Oral Word Reading Research Articles

Are first- and second-language factors related in predicting second-language reading comprehension? A study of Spanish-speaking children acquiring English as a second language from first to second grade.

First-language (L1) and 2nd-language (L2) oral language skills and L2 word reading were used as predictors to test the simple view of reading as a model of 2nd-language reading comprehension. The simple view of reading states that reading comprehension is related to decoding and oral language comprehension skills. One hundred thirty-one Spanish-speaking English learners (ELs) were tested in 1st grade and many were followed into 2nd grade, including a full sample of 79. Structural equation modeling confirmed that a 5-factor measurement model had the best fit, suggesting that L1 and L2 phonological awareness should be viewed as separate but related constructs and that L1 and L2 oral language proficiency, measured by vocabulary and grammatical awareness, were separate constructs. The structural model indicated that for this group of ELs, who were educated in English, English oral language proficiency and word reading were the strongest predictors of English reading comprehension. Other models that deleted 1 of these crucial components resulted in significantly poorer fit. Therefore, the results support the validity of the simple view of reading as a model for the development of reading comprehension in young ELs. Implications for theory and practice, specifically assessment of ELs, are discussed.

Using whole-word multimedia software to support literacy acquisition: A comparison with traditional books

In the UK, literacy instruction is widely supported by computer software programs aimed to improve literacy skills. However relatively few systematic studies have been conducted to date to investigate whether these programs are effective in supporting literacy acquisition. Programs range in nature from those supporting the acquisition of phonic reading skills to those focussing on promoting recognition of whole-words in context. Whilst phonic skills have been shown to be critical for successful reading acquisition, less is known about how promoting orthographic, whole-word, skills relates to literacy success. This study investigated whether whole-word multimedia software (i.e. Oxford Reading Tree for Clicker) facilitates literacy acquisition. We explored whether ‘Clicker’ accelerated early reading acquisition relative to ‘Big Book’ traditional teaching methods. Two groups of children (N = 27), aged 5–6 years, that were reading at a typical level for their age were drawn from two classes within the same school. Each group received instruction with each of two books from the Oxford Reading Tree scheme, using either ‘Clicker’ or traditional printed texts. Instruction was delivered to each group over five one-hour sessions over the course of a week. The order of presentation of instruction was counterbalanced across groups. Performance on tests of written word recognition, oral word reading, and tests of phonological awareness, was measured pre and post each week of instruction. Results showed significant gains in oral reading skill after each method of instruction. However, only after instruction with ‘Clicker’ were significant gains in word recognition and rhyme awareness observed, and only after instruction with ‘Big Book’ were significant gains in graphemic awareness found. We suggest the multimedia features of highlighting words and an auditory cue, built into the Clicker software, support the acquisition of written word recognition and rhyming skills, respectively.

Automatic word recognition: The validity of a universally accessible assessment task

In the current study, the validity of a task designed to assess the automatic word recognition skills of persons with complex communication needs was investigated. A total of 78 students without communication impairments in kindergarten through second grade completed a standard automatic word recognition task requiring oral reading of words presented for less than 0.25 s. The same students completed an experimental word recognition task that did not require a spoken response. Results support the validity of the experimental task. For example, the mean performance scores on both tasks decreased in the expected direction, and there was a significant correlation between the standard and experimental tasks. Other results suggest that the same trait was being measured by both tasks. The data highlight directions for future research and development of the experimental task, while leaving us enthusiastic about the future of the experimental task as a valid means of assessing automatic word recognition for persons with complex communication needs.

Right-hemisphere reading in a case of developmental deep dyslexia

The right-hemisphere hypothesis of deep dyslexia has received support from functional imaging studies of acquired deep dyslexia following damage to the left cerebral hemisphere, but no imaging studies of cases of developmental deep dyslexia, in which brain damage is not suspected, have been reported. In this paper, we report the first evidence of right hyperactivation in an adult case of developmental deep dyslexia. Hyperactivation was observed in the right inferior frontal cortex during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) of the oral reading of imageable content words and nonwords to which imageable lexical responses were frequently made. No evidence of right hyperactivation was observed in the oral reading of function words, nor during the naming of imageable words in response to pictured objects. The results reveal strategic and selective use of right-hemisphere functions for particular types of written stimuli. We propose that children with developmental deep dyslexia compensate for their lack of phonological skills by accessing right-hemisphere imageable associations that provide a mnemonic for linking written forms to spoken names.

