Studies on the reading acquisition of deaf children investigate the similarities and differences in the reading process between these readers and typical hearing readers. There is no consensus on the nature of the reading process among deaf readers, whether they use the same reading processing strategies as typical readers or depend on other…

We segment what we read into meaningful events, each separated by a discrete boundary. How does event segmentation during encoding relate to the structure of story information in long-term memory? To evaluate this question, participants read stories of fictional historical events and then engaged in a postreading verb arrangement task. In this…

A substantial amount of research has focused on children's reading development and reading problems, but in comparison there has been relatively little research into children's reading comprehension. This article provides an overview of the research that has investigated the skills and cognitive processes that support children's understanding of…

To build a coherent accurate mental representation of a text, readers routinely validate information they read against the preceding text and their background knowledge. It is clear that both sources affect processing, but "when" and "how" they exert their influence remains unclear. To examine the time course and cognitive…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine the effect(s) of syntactic knowledge and syntactic awareness on adolescents' reading comprehension. Method: One hundred and seventy-nine, 9th and 10th grade students' syntactic awareness, syntactic knowledge and reading comprehension skills were assessed. In addition, other known contributors to…

By using the eye-tracking method, the present study explores whether working memory capacity assessed via the second language (L2) reading span (L2WMC) as well as the operational span task (OSPAN) affects the processing of subject-extraction and object-extraction in Chinese-English bilinguals. Results showed that L2WMC has no effects on the…

Attempts to unify two major approaches to the study of text comprehension into a process model of causal reasoning which explains how readers discover the causal structure of a complicated text. Presents empirical evidence to support the model. (RS)

A study examined three variables derived from earlier research on comprehension and recall of narrative text: time in short-term memory; causal connections allowed; and referential connections allowed. Subjects, 84 randomly selected fourth graders in three suburban public elementary schools, read 8 short texts that each contained 4 embedded goals,…

The relationships between reading comprehension level, digit span, and short-term memory for Morse code-like temporal patterns were investigated. College students performed better when the first pattern was auditory. No relationship for college or fifth-grade students was found between digit span and accuracy in comparing patterns of tones.…

As part of a larger study of developmental deficits in the skills of automaticity of name retrieval, phonological awareness, and memory span and their role in reading disabilities, a study tested 13 average and 14 poor fourth-grade readers for digit and letter naming speed, phonological awareness, and digit span. Among the reading skills assessed…

A study investigated processing differences between metaphorical and literal versions of the same sentences. The purposes of the study were (1) to directly compare the on-line processing demands of metaphoric and nonmetaphoric sentences, and (2) to examine the consequences of such sentences for memory performance. The subjects were 39 college…

Explores differences in the prose recall of native English speakers and English as a second language learners reading in English. Meyer's content structure analysis was used to analyze the experimental reading passage and the recall paraphrases written about it. Suggests recommendations for future research and implications for reading instruction.…

A study examined basic reading skills among men in prison, comparing poor and adequate readers with respect to comprehension, decoding, short-term memory, and speech perception. Subjects, 88 inmates of normal intelligence, normal hearing, and no significant speech abnormalities, at a minimum-security prison, were given reading comprehension tests…

A study was conducted to evaluate children's ability to comprehend main ideas after reading connected discourse and to develop and validate a straightforward and intuitively simple system for identifying main ideas in prose. Three experimental passages were randomly selected from third and sixth grade social studies textbooks, and education…

A study investigated the hypothesis that mental imagery facilitates access to prior knowledge and therefore enhances the ability to infer and make text-relevant predictions. The subjects, 29 first grade and 29 third grade students, were randomly assigned to either an experimental group where they were instructed to make pictures in their head to…