Critical Reading Research Articles

Impact of the Kangaroo mother care method on weight gain in premature newborns: systematic review

PurposeTo evaluate the impact of the Kangaroo Mother Care method on weight gain in premature newborns.MethodsA systematic review was conducted in scientific databases, including Pubmed, Cochrane, Web of Science, and Scopus, as well as clinically relevant articles from Dialnet and Cuiden. The search covered the period from January 1, 2018, to December 31, 2023, using keywords and boolean operators “AND” and “OR.”ResultsNine studies meeting the inclusion criteria and undergoing critical reading were included. Despite the high heterogeneity, the results underscore the global relevance of the Kangaroo Mother Care Method, demonstrating that this method positively impacts weight gain in newborns. Additionally, the positive influence of breastfeeding and kinesthetic stimulation on the weight of these preterm infants was observed.ConclusionsThe Kangaroo Mother Care method significantly benefits preterm newborns, improving weight gain. Breastfeeding and kinesthetic stimulation combined with KMC further enhance the benefits regarding the weight of preterm infants. These findings highlight the need for broader adoption of Kangaroo Mother Care with standardized protocols.

Critical Peritextual Analysis: Critical Possibilities of Peritext in Books for Young Readers

“Peritext” refers to the components that make up the margins of a book, such as the front and back covers, the flap copy, the copyright page, the author’s note, the author and illustrator biographies, etc. In this essay, we call for readers of all ages to critically engage with the peritext. To that end, we present a framework grounded in critical literacy that we refer to as “Critical Peritextual Analysis” (CPA). This analytical tool can enable readers to rely on the peritext to engage in dialogues about power, perspective, culture, and justice. Using CPA in conjunction with critical content analysis, we examine the fringe elements in books across multiple formats, including board books, picturebooks, and early readers to demonstrate how this approach allows for more critical readings of texts. We offer CPA as a framework to enable adult and child readers alike to adopt a critical stance towards peritextual matter in order to foster critical literacy and advance justice-oriented readings of any children's books.

Bridging Theory and Practice: E-learning Strategies for Strengthening Critical Reading

Critical reading is that kind of reading which takes the reader beyond and beneath the surface meaning of what is written to the assumptions, arguments, and strategies behind them. The current study took place at Faculty of Education, Minia university, Egypt trying to explore the effectiveness of a blended e-learning program in improving English majors' critical reading skills. A sample from third year English majors consisting of 60 students were randomly assigned to two groups: a treatment and a control one, each consisting of 30 students. The treatment group was trained in a Blended E-Learning program based on genre discourse analysis, whereas the control group was taught the same content in a “Discourse Analysis” course through the conventional method of teaching. Tools of the study included two questionnaires, a Blended E-Learning training program, two pre-post-tests in the acquisition and use of critical reading skills, and the English Proficiency Examination for Egypt (EPEE). Equality between the treatment and the control groups was ensured by using t-value to analyze differences between the two groups on the control variables. The present study followed quasi-experimental research in an exploratory sequential mixed methods design. The treatment group and the control group were exposed to pre-post means of getting data. The treatment group was only instructed and trained through a Blended E-Learning program. The treatment lasted for one academic semester, six hours a week. Analysis of quantitative data obtained by students using (t-test - Point Biserial Correlation Coefficient - Pearson Correlation - Eta-Squared) and the sematic analysis of qualitative data revealed that the treatment group significantly surpassed the control group on the post tests of the acquisition and use of critical reading skills. Discussion of these findings, recommendations and suggestions for further research are presented.

Firearms analogies and settler colonialism in US nuclear deterrence strategy

Nuclear strategy has long been formulated through analogies. We focus on one in particular: guns. Early nuclear strategists in the United States used multiple analogical comparisons to make sense of the new, apparently unprecedented technology that confronted them. They compared nuclear deterrence to gun dueling and the nuclear revolution itself to the rise of gunpowder on European battlefields. Both analogies invoked empire, in the form of American settler frontier gunfights and the impact of firearms on European expansion. This article offers a critical reading of them. We show both analogies were historically flawed, relying on outdated accounts of how firearms shaped military-political change. Our argument proceeds in three stages. First, we document the role of gun analogies in early US nuclear strategic writing. Second, we critically evaluate the analogy, showing its historical and analytical limits. Drawing on firearms literatures in history, sociology, criminology, and economics, we show that much of what we now know about firearms diverges from nuclear theory and history. Third, we develop an alternative interpretation, contrasting these analytical fictions with the actual history of nuclear colonialism.