Role of Phonological and Morphological Awareness in L2 Oral Word Reading

In this study, 57 fifth‐grade native Hebrew speakers performed orthographic‐phonological awareness, morphological awareness, and oral word reading tasks in both Hebrew (first language [L1]) and English (second language [L2]). The results of the language‐specific task scores in the two languages reflect, with certain qualifications, participants' L1 proficiency and the language proximity of particular language features. The more similar the language feature (linear morphology), the more positive the cross‐language influence; conversely, the less similar the language feature (phonology), the less positive the influence. Hebrew (L1) language‐specific task scores related to English (L2) word reading. In addition, Hebrew (L1) and English (L2) word reading scores were only related when Hebrew orthographic‐phonological and/or morphological awareness was low. In contrast, when the (L1) Hebrew orthographic‐phonological and morphological awareness scores were high, there was no correlation between Hebrew and English word reading.

Writing problems in developmental dyslexia: Under-recognized and under-treated

The International Dyslexia Association defines dyslexia as unexpected problems of neurobiological origin in accuracy and rate of oral reading of single real words, single pseudowords, or text or of written spelling. However, prior research has focused more on the reading than the spelling problems of students with dyslexia. A test battery was administered to 122 children who met the inclusion criteria for dyslexia and qualified their families for participation in a family genetics study that has been ongoing for over a decade. Their parents completed the same test battery. Although a past structural equation modeling study of typically developing children identified a significant path from handwriting to composition quality, the current structural equation modeling study identified a significant path from spelling to composition for children and their parents with dyslexia. Grapho-motor planning did not contribute uniquely to their composition, showing that writing is not just a motor skill. Students with dyslexia do have a problem in automatic letter writing and naming, which was related to impaired inhibition and verbal fluency and may explain their spelling problems. Results are discussed in reference to the importance of providing explicit instruction in the phonological, orthographic, and morphological processes of spelling and in composition to students with dyslexia and not only offering accommodation for their writing problems.

Intensive Instruction Affects Brain Magnetic Activity Associated with Oral Word Reading in Children with Persistent Reading Disabilities

Fifteen children ages 7 to 9 years who had persistent reading difficulties despite adequate instruction were provided with intensive tutorial interventions. The interventions targeted deficient phonological processing and decoding skills for 8 weeks (2 hours per day) followed by an 8-week, 1-hour-per-day intervention that focused on the development of reading fluency skills. Spatiotemporal brain activation profiles were obtained at baseline and after each 8-week intervention program using magnetoencephalography during the performance of an oral sight-word reading task. Changes in brain activity were found in the posterior part of the middle temporal gyrus (Brodmann's Area [BA] 21: increased degree of activity and reduced onset latency), the lateral occipitotemporal region (BA 19/37: decreased onset latency of activation), and the premotor cortex (increased onset latency). Overall changes associated with the intervention were primarily normalizing, as indicated by (a) increased activity in a region that is typically involved in lexical--semantic processing (BA 21) and (b) a shift in the relative timing of regional activity in temporal and frontal cortices to a pattern typically seen in unimpaired readers. These findings extend previous results in demonstrating significant changes in the spatiotemporal profile of activation associated with word reading in response to reading remediation.

Reading words with irregular decoding rules: A test of premorbid cognitive function?

The present study investigated the relation between level of general cognitive function and the oral reading of irregular words in Swedish. Swedish is an orthographically regular language, so many irregular words are loan words from other languages. A test comprising such words (irregularly spelled words (ISW)) was designed, and tested on a sample of 48 healthy Swedish adults, stratified according to age, gender, and level of education. The results confirmed that the ability to read words that do not follow the regular rules for decoding in Swedish was positively related to general cognitive level. ISW in combination with demographic variables gave a good estimate of general cognitive function and a better estimate than demographic variables alone. Exposure to written and spoken vocabulary during the lifespan may be indexed by ISW performance, for factor analysis suggested that this may constitute a discrete factor contributing to cognitive function.

Development of Lexical and Sentence Level Context Effects for Dominant and Subordinate Word Meanings of Homonyms

Nine-ten-and twelve-year-old children (N = 75) read aloud dominant, subordinate or ambiguous bias sentences (N = 120) that ended in a homonym (BALL). After the sentence (1,000 ms), children read aloud targets that were related to the dominant (BAT) or subordinate (DANCE) meaning of the homonym or control targets. Participants were also divided into three reading skill groups based on an independent measure of single word oral reading accuracy. There were three main developmental and reading skill findings. First, 9-year-olds and low skill readers showed lexical level facilitation in accuracy. Second, 9- and 10-year-olds or low and moderate skill readers showed lexical level facilitation in reaction time. Third, 12-year-olds or high skill readers showed sentence level facilitation in reaction time with high skill readers additionally showing sentence level inhibition in reaction time. These results show that lexical level context effects decreased and that sentence level context effects increased with development and skill. These results are discussed in terms of connectionist models of visual word recognition that incorporate distributed attractor principles.

