Reading in a Moving Text‐window: Differences Between Fast and Slow Adult Readers

Abstract

Abstract Elbro, C. & Christoffersen, J. 1988. Reading in a Moving Text‐window: Differences Between Fast and Slow Adult Readers. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research 32, 141‐151. Most advanced reading courses place a strong emphasis on activities enhancing visual perception. In order to test the underlying ‘perceptual’ hypothesis against a more ‘conceptually’ oriented hypothesis about fast reading, a group of slow readers and a group of fast readers were selected from students who had participated in a reading course at university level. They read four texts in a moving text‐window, i.e. a computer‐based system which displays the text through a small window that moves across the screen in the normal reading direction. The results replicated those from earlier studies in that the subjects did not read any more efficiently with 26 letters than with 16 letters visible at one time. Only the fast readers read more efficiently with a whole page visible at one time. The results favour a conceptual rather ...