Relations between morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge and word reading in different orthographies and scripts: Evidence from Africa and Asia

Unpacking the relation between morphological awareness and Chinese word reading: Levels of morphological awareness and vocabulary

A golden triangle? Reciprocal effects among morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge, and reading comprehension in Chinese children

ABSTRACTAn in-depth exploration of the associations of two aspects of morphological awareness in Chinese—homophone awareness and lexical compounding awareness—to Chinese word reading and vocabulary knowledge was the primary focus of the present study. Among 154 9-year-old Hong Kong Chinese children, both lexical compounding and homophone awareness were significantly associated with word reading (r = .54 for compounding, r = .38 for homophones) and vocabulary knowledge (r = .41 for compounding, r = .53 for homophones). However, with autoregressors additionally statistically controlled, homophone awareness remained uniquely associated with vocabulary but not word reading; lexical compounding was uniquely associated with both word reading and vocabulary. Path analyses best illustrated this pattern. Both morphological awareness constructs are likely bidirectionally associated with word reading and vocabulary knowledge. However, homophone awareness is more centrally associated with vocabulary knowledge because it taps specific, existing morpheme knowledge. In contrast, lexical compounding requires structural understanding of one's language, which seems to be helpful for both learning to read and vocabulary acquisition in Chinese.

Transfert de la conscience morphologique de l’arabe langue première au français langue seconde au cours des trois premières années d’apprentissage

Reciprocal effects of morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge, and word reading: A cross-lagged panel analysis in Chinese

Background: Reading comprehension is a complex skill rooted in language, and significant research has concentrated on identifying metalinguistic abilities that can predict children's comprehension skills. Morphological awareness is one such skill. Within the theoretical framework of reading comprehension, Perfetti, Landi, and Oakhill (2005) proposed that morphology serves a dual function in the text. In the first capacity, morphology is regarded as an integral part of the vocabulary system, indirectly enhancing text comprehension by aiding in the reading of intricate words. In the second capacity, morphology is viewed as a component of the linguistic system, directly impacting reading comprehension by influencing general comprehension processes. Objectives: This study aimed to examine the interconnection among vocabulary proficiency, morphological awareness, and reading comprehension in elementary school students in the Persian language, utilizing the theoretical framework proposed by Perfetti and Landi in their reading comprehension model. Additionally, it sought to construct a structural model of reading comprehension tailored to third-, fourth-, and fifth-grade students in Persian, drawing inspiration from the model introduced by Levesque et al. (2017). Methods: This research adopted a quantitative approach and was carried out using a cross-sectional methodology in Tehran in 2023. The population consisted of 180 students aged between 9 and 11 years. Data collection encompassed a questionnaire that gathered personal information from the students, along with their scores on assessments related to vocabulary knowledge, morphological awareness (comprising production and decomposition subtests), and reading comprehension tests. Results: Among the Persian-speaking students across all three grades, a significant positive correlation was identified between vocabulary knowledge and morphological awareness, vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension, and morphological awareness and reading comprehension (P < 0.01). Conclusions: This study revealed that morphological awareness has varying effects on reading skills among Persian-speaking students. In the third grade, it notably influences fluent reading, while in the fourth and fifth grades, it plays a significant role in enhancing text comprehension. As a result, it is imperative to incorporate instruction on morphological awareness, encompassing both decomposition and production aspects, into Persian language textbooks, with particular emphasis on grades 3 through 6.

