Grapheme-phoneme Correspondence Rules Research Articles

English Transliteration of Arabic Personal Names with the Definite Article {al-} on Facebook

This study aimed to explore how native speakers of Arabic transliterate first and last names containing the definite article {al-} to English on Facebook; what variations exist in transliterating the definite article itself, which is usually attached to the name in Arabic script; how Arabic speakers transliterate {al-} before sun and moon letters in their names; and which strategies they use in transliterating names with a definite article. A sample of 641 unique names with 1207 occurrences (repeats) was collected from the author’s friends’ list on Facebook. Results revealed that {al-} was used in 55% of the names; {el-} was used in 44%; reduced {l-} was used in 1% and {il-} was used in one name only. In 54% of the names, the definite article is attached to the name, with the names spelled in lowercase (الجرف Algarf, Aljarf; الشيخ Alshekh; Alsayd, Elsayed, Alqudah; Alshareef). In 15.5% of the names, the definite article is detached from the name, i.e., spelled as an independent morpheme (الجرف Al Jarf, Al Jorf, Al Jurf; القضاة Al Qudah). In 15.5% the name is spelled with a capital letter although it is attached to the definite article (الجرف AlJurf). In 13.5%, the definite article and the name are hyphenated (الجرف El-Garf, Al-Jurf). In 1%, the definite article is reduced to {l-}, i.e., the vowel in the definite article is deleted (الجرف ljarf, الأسود Lassoued , الغريب Leghrib). In addition, it was found that 40 of the name that follows the definite article begins with a sun (coronal) consonant (Al-Salem; Attaher) as opposed to 60% of the names that begin with a moon letter (Alomari, Aljarf). The study recommends a strategy for transliterating the definite article where the following name begins with a sun (coronal) letter based on the English grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules to enable non-native speakers of Arabic to pronounce the transliterated al+ noun accurately.

Eye movements of children and adults reading in three different orthographies.

In this study, we investigated developmental aspects of eye movements during reading of three languages (English, German, and Finnish) that vary widely in their orthographic complexity and predictability. Grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules are rather complex in English and German but relatively simple in Finnish. Despite their differences in complexity, the rules in German and Finnish are highly predictable, whereas English has many exceptions. Comparing eye movement development in these three languages allows us to investigate whether orthographic complexity and predictability have separate effects on eye movement development. Three groups of children, matched on years of reading instruction, along with a group of proficient adult readers in each language were tested. All participants read stimulus materials that were carefully translated and back-translated across all three languages. The length and frequency of 48 target words were manipulated experimentally within the stimulus set. For children, word length effects were stronger in Finnish and German than in English. In addition, in English effects of word frequency were weaker and only present for short words. Generally, English children showed a qualitatively different reading pattern, while German and Finnish children's reading behavior was rather similar. These results indicate that the predictability of an orthographic system is more important than its complexity for children's reading development. Adults' reading behavior, in contrast, was remarkably similar across languages. Our results demonstrate that eye movements are sensitive to language-specific features in children's reading, but become more homogenous as reading skill matures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Visual motion processing in Chinese children with developmental dyslexia: An fMRI study.

Dorsal stream is an important pathway for visual information transmission. As a part of the dorsal pathway, the middle temporal visual motion areas (V5/MT+) are mainly responsible for visual motion processing and the ability of visual motion processing is closely related to reading. Compared with alphabetic scripts, the visual structure of Chinese characters is more complex and there are no clear grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules. So the ability of visual analysis plays an important role in Chinese character processing. This study first investigated the brain activation of Chinese dyslexic children and children of the same chronological age when they observed coherent motion stimuli. ROI analysis indicated that only the activation of left V5/MT+ was significantly weaker in dyslexics than that in the control group. The activity of the magnocellular-dorsal stream was closely related to orthographic awareness in the combined data (two groups) and the typical children. In dyslexia group, the stronger the activation of V5/MT+ was, the worse the phonological awareness, rapid naming performance and orthographic awareness were. In short, Chinese dyslexic children were deficient in the activation of the left V5/MT+ and the activity of the magnocellular-dorsal pathway was closely related to orthographic awareness in Chinese pupils.