Speeded functor reading: A new treatment program for phonological text alexia

In phonological text alexia (PhTA), a variant of phonological alexia, single word oral reading, including function word (functor) reading is intact, while oral text reading, particularly functors in text, is impaired (Friedman, 1996; Friedman & Lott, 1995). Patients with PhTA have decreased digit and word spans, impaired pseudoword repetition, and poor performance on tasks using rapid serial visual presentation. These findings suggest a decreased ability to hold multiple phonological codes in short-term memory (STM), resulting in increased retroactive inhibition or some form of phonological interference. Increased inhibition might have a stronger impact on functors than on content words, as content words’ semantic activation strengthens their overall activation levels, while functors cannot rely on such strong semantic activation. Moreover, the phonological representations of functors may not be activated completely or at normal speed, a hypothesis for which there is some evidence (Beeson & Insalaco, 1998). If functor activation is slowed but not impaired, accuracy of single functor reading would be unaffected, while functor reading in text would be impeded by interference from surrounding words. We designed a treatment to strengthen and speed the activation of the phonological representations of functors in a patient with PhTA that uses repeated exposure to functors and practice with rapid reading of these words.

Oral reading of words and sentences: Investigating the source of context effects

Background: Aphasic speakers' oral reading of isolated words has been widely studied, yet little is known about how contextual information influences reading ability when words are placed in sentences. Embedding words in sentences or texts has been argued to provide syntactic and/or semantic constraints on oral word reading that are unavailable in word lists, but no details are available about how such constraints might operate. The few studies that have actually compared sentence vs list reading have yielded conflicting results, and fail to show any consistent reading pattern that would predict when and why a reading advantage would arise from sentence context.Aims: We attempted to identify the pattern of aphasia/alexia that is associated with a sentence (vs list) reading advantage, and to assess the contribution of language and reading functions that might influence this context effect.Methods & Procedures: Five fluent, aphasic patients read the same 100 words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, and function words) in lists and in sentences. Patients were selected to have relatively intact sentence production ability, which has been argued to be an important element when sentence reading is superior to list reading.Outcomes & Results: Only two of the five patients showed a significant advantage for reading words in sentences, and additional analyses were carried out in an attempt to distinguish the reading patterns of the patients who showed the effect from the patterns of those who did not. The context effect exhibited by the two patients did not appear to be related to semantic influences, or to a cumulative build-up of contextual cues across words in sentences. Rather, the one finding that distinguished the two patients with significantly better reading of words in sentences compared to lists from the other patients was improved sensitivity in sentences to target words' grammatical class.Conclusions: The results indicate that good sentence production abilities are not a strong predictor that sentence reading will be enhanced relative to list reading. We propose that the sentence context effects in the two patients arose from their ability to extract information from sentences about targets' grammatical class, an ability that was not apparently shared by the other patients. Knowledge of grammatical class was argued to improve patients' reading by combining with other influences (e.g., orthographic structure, imageability) to substantially reduce the number of candidate word responses. Further specification of the source of these effects will help to identify patients who are most likely to benefit from sentence- and text-level reading treatments.

Anomic Alexia of Kanji in a Patient with Anomic Aphasia

The ability to read aloud kanji (logogram) words and to comprehend their meaning was systematically examined to clarify the underlying mechanism of kanji alexia in a patient with anomic aphasia. Confrontation naming, reading aloud and reading comprehension tasks were performed using 110 words from 11 semantic categories written in kanji or kana. Performance in oral reading of kanji words was significantly worse than oral reading of the same words transcribed into kana words. In addition, for kanji words reading aloud was much worse than reading comprehension. Oral reading of kanji words had a significant correlation with naming pictures corresponding to the words, but no correlation with comprehension of kanji words. Qualitative analyses demonstrated that errors in oral reading and naming tasks had many features in common. Our results indicated that some common mechanisms underlie both naming and oral reading of kanji words. We propose calling this type of alexia “anomic alexia of kanji”, which should be distinguished from kanji alexia with difficulty in both reading aloud and comprehension. Lesions in our patient were located in the middle part of the left middle temporal gyrus and its subcortical area, which could be important for access to the phonological lexicon from semantics.