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the relation between morphological awareness on reading comprehension is moderated by multisyllabic word reading ability in fifth-grade students (N = 169, 53.7% female, 65.2% minority status, 69.2% free/reduced lunch status), oversampled for poor reading skill, when controlling for general knowledge and vocabulary. Based on the lexical quality hypothesis, it was expected that morphological awareness would have a stronger effect on comprehension for children with poor word reading skills, suggesting possible use of morphological awareness for word identification support. Results indicated that neither morphological awareness nor word reading was uniquely associated with reading comprehension when both were included in the model along with vocabulary and general knowledge. Instead, the interaction between word reading and morphological awareness explained significant additional variance in reading comprehension. By probing this interaction, it was determined that the effect of morphological awareness on reading comprehension was significant for the 39% of the sample that had more difficulty reading multisyllabic words but not for students at the higher end of the multisyllabic word reading continuum. We conclude from these results that the relation between morphological awareness and reading comprehension is moderated by multisyllabic word reading ability, providing support for the lexical quality hypothesis. Although we have only correlational data, we suggest tentative instructional practices for improving the reading skill of upper elementary struggling readers.

This study investigates the shared, independent, and interactive effects of metalinguistic skills (phonological awareness, morphological awareness, and orthographic knowledge) to word reading with a sample of struggling adult readers. Controlling for vocabulary knowledge, a second-order latent factor of metalinguistic awareness accounted for unique variance (62.5%) in adults’ word reading skills. Two-way latent interactions between the metalinguistic skills (phonological awareness × morphological awareness, morphological awareness × orthographic knowledge, and phonological awareness × orthographic knowledge) revealed unique interactive contributions (1%–5.2%) of these skills to word reading controlling for the metalinguistic skill main effects and vocabulary knowledge. In particular, high levels of morphological awareness are critical to word reading irrespective of high or low phonological awareness and orthographic knowledge. In addition, higher phonological awareness skills are critical to word reading irrespective of high or low orthographic knowledge. These results indicate the importance as well as the complexity of the nature of metalinguistic skills underlying word reading for struggling adult readers. The theoretical, empirical, and applied implications of these findings are discussed in the context of researchers and practitioners invested in improving outcomes in adult literacy programs.

The present study investigated the co-occurrence of word reading and spelling difficulties for Chinese first language (L1) and English second language (L2) and the role of morphological awareness in word reading and spelling ability across two languages. A total of 110 Hong Kong Chinese-speaking students in Grade 7, including 55 adolescents with dyslexia (28 males, mean age = 152.11 months) and 55 typically developing adolescents (27 males, mean age = 151.85 months) participated. They were assessed on the cognitive-linguistic measures of morphological awareness, phonological awareness, vocabulary knowledge, rapid naming, word reading, and word spelling in L1 and L2. Multivariate analysis of variance showed that compared with the typical students, adolescents with dyslexia had poorer performance in all L1 and L2 measures except the phonological awareness in Chinese. Hierarchical regression analysis indicated that for both groups of students, morphological awareness contributed uniquely to word reading and spelling in L1 and L2; rapid letter naming contributed uniquely to English word spelling. Findings highlight the importance of co-occurring difficulties in L1 and L2 reading and spelling and that morphological awareness may play a critical role in predicting word reading and spelling across languages for Chinese adolescents with dyslexia and those without difficulty.

This study aims to explore the contributions of phonological awareness (PA) and morphological awareness (MA) to the reading comprehension skills of Chinese-speaking children with hearing loss (HL) and examine the possible mediation effect of vocabulary knowledge on the relationships of PA and MA with their reading comprehension. The participants were 28 Chinese-speaking children with HL, who were followed from Grade 1 through Grade 2. They were administered a series of tests that measured their PA and MA at the beginning of Grade 1, vocabulary knowledge at the end of Grade 1, and reading comprehension at the end of Grade 2. MA significantly accounted for additional variance in reading comprehension beyond the effect of PA but not vice versa. Both PA and MA contributed uniquely to vocabulary knowledge, which completely mediated the relationships of PA and MA with reading comprehension. PA and MA are both essential to the development of vocabulary knowledge and reading comprehension in Chinese-speaking children with HL; however, MA seems to be more important than PA in their reading comprehension. PA and MA significantly affect children's reading comprehension through their influence on vocabulary knowledge. This study has replicated previous evidence on the importance of PA, MA, and vocabulary knowledge in the reading comprehension of children with typical hearing, and has extended its significance to children with HL. In addition, the findings have the potential to inform educational practitioners regarding the importance of teaching essential reading skills to Chinese-speaking children with HL.