The efficacy of grapheme-phoneme correspondence instruction in reducing the effect of orthographic forms on second language phonology

AbstractThe orthographic forms (spellings) of second language (L2) words and sounds affect the pronunciation and awareness of L2 sounds, even after lengthy naturalistic exposure. This study investigated whether instruction could reduce the effects of English orthographic forms on Italian native speakers’ pronunciation and awareness of L2 English sounds. Italians perceive, produce, and judge the same sound as a short sound if it is spelled with one letter and as a long sound if it is spelled with a digraph, due to L1 Italian grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC) rules whereby double consonant letters represent long consonants. Totally, 100 Italian learners of English were allocated to two conditions (finaln= 88). The participants in the explicit GPC (EGPC) condition discovered English GPC rules relating to sound length through reflection, explicit teaching, and practice; the participants in the passive exposure condition practiced the same words as the EGPC participants, but with no mention of GPCs. Pre- and postintervention production (delayed word repetition) and phonological awareness (rhyme judgment) tasks revealed no positive effects of the instruction. GPC instruction appears to be ineffective in reducing orthographic effects on L2 phonology. Orthographic effects may be impervious to change, whether by naturalistic exposure or by instruction.

Atypical Relationships Between Neurofunctional Features of Print-Sound Integration and Reading Abilities in Chinese Children With Dyslexia.

Conquering print-sound mappings (e.g., grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules) is vital for developing fluent reading skills. In neuroimaging research, this ability can be indexed by activation differences between audiovisual congruent against incongruent conditions in brain areas such as the left superior temporal cortex. In line with it, individuals with dyslexia have difficulty in tasks requiring print-sound processing, accompanied by a reduced neural integration. However, existing evidence is almost restricted to alphabetic languages. Whether and how multisensory processing of print and sound is impaired in Chinese dyslexia remains underexplored. In this study, we applied a passive audiovisual integration paradigm with functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate the possible dysfunctions in processing character-sound (opaque; semantics can be automatically accessed) and pinyin-sound associations (transparent; no particular meaning can be confirmed) in Chinese dyslexic children. Unexpectedly, the dyslexic group did not show reduced neural integration compared with typically developing readers in either character or pinyin experiment. However, the results revealed atypical correlations between neural integration and different reading abilities in dyslexia. Specifically, while the neural integration in the left inferior frontal cortex in processing character-sound pairs correlated with silent reading comprehension in both children with and without dyslexia, it was associated with morphological awareness (semantic-related) in controls but with rapid naming (phonological-related) in dyslexics. This result indicates Chinese dyslexic children may not use the same grapho-semantic processing strategy as their typical peers do. As for pinyin-sound processing, while a stronger neural integration in the direction of “congruent > incongruent” in the left occipito-temporal cortex and bilateral superior temporal cortices was associated with better oral reading fluency in the control group, an opposite pattern was found in dyslexia. This finding may reflect dyslexia's dysfunctional recruitment of the regions in grapho-phonological processing, which further impedes character learning.

The analysis of free writing, vocabulary, and dyslexia in English as a native and foreign language (English vs. Polish students)