Training phoneme to grapheme conversion for patients with written and oral production deficits: A model‐based approach

Background: A previous study (Kiran, Thompson, & Hashimoto, 2001) investigated the effect of training sublexical conversion on improving oral reading of regular words in two individuals with aphasia. Results revealed that training grapheme to phoneme conversion improved acquisition of trained items and facilitated generalisation to trained and untrained stimuli during oral naming, written naming, and writing to dictation as well. Aims: The aim of the present study was to extend this work to investigate if training phoneme to grapheme conversion would result in improvement of writing to dictation of trained items and facilitate generalisation to untrained stimuli and untrained tasks. Methods & procedures: Using a single subject experimental design across three participants with aphasia, the effects of phoneme to grapheme conversion treatment were evaluated by periodic probing of both trained and untrained regular words across lexical tasks: writing to dictation, written naming, oral spelling, and oral naming. Outcomes & Results: Results indicated that training phoneme to grapheme conversion resulted in improved writing to dictation of trained and untrained words in two out of three patients. In addition, improved written naming and oral spelling of trained words was observed. Marginal improvements were observed for untrained stimuli on written naming, oral spelling, and oral naming. Conclusions: The results of this experiment demonstrate the effectiveness of training sublexical conversion to improve written production deficits and to facilitate generalisation to untrained stimuli and untrained tasks. These results also complement findings of our previous study to suggest a more efficient method of improving single word production deficits than training each modality successively.

Stimulus Contrast and Word Reading Speed in Alzheimer's Disease

The oral word reading speed of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) and healthy young and older control participants was evaluated across a broad range of stimulus contrast levels in two experiments. The impact of stimulus repetition on reading speed also was examined. It was found that the older adult participants, and particularly the AD patients, were more sensitive to contrast reductions. Each subject group was able to read repeated words more rapidly than novel words but this repetition effect emerged only at lower stimulus contrast levels. It was concluded that AD patients have feature extraction speeds comparable to nondemented older adults but only when the stimuli are presented at a relatively high contrast. These findings suggest that the automatic encoding processes involved in word recognition remain intact in mildly demented AD patients given stimuli of sufficient strength.

Beginning Reading Intervention as Inoculation or Insulin

This study examined the first-grade reading progress of children who participated in an intensive beginning reading intervention in kindergarten. Specifically, the study investigated whether kindergarten intervention could prevent first-grade reading difficulties, or produce an "inoculation" effect, for some children under certain instructional conditions. Participants included children at risk for developing reading difficulties who received a 7-month beginning reading intervention in kindergarten. In October of first grade, 59 children who had achieved criterion levels on measures of phonological awareness and alphabetic knowledge were randomly assigned to one of two types of first-grade reading instruction: (a) code-based classroom instruction and a supplemental maintenance intervention, or (b) only code-based classroom instruction. February posttest measures assessed oral reading fluency, word reading, nonword reading, and comprehension. Between-group analyses indicated that instructional groups did not differ on any posttest measure. The students' absolute levels of achievement were compared to national and local normative samples. These results indicated that between 75% and 100% of students in both conditions attained posttest levels and demonstrated growth comparable to their average-achieving peers. These results support the hypothesis that strong responders to kindergarten intervention can experience an inoculation effect through the middle of first grade with research-validated classroom reading instruction.

A positron emission tomography study of short- and long-term treatment effects on functional brain activation in adults who stutter

Previous studies have shown that fluency-inducing techniques, such as choral speech, result in changes in neural activation as measured by functional neuroimaging. In the present study, positron emission tomography was used to investigate the effects of intensive behavioural treatment, followed by a 1-year maintenance program, on the pattern of cortical and subcortical activation in stuttering adults during silent and oral reading of single words. The results indicate changes in activation lateralisation, as well as a general reduction in overactivation, especially in the motor cortex, following treatment. The results are discussed in light of previous functional imaging studies with stuttering adults. Educational objectives: The reader will learn about and be able to describe the: (1) use of functional neuroimaging PET in the study of stuttering; (2) differences in neural activation between stuttering and non-stuttering adults; and (3) effects of behavioural fluency treatment on cortical and subcortical activations in stuttering speakers.

Identifying dyslexia in multilingual students: can phonological awareness be assessed in the majority language?

