Reading involves mapping combinations of a learned visual code (letters) onto meaning. Previous studies have shown that when visual word recognition is challenged by visual degradation, one way to mitigate these negative effects is to provide "top-down" contextual support through a written congruent sentence context. Crowding is a…

The morphological structure of complex words impacts how they are processed during visual word recognition. This impact varies over the course of reading acquisition and for different languages and writing systems. Many theories of morphological processing rely on a decomposition mechanism, in which words are decomposed into explicit…

Learning new words is fundamental in both first and second-language reading. There are, however, divided opinions on the best instructional approaches. Two widely used approaches across languages are whole-word focus and word-constituent focus. The appropriateness of each approach has varied historically, even within a single language (e.g., the…

The latest version of the connectionist dual process model of reading (CDP++.parser) was tested on a set of nonwords, many of which were orthographically strange (e.g., PSIZ). A grapheme-by-grapheme read-out strategy was used because the normal strategy produced many poor responses. The new strategy allowed the model to produce results similar to…

To learn to read, the brain must repurpose neural systems for oral language and visual processing to mediate written language. We begin with a description of computational models for how alphabetic written language is processed. Next, we explain the roles of a dorsal sublexical system in the brain that relates print and speech, a ventral lexical…

The statistical structure of a given language likely drives our sensitivity to words' morphological structure. The current work begins to investigate to what degree morphological processing effects observed in visual word recognition can be attributed to statistical regularities between orthography and semantics in English, without any prior…

Several studies have shown that narratives can influence readers' beliefs about themselves. In the present study, our goal was to investigate whether stories portraying a strong protagonist can positively influence recipients' beliefs of being in control of events in their own lives (self-related control beliefs). Experiment 1 showed that…

The visual complexity of orthographies varies across writing systems. Prior research has shown that complexity strongly influences the initial stage of reading development: the perceptual learning of grapheme forms. This study presents a computational simulation that examines the degree to which visual complexity leads to grapheme learning…

Learning to read in any language requires learning to map among print, sound and meaning. Writing systems differ in a number of factors that influence both the ease and the rate with which reading skill can be acquired, as well as the eventual division of labor between phonological and semantic processes. Further, developmental reading disability…

Through computational modeling, here we examine whether visual and task characteristics of writing systems alone can account for lateralization differences in visual word recognition between different languages without assuming influence from left hemisphere (LH) lateralized language processes. We apply a hemispheric processing model of face…

The authors examine the implications of research on Chinese for theories of reading and propose the lexical constituency model as a general framework for word reading across writing systems. Word identities are defined by 3 interlinked constituents (orthographic, phonological, and semantic). The implemented model simulates the time course of…

Senior scientists representing a variety of research-oriented disciplines examine the reading process. Among the topics discussed are visual perception, the processing of written information, models for reading and speech, the relationship of spelling to sound, and areas of needed research. Also discussed are the influences of grammatical…

There appear to be two basic theories about the relationship of written language to oral language and the relationship of writing to reading. The first theory views written language as a derivative of oral language and as an alternate but parallel form of oral language. The pedagogical implications of this model suggest that the problems of…

A schema developed for the teaching of reading involves five factors: learning, language, clues, mediums of communication, and adaptive processes. Learning involves four tasks, taught in the following sequence: comprehension, comparison of semantic shapes, composition of the whole into parts, and concentration. There are four general language…

This discussion focuses on reading problems arising when bilingual children must learn two different scripts, and how the nature of the relationship between the two scripts may influence the child's ability to transfer and develop reading skills. First, models of normal and abnormal reading in English are described. The significance of these…