The objective of this paper is to review and synthesize two interrelated topics in the adult metacomprehension literature: the bases of metacomprehension judgment and the constraints on metacomprehension accuracy. Our review shows that adult readers base their metacomprehension judgments on different types of information, including experiences…

This study investigated the role of executive function in children with attention deficit disorders (ADD) by comparing differences resulting when diagnostic measures of reading comprehension consisting of either short or long passages were used. Subjects (all in grades 1-12) were grouped as having an attention deficit disorder (ADD) and not taking…

This article presents theoretical reflections and empirical data on metacognitive aspects of memory and reading problems in children with reading comprehension disabilities. A distinction is made between metacognitive awareness and metacognitive control processes. Experimental results suggest that poor comprehenders present less adequate…

The ability of 54 learning-disabled high-school students to monitor their comprehension was compared under three prereading conditions: self-questions only, structured overviews and self-questions, and a control condition. Subjects receiving both the overviews and self-questions were best able to detect errors during reading. (Author/DB)

The study compared the effectiveness of providing elementary students with learning disabilities with either (1) instruction in both story structure and self-questioning techniques or (2) just training in story structure identification. The combined self-questioning and story structure group demonstrated the greatest gains in reading…

This study examined the effects of teaching prelingually deaf, elementary school children specific strategies to use when reading. Strategies addressed the skills of inferring, predicting, analyzing, attending, associating, synthesizing, and monitoring. Five of six children made significant gains in both reading levels and specific metacognitive…

This study used a longitudinal design to examine the possibility of a causal link between metacognitive knowledge and reading performance across time in a group of grade 2 Australian children (1989 cohort, N=100; 1990 cohort, N=90) with and without learning disabilities. Revaluation between 1 and 2 years later found: no relationship between…

Because current research offers little conclusive evidence that explicit metacognitive knowledge is necessary for effective reading, a study was designed to determine (1) if comprehension could be enhanced by activating subjects' awareness of appropriate strategies, and (2) which strategies, based on subjects' spontaneous reports, were most…

Examines the relationships between metamemory and strategic behavior in impulsive and reflective children. Children in three experimental groups received (1) prose summarization instructions; (2) summarization instructions in conjunction with meta-cognitive training about the importance of a reflective approach to learning; or (3) no instructions.…

Evaluation of the metacognitive strategies used by four upper elementary gifted students with reading disabilities during a reading comprehension think-aloud task found that, although the students monitored their reading and reported use of evaluation, paraphrase, and regulation metacognitive strategies, they were not proficient in these…

Learning-disabled and average readers (n=120) from grades four through six completed comprehension questions under one of four treatment conditions. Results indicated that computer-mediated text was no better than off-line conditions in improving learning-disabled readers' comprehension. Attribution and metacognitive sophistication were…

Evaluation of a metacognitive reading program with 13 learning-disabled children in grades 3 and 4 found that students increased in performance and awareness of strategies from pre- to posttesting. Differences were also observed between different clusters of students with defensive, pessimistic, or realistic self-concepts. (DB)

Examines reading awareness and comprehension skills to discover the developmental and instructional relationships between metacognition and performance. Half of the third- and fifth-grade subjects received four months of classroom instruction on reading strategies. Results of pre- and posttests and interviews revealed that the instruction…

Aimed at improving the methodology used in comprehension research, this paper analyzes the designs and interpretations of intervention training studies and suggests the implications of that analysis for future research. It points out that the typical training approach, deriving data from three sources--comprehension tests administered to older…

The expert-novice paradigm, which demonstrates the outstanding role of domain-specific knowledge in explaining differences in memory behavior and performance, was examined. Two studies are described which compared memory performance of groups equivalent with regard to domain-specific knowledge but differing in intellectual ability. The hypothesis…