Examined whether instruction on a single structure (the relative clause, the appositive, and the infinitive nominal) would alter frequency of use or global syntactic complexity and whether this instruction lasted beyond the immediate posttest. (HOD)

Compares cohesive ties and chains in the good and poor essays of college freshmen. Results indicate that longer chains, greater variety of words, and greater maturity or word choice characterize good writing. (SRT)

Investigates the question of T-unit length stability in informative discourse written by freshmen near the end of an intensive course in college writing. (HOD)

Analyzes writing samples of 22 first graders and 13 second graders to determine how children learn the rules of punctuation. Finds they develop necessary hypotheses which are alternative to the standard end-sentence period placement rule. Suggests young "language scientists" need opportunities to practice this innate trade: rule formation. (NH)

Describes a sequence of four studies that explored how people composed sentences while writing expository essays. Among the findings were that the sentence composition process was often guided by a writing plan, and the most frequent changes accomplished by revision of parts were word choice, aspect of meaning, and grammatical structure. (HOD)

Reports on a study that examined the development of audience-adapted writing skills between the end of elementary school and the beginning of college, concluding that all students demonstrated sensitivity to the needs of a young reader. (HOD)

Investigates the relative effectiveness of two adjunct questioning techniques employed to increase writers' elaboration. (HOD)

The sentence structure in 64 academic journals representing the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and engineering was examined to determine (1) what structures are common to all academic writing, (2) the range of variation within academic writing, and (3) the extent to which sentence structure differs in the academic areas. (HOD)

Investigates the effects of writing ability and mode of discourse on cognitive capacity engagement across three stages of the composing process, noting that writing ability differentially affected cognitive capacity engagement across discourse modes when using the secondary-task method. (HOD)

Investigates the relationship between topic-specific background knowledge and measures of overall quality, coherence, syntactic complexity, audience, and function in the expository writing of tenth grade students. (HOD)