Discusses the schema theory which holds that any text does not carry meaning by itself; rather, a text only provides directions for readers as to how they should retrieve or construct meaning from their own previously acquired knowledge. Suggests applications of the theory to English as a second language reading pedagogy. (SED)

A study examining readers' ability to infer consequences backward and forward from events described in stories is described. Results show that backward consequence inferences are more reliably drawn during the course of reading than forward consequence inferences. (MSE)

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not children in grades two, four, and six make consistent use of Haviland and Clark's Given-New Strategy in visually and aurally comprehending presuppositive negatives. (HOD)

Presents three mini-essays reviewing progress made on three problems in text comprehension (two traditional and one newer problem): their relationship between sentence processes and text processes; individual differences in discourse comprehension; and the representation of multiple-text information, which exposes fresh views of problems of…

Studies the effectiveness of the keyword method of learning vocabulary employed by students with limited English proficiency (LEP). Finds this method appears to be effective in helping LEP students to recall word definitions rapidly and efficiently, to comprehend sentences, and to retain vocabulary learning over a one-week period. (NH)

Plaut and Booth developed a distributed connectionist model of written word comprehension and evaluated it against empirical findings on individual and developmental differences in semantic priming in visual lexical decision. Borowsky and Besner raised a number of challenges for this model. First, the model was not shown to be capable of…

In the influential "simple view of reading" (Gough & Tunmer, 1986), Reading Comprehension (R) = Decoding (D) x Linguistic Comprehension (C). To evaluate this model, this article explores the performance of 15-year-olds with severe reading delays. Results showed that D and C described reading comprehension better than D and verbal cognitive ability…

Language-related differences between discrepancy-defined and non-discrepancy-defined poor readers were examined in a three-year longitudinal study that began at school entry. The discrepancy-defined (dyslexic) poor readers (n = 19) were identified in terms of poor reading comprehension and average or above average listening comprehension…

This study investigated the relationship between reading comprehension development of 389 adolescents in their dominant language (Language 1 [L1], Dutch) and a foreign language (Language 2 [L2], English). In each consecutive year from Grades 8 through 10, a number of measurements were taken. Students' reading comprehension, their linguistic…

In order to test hypotheses derived from the concept that grammatical, syntactic, semantic, and contextual cues affect the degree of reading comprehension in a visual display, the present investigation was undertaken using the French language. The subjects were approximately 30 college students in a second-semester elementary French course. Five…

A study was conducted to determine how a reader identifies and represents the major topics in a text and their interrelationships. Subjects, 56 college students, read two texts one sentence at a time. Each text contained 12 paragraphs that discussed six attributes of two major topics. The paragraphs on one text were organized by attribute, while…

A study investigated at what point during eye fixations visual information is used in furthering the reading process. The study identified two aspects of information processing: registration, in which a light pattern on the retina triggers a pattern of neural activity in the visula cortex; and utilization, in which the registered pattern has an…

Addressing the question of how schools and teachers can foster an advanced level of reading awareness among secondary students, this paper focuses on the similarity in language used to describe recent research on both the composing process and comprehension as acts of constructing meaning. It presents a perspective on the reading/writing…

Two studies investigated the processing of metaphor, specifically (1) the extent to which metaphor is processed similarly to literal language and (2) the effects of the presence or absence of a specific context on processing. In the first study, 82 college students listened to one of four taped lectures, each containing 22 metaphors. The tapes…

The present paper describes results of a study that investigated 209 bilingual Puerto Rican college students' ability to solve verbal deductive reasoning problems administered in Spanish and English in relation to their reading comprehension skills in either language. A series of confirmatory factor analyses revealed that the data on reasoning and…