This study aims to explore the relations of phonological awareness and rapid naming with efficient word reading. Our work builds on the strong evidence base of associations between phonological awareness, rapid naming, orthographic knowledge, and efficient word reading. Specifically, we tested a pathway linking phonological awareness to…

Cross-sectional studies have already addressed the question of the syllable's role in the first steps of reading acquisition--though with mixed results. To determine whether and when (1) syllables become units that drive the segmentation of and access to words and how (2) sublexical orthographic and phonological syllable frequency mediate the…

With the overwhelming "Anglocentric" or "alphabetocentric" science of reading, the current review aimed to add to the science of reading acquisition from the perspective of abugidic writing system, distinct from the well-research alphabetic writing system in multiple dimensions of orthographic complexity, as proposed by Daniels…

Background: Lexical properties such as orthographic neighbours have been shown to have an influence on reading and writing; however, this phenomenon is yet to be explored in the Southern Bantu languages. Objectives: We investigate the role of orthographic neighbourhood density and neighbourhood frequency in reading and spelling in Grade 3 isiXhosa…

Gender-fair language makes women and people of other genders, their interests, and achievements more visible. However, critics argue that gender-fair language impairs the comprehensibility and aesthetic appeal of texts. This study tests these assumptions specifically concerning the gender asterisk, a form of gender-fair language that makes people…

Children's ability to correctly name letters is a key predictor of later reading abilities and skills, but research on letter naming from Scandinavian orthographies is scarce. The aim of this study is to explore how child- and letter-related factors (i.e., gender, child name, phonemic awareness, letter position in the alphabet and frequency, and…

Orthographic knowledge (i.e., the knowledge of conventions of a written language) has been identified as a predictor of both basic and higher-level reading processes, however, mostly examined in a cross-sectional design. It remains unclear, whether and how orthographic knowledge contributes uniquely in explaining differences in the acquisition of…

The present study aimed to investigate whether and how Chinese single character reading and 2-character word reading can reflect somewhat different processes. Tasks of Chinese rapid automatized naming (RAN), morphological awareness, phonological awareness, orthographic knowledge, along with vocabulary knowledge and nonverbal intelligence tasks,…

The use of phonetic symbols in language teaching classrooms, as a bottom-up approach to pronunciation instruction, has been debated. This study investigates the perspectives of Turkish instructors of English as a foreign language on their use of phonetic symbols for teaching pronunciation at tertiary-level institutions. To explore this issue,…

While previous research has documented the unique aspects of Chinese dyslexia as compared to dyslexia in alphabetic scripts, it remains unclear whether the difference in Chinese literacy experiences influences the manifestation of Chinese dyslexia. The present article first reviews the characteristics of Chinese languages and scripts, including…

This study investigates the role of diglossic and orthographic features in reading comprehension in Arabic. Specifically, it probes the independent contribution of language, metalinguistic, and decoding skills in the spoken language and in Standard Arabic to reading comprehension in the "abjad" writing system of Arabic. A sample of 112…

This study sought to examine the influence of transcription skills, evaluated using graphonomic measures, on the proficiency of text generation in students attending primary schools in Spain. A longitudinal design was employed involving 278 Spanish students distributed across three cohorts (cohort 1: 1st-2nd-4th grade; cohort 2: 2nd-3rd-5th grade;…

Most printed Chinese words are compounds built from the combination of meaningful characters. Yet, there is a poor understanding of how individual characters contribute to the recognition of compounds. Using a megastudy of Chinese word recognition (Tse et al., 2017), we examined how the lexical decision of existing and novel Chinese compounds was…

English-speaking children and adults generate "orthographic skeletons" (i.e., preliminary orthographic representations) solely from aural exposure to novel words. The present study examined whether skilled readers generate orthographic skeletons for all novel words they learn or do so only when the words have a unique possible spelling.…

This article delves into the multifaceted nature of the placenta, both as a physiological organ and a cultural symbol, through personal narrative, Indigenous-feminist scholarship, and scientific inquiry. Beginning with the author's pregnancy experience and reflections on birth practices, it navigates the placenta's role in childbirth, its cultural…