BackgroundThe aim of our study was to compare free writing skills in English as a native language and a foreign language (in English and Polish students respectively). English and Polish have dissimilar orthographies in terms of grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules that is why we were curious to examine whether native and foreign speakers of English exhibit some similarities and/or differences in terms of writing and vocabulary, controlling the dyslexia factor at the same time.Participants and procedure28 English junior high school students: 13 with dyslexia (ED), 15 without (END), and 32 Polish junior high school students: 16 with dyslexia (PD) and 16 without (PND) participated. They completed tests measuring free writing and vocabulary in English as a native (ED and END) and a foreign (PD and PND) language.ResultsWe found that both PD and PND knew fewer words of different difficulty, made more grammar errors, wrote shorter compositions, and composed shorter sentences than ED and END, demonstrating the influence of a NL and a negative linguistic transfer between synthetic Polish and analytical English. In a free writing task, tough, they committed an equal number of phonological and orthographic errors, probably choosing best-known words, which did not allow to demonstrate the expected deficits of students with dyslexia due to phonological deficit.ConclusionsGenerally, both PD and PND, despite having studied EFL for on average 7 years, failed to equal their ED and END peers’ performance in a simple free writing task. Dyslexia and/or related spelling errors correlated with vocabulary in both Polish and English students, confirming that dyslexia may limit one’s mental lexicon for both NL speakers and FL learners.

Reading Ability and Knowledge of Grapheme-Phoneme Correspondence Rules

Reading Ability and Knowledge of Grapheme-Phoneme Correspondence Rules

The Letter-Sound Test (LeST): a reliable and valid comprehensive measure of grapheme–phoneme knowledge

Children who have difficulty learning to read are at increased risk for academic failure, poor self-esteem, anxiety and depression, and unemployment. To help reduce these risks, it is important to identify and treat weaknesses in a child's reading as early as possible. The aim of this study was to develop a valid and reliable comprehensive standardized test of a key reading sub-skill called grapheme–phoneme correspondence (GPC) knowledge. In Phase 1 of the study, we selected a comprehensive evidence-based list of the most important GPC rules for learning to read in English. In Phase 2, we administered this list to a representative sample of Australian children to calculate age- and grade-based norms. In Phase 3, we established that the test had robust inter-rater and test–retest reliability, and appropriate criterion validity. We hope that this new test, which is called the Letter-Sound Test, proves useful to clinicians, teachers, and researcher as a comprehensive test of GPC knowledge.

Sight Word and Phonics Training in Children With Dyslexia

The aims of this study were to (a) compare sight word training and phonics training in children with dyslexia, and (b) determine if different orders of sight word and phonics training have different effects on the reading skills of children with dyslexia. One group of children (n = 36) did 8 weeks of phonics training (reading via grapheme–phoneme correspondence rules) and then 8 weeks of sight word training (reading irregular words as a whole), one group did the reverse (n = 36), and one group did phonics and sight word training simultaneously for two 8-week periods (n = 32). We measured the effects of phonics and sight word training on sight word reading (trained irregular word reading accuracy, untrained irregular word reading accuracy), phonics reading (nonword reading accuracy, nonword reading fluency), and general reading (word reading fluency, reading comprehension). Sight word training led to significant gains in sight word reading measures that were larger than gains made from phonics training, phonics training led to statistically significant gains in a phonics reading measure that were larger than gains made from sight word training, and both types of training led to significant gains in general reading that were similar in size. Training phonics before sight words had a slight advantage over the reverse order. We discuss the clinical implications of these findings for improving the treatment and assessment of children with dyslexia.

Hyphenation can improve reading in acquired phonological dyslexia

Background: We describe JD, a person with severe phonological dyslexia. JD is good at reading words yet is extremely poor at reading nonwords. She shows no effect of word regularity on her reading performance. However, she has only a very mild general phonological deficit. Although it is known that teaching grapheme–phoneme correspondence rules and learning bigraph syllables can improve dyslexic reading, we investigate the possibility that segmenting the input string using hyphens can also improve reading. Parts of this paper were based on work reported by David A. O’Mara in his undergraduate thesis at the University of Dundee. We are indebted to Dr Allan Ward, GP, for his summary of JD’s medical history. Most of all, we are grateful to JD, who was always a most willing and cheerful participant. We thank Lynne Duncan, Nadine Martin, and Tim Shallice for their comments. Aims: We investigate the locus of JD's reading deficit and explore means of improving her reading. We examine the extent to which hyphenation can improve nonword reading. Methods & Procedures: We use a battery of tasks in a single‐case study. We test oral reading, writing and spelling ability, and lexical and semantic knowledge. We assess phonological processing using tests of repetition and phonological awareness. We focus on blending and segmentation, and test whether hyphenating the letter string can improve reading. Outcomes & Results: JD is very good at reading words (overall about 90%), but very poor at reading nonwords (overall about 10%). She makes no semantic errors and shows little effect of word regularity. JD has only a mild concomitant phonological deficit. She also has a very good digit span (8). JD can read affixes in isolation, and can also read nonwords made up of inappropriately affixed morphemes (e.g., “dismove”) if a hyphen is inserted at the affixation point (e.g., “dis‐move”). We found that hyphenation improves nonword reading in general, but particularly if it is the grapheme units that are separated by hyphens. Conclusions: We discuss the possibility that JD's phonological dyslexia arises from impaired graphemic parsing, and that affixes have inherent meaning for her. Hyphenation may be a therapeutic tool worthy of wider consideration for improving reading performance in people with dyslexia.

