Notes that readers do not depend solely on the visual aspects of reading, but also make use of nonvisual understanding in decoding print. Among the nonvisual components of reading discussed are desiring knowledge, understanding the nature and purpose of reading, reading for meaning, and predicting an author's message. (MKM)

Fifth- and sixth-grade students were given reading passages of higher and lower interest and tested on their comprehension of these passages. Results revealed that higher interest materials significantly facilitated the reading comprehension of high ability students but had little effect on lower and middle ability students. (JD)

Reports on a study comparing four reading practice methods (sustained silent reading, programed textbooks, programed cassette tapes, and programed skill development kits) used with Upward Bound students. Sustained silent reading was found to be significantly more successful in improving educationally deprived students' literal and inferential…

Analyzes the process of reading philosophical works. Considers reflective reading a performative act in which the genuine reader enters into a dialogue, questions, recollects, and rereads. (PD)

Explores professional educators' responses to the research contributions of cognitive psychologists, psycholinguists, and educational psychologists in the area of reading comprehension. Some of the contributions discussed are schema theory, readability, anaphoric devices, and questioning. (HTH)

Indicates that comprehension was enhanced for sixth grade remedial readers when word recognition and pronunciation were drilled to mastery before a passage was read. (MKM)

Describes difficulties with nominalization and with the rhetoric of scientific papers experienced by English of Science and Technology (EST) students, relating nominalization occurrence to scientific rhetorical divisions. Finding significant differences in that-nominal construction frequency between rhetorical sections, suggests coordinating…

Reports on a study to determine whether questions asked prior to reading or questions asked before and after reading would improve elementary school students' word recognition and reading comprehension performance. Concludes that no significant differences existed in favor of the prequestion task on word recognition or comprehension performance.…

Concentrates on studies done in Germany that examine a reader's response to literature and applies three basic concepts of reception theory to children's literature. (HOD)

Reaction time to reading sentences which were not clearly interrelated was longer when a paragraph was titled to give it to more discourse (paragraph) level meaning. The presence of titles had no effect on reaction times for meaningful paragraphs, however. (CP)

The ability to determine what a main idea is and to identify supporting details are two concerns which are effectively integrated in a high school reading/writing program that aims at improved communication, increased skills use, and preparation for survival. (Author/KC)

Details an investigation into the relationships between reading attitude, reading comprehension, and mental imagery. Concludes that there are significant correlations between reading attitude and mental imagery and between reading comprehension and reading attitude, but that there is no significant relationship between reading comprehension and…

Concludes that there is a general language comprehension deficit in poor readers. (DD)

Reports on research designed to determine the development in comprehension of selected pronoun-referent structures. Some of the conclusions were that noun phrase pronominal structures were easier to comprehend than sentential pronominals and that structures with forward reference were easier to comprehend than those with backward reference. (MKM)

Expands D. Durkin's definition of reading comprehension instruction, reanalyzes several observational studies of comprehension instruction, and concludes that an alternative and more plausible definition of comprehension instruction than that used by Durkin leads to a much higher estimate of the time teachers devote to comprehension instruction.…