A study of 97 students from two schools in Göteborg, Sweden, examined reading proficiency and phonological skill using a comprehensive battery of group measures in the classroom. The sample comprised 38 monolingual native‐Swedish speakers, and 59 multilingual students for whom Swedish is an additional language. Students were administered tests of non‐verbal intelligence, vocabulary, reading comprehension, word recognition and non‐vocal phonological tasks. Two sub‐groups of 26 monolingual and 26 multilingual students, matched on non‐verbal intelligence, also participated in oral word and nonword reading tasks. No significant differences were found between language groups on the separate phonological subtests or the composite phonological score after controlling for non‐verbal intelligence in hierarchical regression analyses. The language groups were equally represented at the 20th percentile on both composite phonology and word reading measures. The composite phonological score was equally powerful for both language groups in predicting word recognition. The results of the present study suggest that, given sufficient exposure to the majority language, it is possible to assess a range of phonological skills among speakers of minority languages using the same battery of tasks as for native speakers.

Treatment of single word oral reading in an individual with deep dyslexia

Background: Deep dyslexia is an acquired reading disorder in which the lexical and nonlexical reading routes are impaired, resulting in poor nonword reading, semantic errors in oral reading, visual-perceptual errors in oral reading, poor reading of functors, and imageability effects. There is evidence that individuals combine information from the lexical (semantic system) and the non-lexical routes to read words aloud. This evidence shows that partial phonological and semantic information combined at the level of the phonological output lexicon reduces semantic errors in reading aloud and increases the ability to produce the correct words. Aims: The aim of the present study was to use a phonologically based oral reading treatment to treat impaired single word oral reading in an individual with deep dyslexia. We hypothesised that phonologically based treatment would improve oral reading of real words, decreasing the amount of semantic errors. Methods & Procedures: The Wilson Reading System was used in therapy. This phonics-based programme focuses on the use of grapheme-phoneme correspondences, blending, and phonological awareness. A multiple-baseline design was used to evaluate the treatment effects in a single individual with deep dyslexia. Outcomes & Results: Following treatment at the single word level, the individual showed a significant improvement in single word oral reading for the targeted syllabic structure and in nonword reading. There was also a significant reduction in semantic errors in oral reading. One month post-treatment, the individual maintained treatment gains. Conclusions: Results support the hypothesis that the partial use of phonological information, combined with semantic information, results in improved accuracy of oral reading. This suggests that treatment of oral reading in people with deep dyslexia may benefit from attention to the non-lexical (phonological) component of reading in addition to the lexical/semantic component.

Disturbed visual processing contributes to impaired reading in Alzheimer’s disease

The relationship between visual processing dysfunction and oral reading impairment was investigated in 17 patients with probable or possible Alzheimer’s disease (AD). When dementia severity was controlled, a significant relationship was found between single word oral reading impairments and difficulties discriminating words written in different fonts and photographs of objects in different orientations, which are all functions believed to be dependent on the integrity of left ventral temporal–occipital visual association regions. By contrast, there was no significant relationship between reading performance and the score on a test of spatial localization, believed to be more dependent on parietal lobe function. There was also no relationship between reading ability and discrimination of unfamiliar faces, a function thought to engage right inferotemporal lobe structures. In contrast to the significant association between impaired reading and certain visual processes, when dementia severity was controlled, there was no relationship between reading and lexical semantic impairment. These results highlight the contribution of visual processing deficits to impaired oral reading in AD and further suggest that this association may derive from neuropathological changes in areas of the left temporal occipital lobes specialized for high-level visual processing.

Oral reading in Chinese: evidence from dementia of the Alzheimer's type

The traditional view of oral reading ability in patients with dementia holds that it is a preserved skill even if there is a general impairment to lexico-semantic processing ability. Recently, this view has been challenged by studies showing that the oral reading ability of patients with dementia can deteriorate over the course of the disease. These studies have found that the oral reading of irregular English words is more prone to error than the oral reading of regular words by patients with dementia suggesting that the oral reading of irregular words depends upon support from semantic memory. Relatively little is known about the oral reading abilities of Chinese-speaking dementia patients. This paper reports on the results of a study of the language processing and the oral reading ability of Chinese speakers with probable dementia of the Alzheimer's type (DAT). DAT patients displayed impairment on tests of oral reading as well as impairment on tests of semantic memory, confrontation naming and word comprehension. The results also show significant effects of regularity, frequency and imageability on the oral reading of DAT patients. It is argued that Chinese-speaking DAT patients display a pattern of language impairment similar to their English-speaking counterparts and, moreover, that normal oral reading of Chinese characters may depend critically upon the integrity of semantic memory.