Genetic and environmental bases of reading and spelling: A unified genetic dual route model

We develop and test a dual-route model of genetic effects on reading aloud and spelling, based on irregular and non-word reading and spelling performance as- sessed in 1382 monozygotic and dizygotic twins. As in earlier research, most of the variance in reading was due to genetic effects. However, there were three more specific conclusions: the first was that most of the genetic effect is common to both regular and irregular reading. In addition to this common variance evidence was found for distinct genes influencing the acquisition of a lexicon of stored words, and additional genetic effects influencing the acquisition of grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules. The third conclusion, from a combined model of reading and spelling, is that reading and spelling have a common genetic basis. Models that did not distinguish lexical and non- lexical performance fit significantly worse than dual route genetic models. An impli- cation of the research is that models of reading, whether connectionist or dual-route, must allow for the genetic independence of neurological processes underlying the decoding of non-words and irregular words.

Sensitivity to voicing similarity in printed stimuli: effect of a training programme in dyslexic children

Dyslexic children exhibit great difficulties in acquiring reading skills, despite adequate intelligence and instruction, and in the absence of any obvious neurological or sensory disorders. Both phonological and surface dyslexics are impaired in phonological skills (Sprenger-Charolles, Col! e, Lacert, & Serniclaes, 2000), but the origin of these disabilities is controversial. According to the ‘rapid processing hypothesis’, phonological impairments in dyslexia stem from an auditory deficit in the processing of brief and/or rapidly changing acoustic events, which compromises phoneme discrimination, and the acquisition of metaphonological skills and grapheme–phoneme correspondence rules (Nagarajan et al., 1999; Tallal, 1980). According to the ‘linguistic hypothesis’, auditory deficits and language disorders may be associated but are not causally related (Cornelissen, Hansen, Hutton, Evangelinou, & Stein, 1998; Nittrouer, 1999; Rosen, 2003). The evidence for this view is twofold. First, many studies demonstrated the existence of a speech-specific impairment in dyslexia (Mody, Studdert-Kennedy, & Brady, 1997; Rosen & Manganari, 2001). Second, the processing of short and/or rapidly varying acoustic signals may not be the fundamental problem in dyslexia (Bradlow et al., 1999). Intensive training with artificially slowed speech did not improve reading and phonemic awareness, compared with training on unmodified speech (Rey, De Martino, Espesser, & Habib, 2002). Whatever the origin of linguistic disorders in dyslexic children, it is generally agreed that the core deficit is phonological. In this paper, we ask which phonological mechanisms and which aspects of phonological knowledge are impaired in dyslexia. We assume that this impairment relates to the phonetic underpinnings of phonemic knowledge. This hypothesis is supported by recent experiments on the effect of phonetic similarity in reading. ARTICLE IN PRESS

Activation of Multiple Phoneme Associates of Graphemes in Visual Word Recognition