Disposable counterpublics: Women, queers, and Uyghurs in the White Paper Movement

Protesting China's zero-Covid policy and intensified state control, the White Paper Movement (TWPM) is often applauded as a landmark anti-authoritarian movement. This article disrupts the claim by examining how women, queers, and Uyghurs were represented and rhetorically positioned within TWPM and their implication for an intersectional politics in China's pro-democracy activism. Through a critical reading of media coverage and digital narratives, I introduce the concept of disposable counterpublics to characterize the dynamics in which the sufferings and efforts of multiply marginalized populations and protesters are persistently subsumed into a monolithic democratic agenda. Engaging with the scholarship on transnational and networked counterpublics, this study advances the conversations by illuminating the power dynamics within (counter)publics and the digitally mediated spaces where (counter)public negotiations unfold in a transnational setting.

Recentering Women in Judicial Decisions on Reproductive Practices

In the dynamic landscape of legal academia, narrative analysis emerges as an essential avenue of study. Narratives shape laws, policies, and societal norms, urging parties and observers to recognize the profound influence of stories in legal discourse. Yet, the role of storytelling, particularly within the nuanced sphere of court rulings, has been undertreated by legal scholars. This Article explores how storytelling converges with legal, ethical, and feminist perspectives in court, where narratives wield transformative power, offering a critical reading of the rhetoric and narrative structure in two court cases that address the constitutionality of restricted access to reproductive practices. The first, a ruling from the Supreme Court of Israel, Arad-Pinkas v. Committee for Approval of Embryo Carrying Agreements, establishes the eligibility of same-sex couples and single men for domestic surrogacy services after years of ineligibility. The second, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, holds that the right to abortion is no longer considered a fundamental right guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. This Article contends that the narratives underpinning legal proceedings are not mere rhetorical devices but wield ethical and practical significance, shaping society’s implicit image of women, their societal role, and the opportunities they are afforded. Through this analysis, this Article uncovers the underlying values, assumptions, and narratives that courts rely on and, perhaps more significantly, dismiss. Findings reveal tensions between women’s rights and competing interests—those of single men who rely on a woman’s body to achieve parenthood (in the Israeli case) and those of fetuses (in the Dobbs case). In both contexts, legal narratives centering these other figures are used to systematically downplay women’s interests, restrict their opportunities, and minimize their autonomy. This Article advocates for centering women in the legal narrative when discussing reproductive practices performed on women’s bodies. The failure to do so, it argues, causes far-reaching harm to women’s experiences and life opportunities. Lessons from both cases are relevant to ongoing and future advocacy fights and the women whose well-being depends on their outcomes.

The Dimension of and Paradoxical Thinking in the poetic experience of (Hamdi Sahibqiran)

This Research is titled "The Dimension of Conflict and Contradiction of Thinking in the Poetic Experience of Hamdi Sahebqran" and is dedicated to discussing a different and specific dimension in the history of Kurdish literature in the twentieth century؛ in particular, it presents a different and interesting dimension in the poetic experience of Hamdi Sahib Bakran, according to the historical method, and we can say that it is relatively new and less researched. In particular, it is to show the positive and negative images that the poet has created in his poems about the power and rule of Sheikh Mahmud, the British, and the political and social situation of the Kurdish community in southern Kurdistan at that time. It is a contradiction to the writing that preceded it and requires careful and in-depth critical reading to identify these fine lines. Reading the Diwan of Hamdi al-Sahib al-Bakran, we are faced with two types of opposing and contradictory ideas: one is to describe and praise a specific political authority of his time and praise his experience, and the other type is to oppose and oppose that political experience, and to look down on its leaders and officials and to question the entire history of that political experience. He also confronted and confronted the political and religious class of his time and revealed their shortcomings and shames without hesitation and ignored the dangers that these poems pose to his life.

