grade Hebrew and Arabic speakers in their 4th year of learning EFL. We examined the use of correct verb morphology and morphosyntactic structures, in relation to supporting L1/EFL skills. Fifty-eight pupils (29 Arabic speakers) participated…

This study aims to explore the specific contributions of derivational, inflectional, and compounding morphological awareness to reading comprehension through decoding and syntactic awareness. A total of 181 Grade 3 and 4 Chinese primary school children learning English as a second language in Hong Kong participated in this study. The results of…

Grammatical awareness of syntax and morphology is important in children's literacy development for both reading and writing. Hebrew, a language with rich inflectional morphology, marks nouns for plural number in conjunction with gender. Hebrew attributive adjectives agree with noun number and gender in the same noun phrase, while predicative…

Inaudible syntactic markers are especially difficult to spell. This paper examines how 455 fourth graders spell silent French plural markers in a dictation with real and pseudowords after one year of formal French instruction (L2). The Generalized Linear Mixed Model analysis shows first that noun plural spelling (real and pseudo) is a strong…

Using context to derive a word's meaning is typically conceptualized as part of the reading comprehension process. However, context sensitivity develops early--before children start to learn to read. This study took a developmental perspective, attempting to capture children's context sensitivity through spoken discourse and assess its value in…

This study examined the direct and indirect relations of foundational language skills (vocabulary, syntactic knowledge, and orthographic knowledge), higher-order cognitive skills (inference making and comprehension monitoring), and word reading to reading comprehension in Chinese. Consistent with the hierarchical relations specified in the Direct…

This study aims to explore to what extent syntactic complexity predicts holistic scores generated by China's two prominent automated writing evaluation systems--"pigai" and "iWrite," the results of which will have some implications for the validity of these two systems. In the meanwhile, this study targets how syntactic…

In successful writing development, English as a foreign language (EFL) learners not only need to acquire grammatical complexity (GC) features but also know when and how to use them flexibly across communicative contexts, known as register flexibility. The present study, guided by the sociocultural theory of language learning, examines descriptive…

Typical print formatting provides no information regarding the linguistic features of a text, although texts vary considerably with respect to grammatical complexity and readability. Complex texts may be particularly challenging for individuals with weak language knowledge, such as English language learners. This paper investigates the usefulness…

Common tests of morphological awareness measure both morphology and syntax by requiring participants to fit words and pseudowords into sentences by adding or removing affixes. We report the results of a study testing a new word level task. College students viewed transparent words (without phonological or orthographic shifts) and used a keyboard…

This study assessed the effect of adjectives and noun premodifiers on L2 noun phrase comprehension and error types among English Language Learners. We also examined the correlation between L2 noun phrase comprehension and L2 reading comprehension, as well as the contribution of L2 noun phrase comprehension to L2 reading comprehension. One hundred…

The current study explores the contributions of written vocabulary and syntax to informational writing quality in Grades 5 through 8. Various aspects of language skills (receptive to written, oral register to academic register) have differing relationships with narrative and informational writing achievement across development. In this study, we…