One general issue in the domain of visual word recognition is to delineate the nature of readers' knowledge of the print-sound mapping. A more specific question is to determine whether multiple grapheme–phoneme associations are available and activated during the phonological transcoding of a letter string. Evidence for the activation of irregular associations during print-to-sound transcoding, independently from lexical influences, was assessed in a letter detection task by examining performance on target-absent pseudowords. We contrasted two types of pseudowords that could be considered homophone with a real word by application of either grapheme–phoneme correspondence rules or of multiple phonemic activation. Performance on both types of homophones was compared to nonhomophone control pseudowords, strictly equivalent in terms of orthographic similarity to the base words. The finding of a homophony disadvantage for the homophones by multiple activation was interpreted as evidence for multiple phonemic activation in the print-to-sound conversion system.

Inferring sublexical correspondences from sight vocabulary: evidence from 6- and 7-year-olds.

We report an experiment designed to investigate 6-to-7-year-old children's ability to acquire knowledge of sublexical correspondences between print and sound from their reading experience. A computer database containing the printed word vocabulary of children taking part in the experiment was compiled and used to devise stimuli controlled for grapheme-phoneme correspondence (GPC) frequency and rime neighbourhood consistency according to the children's reading experience. Knowledge of GPC rules and rime units was compared by asking children to read aloud three types of nonword varying in regularity of GPC and consistency of rime pronunciation. Results supported the view that children can acquire knowledge of both GPC rules and rime units from their reading experience. GPC rule strength affects the likelihood of a GPC response; rime consistency affects the likelihood of a rime response.

Nonword pronunciation and models of word recognition.

Nonword pronunciation is a form of generalization behavior that has been at the center of debates about models of word recognition, the role of rules in explaining behavior, and the adequacy of the parallel distributed processing approach. An experiment yielded data concerning the pronunciation of a large corpus of nonwords. The data were then used to assess 2 models of naming: a model developed by D. C. Plaut and J. L. McClelland (1993), which is similar to the one described by M. S. Seidenberg and J. L. McClelland (1989) but uses improved orthographic and phonological representations, and the grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules of M. Coltheart, B. Curtis, P. Atkins, and M. Haller's (1993) dual-route model. Both models generate plausible nonword pronunciations and match subjects' responses accurately. The dual-route model does so by using rules that generate correct output for most words but mispronounce a significant number of exceptions. The parallel distributed processing model does so by finding a set of weights that allow it to generate correct output for both "rule-governed" items and exceptions. Some ways in which the two approaches differ and other issues facing them are also discussed.

Nonword pronunciation and models of word recognition.

Nonword pronunciation is a form of generalization behavior that has been at the center of debates about models of word recognition, the role of rules in explaining behavior, and the adequacy of the parallel distributed processing approach. An experiment yielded data concerning the pronunciation of a large corpus of nonwords. The data were then used to assess 2 models of naming: a model developed by D. C. Plaut and J. L. McClelland (1993), which is similar to the one described by M. S. Seidenberg and J. L. McClelland (1989) but uses improved orthographic and phonological representations, and the grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules of M. Coltheart, B. Curtis, P. Atkins, and M. Haller's (1993) dual-route model. Both models generate plausible nonword pronunciations and match subjects' responses accurately. The dual-route model does so by using rules that generate correct output for most words but mispronounce a significant number of exceptions. The parallel distributed processing model does so by finding a set of weights that allow it to generate correct output for both "rule-governed" items and exceptions. Some ways in which the two approaches differ and other issues facing them are also discussed.

Can dyslexia be treated? Treatment-specific and generalized treatment effects in dyslexic children's response to remediation