Implikasi SEMA No. 2 Tahun 2023 terhadap Disparitas Cultus dalam Perspektif Undang-Undang Perkawinan dan Hukum Gereja Katolik

This paper focuses on an elaboration of the implications of SEMA No. 2 of 2023 for interfaith marriages/ Disparitas Cultus in Indonesia. The implications are raised from a discussion with the Republic of Indonesia Law on Marriage and the perspective of Catholic Church Law as seen in the Code of Canon Law. The methodology used is descriptive qualitative and critical reading of the text, namely: The Code of Canon Law that regulates Disparitas Cultus (especially Canon 1086, Canon 1125, Canon 1126, and other related canons) and Law Number 1 of 1974 article 2 paragraph (1) juncto article 66; and other related laws. The author finds that SEMA No. 2 Year 2023 raises quite complex issues. The complexity lies in the consequences. First, the state more explicitly does not recognize Disparitas Cultus marriages. Second, the state is not present to accommodate the interests of people who enter into Cult Disparity marriages. Third, there is a question of justice for those who continue to enter into these marriages. Fourth, the strong and fair foundation or motive of a legal decision is not raised.

Cultural reader and the representation of the margins: a critical reading of Olhos d’água by Conceição Evaristo

Este artigo analisa a Interação entre o conceito de leitor cultural e a obra Olhos d’água (2014), de Conceição Evaristo, com foco na representação das margens e suas implicações para a leitura crítica. O leitor cultural, cujas práticas de leitura são Influenciadas por seu contexto sociocultural e histórico, encontra nas narrativas de Evaristo uma provocação à reflexão sobre questões de identidade, raça, gênero e exclusão social. A pesquisa utiliza a metodologia de revisão de literatura e é amparada por teóricos como: Quijano (2005), no que se refere ao controle do trabalho e das margens. Gomes (2017), na conceituação do leitor cultural, e Hall (2003), em suas reflexões sobre identidade, entre outros. A pesquisa Investiga como as narrativas presentes na obra impactam o leitor, contribuindo para a formação do leitor mais consciente e engajado socialmente.

Semiperipheral Interventions into Post-Human Protagonist Trajectories: Disembodiment and Palimpsestic Be-Longing in Dukaj’s The Old Axolotl (2015) and Chabria’s Clone (2018)

ABSTRACT This article offers a critical reading of two speculative novels from the global semiperiphery: Jacek Dukaj’s The Old Axolotl (2015) from Poland and Priya Sarukkai Chabria’s Clone (2018) from India, focusing on their representations of (dis)embodied be-longing within post-human, speculative frameworks. We argue that while both novels articulate scenarios in which Donna Haraway’s cyborg world could be imagined, their posthuman potential remains unrealized, especially due to the ways that the characters’ gendered dis/embodiment comes about. Through a reading of be-longing, we examine the novels’ anthropocentrism, focusing on how humanness and gendered human bodies are presented. We read be-longing as a post-human feature (not a posthuman one) through a comparative discussion of both novels’ engagement with the recollection of “past times.” We argue that both novels tend to privilege anthropocentric frameworks, and although this is achieved differently in each novel, their visions of the future largely reproduce the present status quo. In our analysis, we identify common patterns across the two novels and crucially, we show how, through these patterns, an inability to propose and envision transhuman and posthuman scenarios that ethically and ontologically transcend the human condition is at play.

Silencing and Distancing: literary representations of strategies that negate meaningful engagement with environmental destruction and climate change

Through a close, critical reading of three novels that were published in 2021, this article will explore the ways in which authors expose how silencing and distancing are mobilized as discursive strategies that marginalize the voices of characters who are concerned about the impact of environmental destruction. The novels are Damnation Spring by Ash Davidson, The High House by Jessie Greengrass, and Something New Under the Sun by Alexandra Kleeman. These strategies create a false binary between ‘us’ and ‘them’, and they serve to scupper attempts at meaningful collective action against ecological damage. Through my engagement with the primary texts, I will demonstrate how gender, race, and class shape the construction of the voices that sound the alarm about harm to the natural world. Perceived differences (or distances) in terms of gender, race, and class enable community members to dismiss particular voices, and this mode of silencing facilitates the perpetuation of the status quo. In all three selected novels, the authors signal the dangers of maintaining the status quo by representing the impact of environmental degradation on both contemporary and future communities. The authors make it very clear that no amount of privilege will protect characters if their natural environments remain under anthropocentric attack.

