The conference papers in this collection emphasize the theoretical significance of their authors' work in the areas of mathematical and cognitive psychology. Major topics considered include facilitation of problem solving; psychological differences among problem isomorphs; the process of understanding in problem solving; processing information for…

Classroom management procedures instituted to alleviate reading difficulties are not the answer and only tend to confuse the real problems. (JH)

Skilled readers read passages while their eye movements were monitored. Certain critical words were changed by the computer as the eye was in motion. Subsequent data indicated how wide the area is from which a reader acquires information during a fixation in silent reading. (Author/BJG)

The suspicion that some second language learners' problems in reading can be attributed to a lack of literacy in general rather than to a lack of fluency in English per se motivated the present study. The hypothesis suggests that readers learn literacy only once and that a lack of literacy in one's first language can be more of a barrier to…

This book examines the nature and processes of reading in a foreign language and the implications for instruction and teacher training. The questions are addressed in five parts as follows: (1) the case for foreign language literacy, which includes a discussion of objectives, other language learning skills, shifting emphasis and reading readiness;…

For many years dyslexia has been incorrectly applied to those who have demonstrated difficulty in learning to read. Given the proper guidance and opportunities for becoming sensitive to demonstrations of the workings of language and engaging their minds in learning, many students will overcome their so-called learning disabilities. However, there…

Reading instruction is on the verge of a shift to a new paradigm that will be based on a new understanding of cognitive processes and will include five important tenets: (1) the best way to promote the emergence of reading behavior is to use interesting story books; (2) the primary cause of reading problems is too much instruction, too much…

The procedures described in this report are designed to help students both develop and apply effective behaviors for understanding expository text by means of gloss--a technique that involves the use of marginal notes and other intratext notations to direct readers' attention to places in the text where the application of specific skills and…

A study investigated the degree to which elementary school reading teachers understood the reading process. Thirty teachers were asked to respond to four questions: (1) Have you ever thought about what you do when you read? (2) Have you ever thought about how meaning is represented in written language? (3) When you are reading, what do you do when…

The failure of readability formulas can be attributed to three weaknesses in the formulas. First, they ignore or violate current knowledge about the reading process. Most formulas affect only sentence length and word difficulty while ignoring factors that influence text comprehensibility, such as cohesion, the number of inferences required, the…

A study analyzed the cohesive elements found within a text and the difficulty of their resolution within a particular text structure. The specific cohesive form used was pronominal reference. Each of forty-four students in grades ten through twelve was asked to read, sentence by sentence, a text which contained pronouns and pronoun referents. They…

Cognitive psychology has provided an information processing model that distinguishes between input processes such as listening to speech or reading and output processes such as speaking or writing. It is useful for spelling reformers to consider reading (input) and writing (output) processes separately, because the demands of the reader and of the…

Twenty college students, ten each in the experimental and control groups, were the subjects of an experiment designed to demonstrate that integration of verb meanings occurs in connected discourse. Six paragraph-length stories, each of which included one or two critical sentences containing a general verb, were presented orally to the subjects.…

One hundred twelve college students participated in a study designed to determine whether students differ in their relative employment of knowledge-based processes in discourse processing and whether individuals tend to be more "text-bound" and less able to use preexisting knowledge schemata when they are more "stimulus-bound"…