Finds that perceptual identification of target words explicitly presented was significantly higher than that of new targets and that targets inferred to maintain coherence and targets predicted by the text were identified as well as explicit targets and significantly better than targets schematically appropriate to the text. (SR)

Reports on a study in which a display system controlled by eye movements of the reader was used to identify the area in a text from which information is collected during silent reading. Results indicated a perceptual span of 25 to 31 character positions for adult subjects. (MKM)

This study sought to develop a method for describing readers' perceptions of the topical organization of prose and to specify text features that determine perception of organization. A hierarchical clustering analysis was applied to high-school and college readers' judgments of the topical relatedness of sentences in two prose passages. This…

Fifteen college students read passages from a cathode-ray tube as their eye movements were monitored in a study that investigated the size of the visual region within which they used visual information to distinguish among letters as they read. (HOD)

Three factors in the reader have a generalized effect on all perception, including reading: competence, purpose, and set. Competence involves applying past learning to new learning through transference, understanding the conventions of different types of texts, and transforming the text through the perceptual process into a new entity. Competent…

It was hypothesized that college students' metacognitive behaviors would predict their reading achievement scores. Nelson-Denny Reading Tests scores were obtained for each of 66 students in undergraduate reading methods courses, and these students were asked to introspect about their behavior as they read an article related to course work.…

Reading in the writing classroom can be defined as a cluster of arbitrary categories, each with its own effect on the reading/writing process. Given this definition, it can be said that (1) perceptions significantly affect both reading and writing, (2) attitudes are factors in reading and writing, (3) rhetorical triangles are useful in teaching…

This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 21 titles deal with a variety of topics, including the following: children's development of syntactic aspects of reading comprehension, the relative contributions of the individual and the text in the comprehension and retention…