In this study, we examined whether Chinese character structure influenced readers' saccadic targeting in Chinese reading. Readers' eye movements were recorded when they read single sentences containing one-character or two-character target words. Both the one-character words and the two constituent characters of two-character words either had a…

Two experiments investigated the role of capacity in children's comprehension of relative clause sentences. Sentences varied in number of participant roles, focus (object, subject), and embeddedness (center-embedded, right-branching). Center-embeddedness and object-focus were expected to constrain individuals toward assigning more nouns to their…

A battery of reading tests designed to identify the component skills involved in reading comprehension was administered to 624 sixth grade students in the metropolitan Sydney (Australia) schools. Factor analysis of the data showed that knowledge of word meanings, sentence comprehension, and semantic context are experimentally identifiable…

The reports of research in this monograph reflect 18 years of observation of the behaviors of children learning to read in New Zealand schools. The first section of the monograph urges teachers to look more closely at language behaviors in their classrooms to see how children go about the tasks set before them. The second section reports on…