A growing body of cross-linguistic research has suggested that morphological awareness plays a key role in both L1 and L2 word reading among bilingual readers. However, little is known about the interaction and development of L1 and L2 morphological awareness in relation to word reading. We addressed this issue by evaluating the unique contributions of L1 Chinese and L2 English morphological awareness to word reading in both Chinese and English across Grades 2 (N = 150), 5 (N = 158), and 8 (N = 159) Hong Kong Chinese–English bilingual children. Children completed five tasks of Chinese morphological awareness which tapped for compounding awareness, homophone awareness, homographic awareness, semantic radical awareness, and affix awareness, and six English morphological judgment and analogy tasks that assessed morphological awareness at three levels: inflection, derivation, and compounding. English phonological awareness, Chinese and English vocabulary, and nonverbal ability were measured as controls. Word reading was assessed in both languages. Within-language analyses revealed that Chinese morphological awareness accounted for 27, 22, and 12% of unique variances in Chinese word reading above the control measures in Grades 2, 5, and 8 respectively. In contrast, English morphological awareness explained small but significant unique variances in English word reading, i.e., 4, 8, and 2%, across Grades 2, 5, and 8 respectively. Critically, there were cross-language influences: Chinese morphological awareness explained 4% of unique variance in English word reading in Grade 2 after controlling for IQ, English vocabulary, English phonological awareness, and English morphological awareness; English morphological awareness explained significant variances in Chinese word reading, i.e., 4, 3, and 4% in Grades 2, 5, and 8 respectively, after the relevant controls. These findings suggest a bi-directional cross-language transfer of morphological awareness to word reading in L1 Chinese and L2 English. However, the direction of its transfer may be constrained by some language-specific morphological features.

Character and word reading in Chinese: Why and how they should be considered uniquely vis-à-vis literacy development

Understanding how words are formed is a crucial component of learning new words. A child’s ability to manipulate the morphological elements of words is related to their subsequent vocabulary development. Morphological awareness can also enhance learning new syntactic and semantic properties of morphologically complex words to meet the demands of language production. However, there is a dearth of research on how receptive-productive morphological awareness is acquired, especially in an EFL context. This study used a quantitative design to explore the nature of morphological awareness in 104 Thai primary school students and to investigate the relationships between receptive-productive morphological awareness and vocabulary knowledge. All participants were given six measures of morphological awareness and two vocabulary knowledge tasks. The results revealed the close relationship between the students’ morphological awareness and vocabulary knowledge, both receptively and productively. The results also indicated that Thai primary school students’ morphological awareness grows gradually along the receptive and productive continuum and that morphological knowledge is learned at varying rates and improves with learners’ increased education levels. Indeed, all aspects of morphological awareness contributed to receptive and productive vocabulary knowledge. Overall, the current study highlighted the importance of the word family construct for teaching and learning morphologically complex words. It was also shown that morphological awareness is a crucial mechanism for vocabulary acquisition and growth and a facilitative scaffold for forming morphologically complex words.

A reciprocal relationship between syntactic awareness and reading comprehension

This study tested 98 and 95 kindergartners (ages 4-5) living in rural and urban communities, respectively, for one year to examine the contributions of semantic knowledge at a word level (vocabulary knowledge) and at a morpheme level (morphological construction awareness) to listening and reading comprehension in Korean. Results showed that children living in urban community performed better than those living in rural area at Time 1 in many tasks such as word reading, CV (consonant + vowel) Gulja reading, coda deletion, number naming speed, whereas the differences were not found at Time 2. Regression analyses showed that morphological awareness and CV Gulja reading at Time 1 uniquely explained listening comprehension at Time 2, and vocabulary and Gulja reading at Time 1 explained reading comprehension at Time 2. Results suggest that vocabulary and morphological awareness contribute to reading and listening comprehension over and above phonological awareness and cognitive-linguistic skills.