Elucidates the reading problems of nonnative English speakers, noting reasons for the problems, giving signs of the problems, and demonstrating results of the problems. (HOD)

Describes cultural bias at four levels: lexico-syntactic, content and concepts, social and cognitive, and schematic or frame of reference. A study is described which provides examples of cultural bias in reading comprehension items because of a mismatch between the culture of the test item and that of the test taker.

Studies how children negotiate the meaning of literature by examining how they responded when given the opportunity to retell a story directly after hearing it. (DF)

Compares the processing of English words by Chinese-English bilinguals with that of monolingual English speakers. Subjects read and rated English words for their contribution to sentence structure and meaning. It was found that bilinguals generally rated English words as contributing more to sentence structure and meaning than did monolinguals.…

Discusses the active contribution a learner/user must make in using a dictionary and breaks the look-up process into seven main steps. (EKN)

Summarizes a study of advanced ESL university students from eight first-language backgrounds and discusses the proficiency differences found between several groups in processing two types of information patterns in written English. Suggests possible variables in cognitive strategies and skills related to the students' different cultural/linguistic…

Investigates adult second language learners' processing of English syntactically ambiguous sentences in which a prepositional phrase is interpreted as either a noun phrase or verb phrase attachment. Results reveal lexical, syntactic, prosodic, and contextual constraints on processing ambiguous sentences. (87 references) (Author/CK)

Notes that beginning foreign language learner-readers lack linguistic and cultural knowledge assumed in foreign language literary texts, gaps often resulting in possible "mismatches" between the readers' actual cognizance of linguistic and cultural norms and the level of understanding assumed in the foreign text. (40 references) (Author/CK)

Presents strategies for reading visual images. Illustrates how visual systems inform the process of listening for the meaning of foreign language words and phrases. Suggestions are provided on how these strategies apply to a larger curricular program that integrates media into its overall learning objectives. (35 references) (Author/CK)

Two experiments investigated the focusing properties of thematic roles, and a third examined the view that thematic role preferences reflect a focusing on the consequences of the represented event. Results focus on the structure of represented events, top-down and bottom-up processes, thematic hierarchies and pronoun comprehension. (35 references)…

Describes metacognitive processing strategies employed by nonnative readers of German who read and recalled authentic texts. Findings indicate that second-language readers of German engage in metacognition, using the following strategies: awareness of text format and attention to trivial detail, and an ability to monitor comprehension and identify…

In this study, we explored the relationship between beginning readers' phonological awareness and other aspects of phonological processing, specifically as manifested in short-term memory and comprehension tasks. The theoretical questions underlying the study were (a) what roles phonological processes play in children's beginning reading, from…

On-line comprehension studies of flexible word-order languages find that noncanonical ("scrambled") structures induce more difficulty than canonical structures [e.g., Hyona & Hujanen, "Q. J. Exp. Psychol." 50A (1997) 841-858], with this difference being attributed to the structural complexity/infrequency of these forms. However, by presenting…

Designed to improve reading comprehension and other complex verbal functions, fertile instruction in word skill focuses on improving accuracy of word knowledge, increasing fluency of access to meanings in memory, and enriching semantic network connections among related concepts. It is particularly appropriate for teaching the high frequency words…

Instructional models for foreign language reading and listening comprehension are outlined and synthesized, and an instructional procedure based on immediate recall, a standardized method for assessing first-language comprehension, is proposed. First, the interrelated processes of reading and listening comprehension, as currently defined in the…