Results from two experiments with college students indicate that better readers evaluate information in a paragraph with respect to its relevance to the paragraph topic, processing topical information at the expense of nontopical concepts. (AA)

Investigated within-sentence contextual constraints in a sentence-completion task completed by 408 students from grade 6. (AA)

Recent research within the framework of existential sociolinguistics is reviewed, and its implications for the interpretative processes of reading are discussed. It is argued that comprehension through language is based largely on the role that the assumptions of the speaker and the social expectations of the hearer play in symbolic interaction.…

Emphasizing environmental, situational, and social variables that influence behavior, this paper conceptualizes a behavioral model of comprehension anchored in the assumption that the majority of behaviors are learned or alterable through learning procedures. (Author/DS)

Supports Frederiksen's (1975) model of the structure of text and of memory through a study of the effects of manipulation of four aspects of text structure with community college and Ivy League subjects. (AA)

A series of experiments was reported in which three models of word identification were evaluated: the direct-semantic-access model, the visual-features stage model, and the phonemic-recoding stage model. A modified Stroop task was used to contrast these three models. (Editor/RK)

The primary research question in this study was whether good and poor readers differ in their use of orthographic and contextual information available in printed text. (HOD)

Reviews research establishing the pervasiveness of the teacher variable, and discusses a new hypothesis for reading teacher research--that both the teaching and the learning of reading are theoretically based. (JM)

This paper describes four writing systems and discusses research on phonetic coding, eye movements, and cortical processing in English, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean scripts. Research on word recognition in English, Japanese Kanji and Kana, and Korean Hangul are presented. (Author/MT)

Reports a study indicating that decoding speed and spelling are distinguishing factors in reading comprehension, but that differences in comprehension cannot be attributed solely to differences in decoding speed. (HTH)

Describes research in which a group of proficient speakers of a second language were tested in their ability to identify individual words taken from spoken discourse in both their native language and their second language. Results show that, on the average, they were more proficient in identifying words in their second rather than their first…

Three studies conducted to examine individual differences among 6- and 7-year-olds in the extent of use of alternative cognitive processes for word reading supported the expectation that boys tended to rely more than girls of the same reading level on access to phonological segments of words. (Author/CB)

Reports on a study which examined children's and adults' use of text structure and content schemata in isolation and as they interact. Indicates that subjects' ability to select appropriate schemata supported the validity of both schema types. Also finds that structure and content schemata interact with schooling and text to influence processing…

Indicates that subjects spent more time reading important information than unimportant information and that, when processing time was limited, extra cognitive effort was allocated to accomplish the same result. Finds that important information was also recalled better, confirming the "levels effect." Reports three experiments supporting…

Commonalities and differences in the processing mechanism of analytic reading in English and Chinese orthography are compared. Although the phonological processing route is more prominent in English and the morphological route in Chinese, certain processing routes may be implicated in reading disorders. (Author/DB)