A Collaborative Auto-ethnographic Study of Indonesian Higher Degree Research Students’ Adaptation in Anglophone Universities

Background: This research explores the experiences of Indonesian doctoral students in English-speaking universities through a collaborative auto-ethnographic approach. Utilising Schartner and Young's (2016) stress and coping strategies and culture-learning frameworks, we analyse narrative data to investigate our academic and sociocultural journeys in the US, UK, and Australia. Methodology: To attain a profound comprehension, we participate in personal and group introspection, analysis, and interpretation, utilising imaginative thought, creativity, emotional self-exploration, and ongoing dialogues. The study identifies four major psychological adaptation themes (social support, survival, spirituality, and compliance), a critical socio-cultural adaptation theme (feeling like cultural aliens), and a vital academic adaptation theme (questioning our academic capability amid struggles with critical reading and writing). Findings: The findings reveal three themes: Psychological Aspects: “Social Support, Survival, Spirituality, and Compliance”, Sociocultural Aspect: “We Are Cultural Aliens”, Academic Aspect: “Questioning Our Academic Capacity as We Struggled to Read and Write Critically”. Conclusion: The findings underscore the significance of awareness and emphasise the necessity for effective adaptation among international doctoral students. This research contributes valuable insights into the challenges faced by Indonesian doctoral students in Anglophone academic settings, shedding light on the importance of support systems, cultural understanding, and academic confidence stop where for a successful academic journey. Originality: While previous studies have largely examined the difficulties faced during adaptation, the way these challenges ultimately lead to successful outcomes remains under-explored. This research seeks to address this deficiency by investigating how Indonesian international research students in Anglophone universities convert cultural, psychological, and academic obstacles into successful adaptation.

Critical Reading: Which Measures Best Predict Academic Performance?

ABSTRACT This study evaluates which reading skills best determine academic performance in undergraduate students. We investigated how well Comprehension (H1), Vocabulary (H2), Metacognitive Awareness (H3), and Critical Reading (H4) predict GPA. Two samples of undergraduate students completed the study. The first sample (n = 100) was recruited in the first half of the semester; the second sample (n = 100) was recruited in the second half of the semester (Study 2 is a direct replication of Study 1). Across both samples, ACT Reading scores significantly predicted GPA. However, the subjective measures (Metacognitive Awareness and Critical Reading) did not predict GPA in either sample. Understanding which reading skills predict academic performance is important to determine which students are at risk so that universities can provide targeted services.

Effectiveness of visual, auditory, and kinesthetic reading techniques on students’ reading comprehension: A sensory comparative study in the context of higher education

Reading interest in Indonesia remains low, negatively affecting students' reading comprehension and productive skills such as writing and speaking. Although various reading techniques have been introduced, their relative effectiveness remains uncertain. This study compares the effectiveness of four reading techniques—read-aloud, read-type, read-memorize, and read-write—on students' comprehension levels. Employing a quasi-experimental design with a posttest-only control group, this research involved 80 fifth-semester students of the Indonesian Language and Literature Education Study Program at FKIP Pasundan University in the 2023/2024 academic year. The participants were randomly assigned to four treatment groups, each receiving one of the reading techniques. Comprehension was assessed using a standardized test consisting of 30 multiple-choice and short-answer questions based on Bloom’s taxonomy, supplemented by observation of student behavior during reading. Data were analyzed using ANOVA and followed by Tukey HSD post-hoc testing. The findings revealed that the read-write group achieved the highest comprehension scores, followed by read-type, while read-aloud and read-memorize showed lower and statistically insignificant differences. Techniques involving kinesthetic activities—writing and typing—were more effective, likely due to deeper cognitive engagement from motor activity. This supports the levels of processing theory, which suggests that deeper encoding occurs through active manipulation of information. These results imply that incorporating kinesthetic reading strategies into learning activities can enhance reading comprehension. Practically, educators in higher education can integrate read-write and read-type strategies into coursework to improve critical reading skills and knowledge retention.