A total of 178 reading disabled children were randomly assigned to one of three treatment conditions providing training in word recognition and decoding skills (DS), oral and written language (OWLS), or classroom survival skills (CSS, an alternative treatment control). Pre- and post-treatment comparisons on an array of standardized and experimental measures indicated that the two experimental treatments (DS, OWLS) resulted in improvement on selected tests significantly greater than that resulting from a third treatment intervention which controlled for treatment time and individual attention (CSS). Effects specific to each experimental treatment were identified, as well as some generalized treatment advantages shared by both experimental groups at post-test. These results indicate that some of the deficits associated with developmental dyslexia are amenable to treatment. Greater generalization of treatment effects was observed following the DS than the OWLS treatment. While DS-instructed children exhibited better word recognition skills, however, their knowledge of grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules was not improved. Several OWLS-specific effects observed on experimental reading and language measures were not replicated on standardized tests which purport to measure the same skills. These results are discussed with respect to (i) possible mechanisms by which disabled readers may acquire word recognition skills, (ii) their failure to acquire and use grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules, and (iii) a possible reduced tendency in the present population to generalize newly acquired specific knowledge to related knowledge domains.

Visual and phonological processing of words: a comparison of good and poor readers.

At the beginning of the school year, 80 first graders, half receiving phonics instruction and half receiving whole word instruction, were asked to spell, read aloud, and recognize 60 regular and exception words. A standardized reading test and phoneme segmentation test were also administered. Those above grade level in reading excelled in phonological recording and application of grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules and were weaker in utilization of visual-orthographic knowledge. Those below grade level applied visual more than phonological coding and benefited from the visual-orthographic knowledge available in a clue word. Results support a continuum of visual and phonological analysis skills in first-grade reading consistent with Frith's (1985) logographic, alphabetic, and orthographic skill levels.

Acquisition of certain grapheme-phoneme correspondences in normally achieving and disabled readers

The present study was designed to assess the development of the understanding of certain aspects of grapheme-phoneme correspondences in normally achieving and disabled readers. The correspondences rules were studied using both English words and pseudowords, the latter designed to contain the same features as the real words. The subjects were 76 normally achieving and 32 reading disabled children aged 6 to 14 years. The stimuli included words and pseudowords that tested the following: consonant blends, final e, r-influenced vowels, regular and irregular words, function words, and consistent and inconsistent vowels. When matched for chronological age, the reading disabled children performed significantly more poorly than normally achieving children on all of the tasks involving pseudowords. A similar pattern was found for the words with the exception of the highest frequency words (cvc, final e, consonant blends) at the oldest age level, 11–14 years. In this case, the performance of the oldest reading disabled children was similar to that of the normals on the words, but was still significantly poorer when the stimuli were pseudowords. Complexity and irregularity were significant determinants of difficulty. Comparisons were also made for groups of children matched on reading grade level. Even when the reading disabled and normally achieving children were matched on reading grade, the reading disabled children had significantly more difficulty, particularly with pseudowords. Reading disabled children had significant difficulty in abstracting the basic rules for grapheme-phoneme correspondences in English, and even when they have mastered these rules in connection with real words, they still had difficulty applying these rules to pseudowords. In normal development, the learning of these correspondences appears to be consolidated by approximately 9 years of age. However, reading disabled children appear to have a significant and persistent problem with the learning of basic grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules.

Biscriptal Interference: A Study of English and Japanese

It was once assumed that alphabetic, syllabic, and logographic scripts could be clearly differentiated in terms of their respective processing demands, but recent evidence suggests that, as visual stimuli, they all draw upon common “configurational” processing resources. Two experiments are reported which address this issue. Both employ cross-lingual interference paradigms, with the rationale that competition for limited processing resources will be reflected in the degree of interference generated when two scripts are presented simultaneously. The experiments differ in terms of task requirements, the first being a word-naming task, biased towards reliance upon the more rule-based decoding skills; whereas the second is a colour naming task, with a more configurational bias. In the first study, the locus of the interference effect was clearly pre-lexical, and interference was only generated by those scripts that could feasibly draw upon grapheme-phoneme correspondence rules. No interference was generated by logographs that could be accessed “directly” without recourse to any prelexical phonological code. In the second study, the locus of interference was twofold: early in processing, as a result of competition for configurational processes, and later, phonological output competition prior to articulation. These results clearly demonstrate major differences in the ways in which logographic, syllabic, and alphabetic scripts are processed.