Nurturing Women Leaders and the Danger of a Single-Narrative Regarding Them in Memories We Lost and Other Stories

Human productions such as literature, film, music, art, science, technology, and architecture among others are outgrowths of human experiences and therefore reflect human desires, conflicts, and potentials. Therefore, critical interpretation of those productions is vital in understanding something about human beings who make sense of the world through telling and listening to stories; which shape their worldview. Memories We Lost and Other Stories is an anthology of fourteen short stories written by fourteen authors from thirteen different countries. From the year 2018 to 2021, this anthology was recommended by the Ministry of Education in Kenya to be studied by Kenyan secondary school students. These were at least 2,931,394 teenagers, who were preparing for their college and university entry exam; the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) national exam in English literature. A critical reading against the grain of this anthology however shows how five of these stories depict a general negative single-narrative of female characters. This presentation has questioned how young minds, especially females, may internalize their position as future women leaders in Kenya after interacting with the narratives. Additionally, it has proposed possible solutions to the established challenges that are likely to hinder the nurturing of sustainable women's leadership

A Program Based on Critical Reading Strategies for Improving the Content-Area EFL Reading Comprehension Skills of the Mass-Media Students at the Faculty of Specific Education

A Program Based on Critical Reading Strategies for Improving the Content-Area EFL Reading Comprehension Skills of the Mass-Media Students at the Faculty of Specific Education

Vocabulary Coverage and Size in EFL Critical Reading

Research on the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and reading has largely focused on literal comprehension of informational texts. The present study, however, investigates the vocabulary-reading relationship by specifically examining critical reading skills in an argumentative text.76 EFL university students majoring in Education and studying in English participated in this study. To assess vocabulary knowledge, two tests were administered: a vocabulary size test (VLT) and a lexical coverage test. The coverage test was prepared by generating word families from the text using Vocabprofiler computer program software. Students’ critical reading skills were assessed using a multiple-choice test format. The findings indicate that participants had a vocabulary size of 4,000 to 5,000 words. Both vocabulary size and text coverage correlated significantly with critical reading. However, this correlation does not apply for all the targeted critical reading skills. The study concludes that a minimum vocabulary size of 4,000 words would ensure approximately 97% of text coverage, leading to successful performance in critical reading. Below this threshold, participants’ performance declined. Both vocabulary measures correlated with critical reading skills that required some reliance on the vocabulary of the text. The study suggests some pedagogical implications.

A Proposed Strategy based on information processing theory to the development of critical reading skills among students in the secondary stage

A Proposed Strategy based on information processing theory to the development of critical reading skills among students in the secondary stage

The Unfillable Stomach

Abstract The effects of settler colonialism on Indigenous communities manifest in psychological issues that are traceable to not one but several historical traumas, including but not limited to those beyond living memory. The “decolonial turn” of trauma theory has tended to accept these assertions in order to underpin scholarly readings of literature by Native American authors. My article close reads Louise Erdrich’s 2012 novel The Round House, the narrative of which oscillates around the rape of an Ojibwe woman by a non-Native man. While this topic lends itself to a critical reading using the aforementioned paradigms, the author hypothesizes that the narrative offers a more complicated picture, one that leaves room for trauma of an individual nature alongside the “soul wound” or historical unresolved grief familiar to decolonial trauma theory. Allowing for the presence of both dimensions requires that one make use of decolonial trauma theory while also asking how a gendered dimension to trauma—a raped woman’s, in this instance—might require trauma theoreticians to build more flexibility into their modeling. Through close readings of food imagery, color imagery, and mythopoetics, the author teases out these issues while emphasizing the need for critical interventions of the sort previously described.

Formação do capital humano como mecanismo para o desenvolvimento do turismo local: o caso do instituto superior universitário Nimi Ya Lukeni, Soyo

Promoting the development of local tourism is a concern for many countries, especially those that intend to adopt this practice as a means of diversifying their economy. This goal can only be achieved with the formation of human capital in this area. Thus, this article aimed to analyze how the formation of human capital at the Nimi Ya Lukeni Higher University Institute can contribute to the development of local tourism in Soyo. To this end, mixed research was used, with a greater predominance of quantitative research. Regarding technical procedures, the research is a single and documentary case study, based on the analysis of institutional documents and official records (course reports, statistics on enrolled students, among others). Qualitative data were analyzed through textual analysis, involving critical reading and interpretation of official texts, and numerical data were analyzed using the univariate descriptive statistics technique. The results achieved showed that the undergraduate course in Hotel and Tourism Management taught at INSPUNYL is focused on training professionals in the sector, capable of responding to the potential challenges in the area, both locally and nationally. However, it was noted that there was a low number of students taking part in the course in question.