Passage Comprehension Research Articles

Investigating the Double-Deficit Hypothesis in Greek

This study examined longitudinally the double-deficit hypothesis in Greek, an orthographically consistent language, following a group of children from kindergarten to Grade 2. Four groups were formed on the basis of two composite scores of phonological and naming-speed criterion measures: a double-deficit group (DD; n = 17), a phonological deficit group (PD; n = 33), a naming deficit group (ND; n = 33), and a control group exhibiting no deficits (CnD; n = 159). The four groups were identified in Grade 1, and they were compared retrospectively in kindergarten only on the criterion measures, and in Grades 1 and 2 on measures of word-reading fluency and accuracy, orthographic processing, and passage comprehension. The effects of verbal and nonverbal ability, age, gender, and parental education were controlled among the groups. Results showed that the DD group exhibited greater dysfunction in reading and orthographic processing compared to the single-deficit and CnD groups. Also, although the three deficit groups were not easily differentiated in kindergarten, their differences were maximized in Grade 1 and retained in Grade 2. The type and severity of reading deficits found in the ND group were mostly associated with naming speed at both the word- and text-reading levels, deficits that persisted across development. The PD group showed mostly deficient orthographic and poor decoding skills that improved across development. Implications of the findings for the double-deficit hypothesis in languages with transparent orthographies are discussed.

Metacognition in Taiwan: Students' calibration of comprehension and performance

Researchers have increasingly investigated the role played by metacognition in students' learning and performance. Metacognition is comprised of metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive experiences, and both components of metacognition are viewed as being important to learning and performance in academic settings. Metacognitive experiences involve, in part, students' awareness of progress on cognitive tasks. Such awareness is critical to learning, for students may fail to spend additional time reviewing or studying material if they believe they have understood the material adequately. In the present study we examined Taiwanese students' ability to assess their comprehension of passages following reading as well as their ability to predict the number of questions they would be able to answer about passage content. Following an actual test on the material, students were asked to assess how many questions they felt they answered correctly about a passage (postdiction). Students were able to predict comprehension and test performance at better than chance levels and were more accurate at postdiction than prediction. Students with better performance, as measured by comprehension test scores, were better at both prediction and postdiction of comprehension performance. However, students' self-assessments of general calibration ability did not relate to their test performance. The metacomprehension skills of Taiwanese students were quite similar to those previously found for western students, but also diverged in some respects.

Reading Comprehension Tests Vary in the Skills They Assess: Differential Dependence on Decoding and Oral Comprehension

Comprehension tests are often used interchangeably, suggesting an implicit assumption that they are all measuring the same thing. We examine the validity of this assumption by comparing some of the most popular reading comprehension measures used in research and clinical practice in the United States: the Gray Oral Reading Test (GORT), the two assessments (retellings and comprehension questions) from the Qualitative Reading Inventory (QRI), the Woodcock–Johnson Passage Comprehension subtest (WJPC), and the Reading Comprehension test from the Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT). Modest intercorrelations among the tests suggested that they were measuring different skills. Regression analyses showed that decoding, not listening comprehension, accounts for most of the variance in both the PIAT and the WJPC; the reverse holds for the GORT and both QRI measures. Large developmental differences in what the tests measure were found for the PIAT and the WJPC, but not the other tests, both when development was measured by chronological age and by word reading ability. We discuss the serious implications for research and clinical practice of having different comprehension tests measure different skills and of having the same test assess different skills depending on developmental level.

Validating Curriculum-Based Measurement for Students With Emotional and Behavioral Disorders in Middle School

The purpose of this study was to investigate the concurrent validity of curriculum-based measurement (CBM) for students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) in middle school using the Maze (MAZE); Oral Reading Fluency (ORF); and the Woodcock-Johnson, Third Edition (WJ-III), Passage Comprehension (WJ-PC) and Reading Fluency (WJ-RF) subtests. Fifty-five students in grades sixth through eighth with emotional and behavioral disorders participated in this study. Results indicated a strong correlation between the MAZE and the WJ-PC, while moderate correlations were found between the CBM Oral Reading Fluency and the Woodcock-Johnson subtests (passage comprehension and reading fluency). Limitations of the study, implications for practice, and future research are discussed.

Benefits of Repeated Reading Intervention for Low-Achieving Fourth- and Fifth-Grade Students

Many students have difficulty achieving reading fluency, and nearly half of fourth graders are not fluent readers in grade-level texts. Intensive and focused reading practice is recommended to help close the gap between students with poor fluency and their average reading peers. In this study, the Quick Reads fluency program was used as a supplemental fluency intervention for fourth and fifth graders with below-grade-level reading skills. Quick Reads prescribes a repeated reading procedure with short nonfiction texts written on grade-appropriate science and social science topics. Text characteristics are designed to promote word recognition skills. Students were randomly assigned to Quick Reads instruction that was implemented by trained paraeducator tutors with pairs of students for 30 minutes per day, 4 days per week, for 18 weeks. At posttest, Quick Reads students significantly outperformed classroom controls in vocabulary, word comprehension, and passage comprehension. Fluency rates for both treatment and control groups remained below grade level at posttest.

Treatment Effects of Fast ForWord® Demonstrated by Magnetoencephalography (MEG) in a Child with Developmental Dyslexia

Treatment effects of Fast ForWord®, hypothesized to ameliorate temporal processing deficits, were demonstrated by magnetoencephalography in a child with dyslexia using four paradigms: Word/Non-word Reading (NW), Grapheme-to-Phoneme Matching (GP), Verbal, and Spatial Working Memory (VWM, SWM). Shifts in brain activation from right inferior frontal and temporal to left frontal, bilateral supramarginal, and transverse temporal regions occurred during GP. During NW, shifts progressed from (1) right or bilateral anterior and superior to (2) left, inferior frontal, to (3) left, superior posterior temporoparietal, to (4) left, inferior, posterior temporooccipital regions. Reading and written language improvements were noted in passage comprehension and spelling.

Tracking children who fly below the radar: Latent transition modeling of students with late-emerging reading disability

The purpose of this study was to examine (1) the stability of latent classes associated with reading disability (RD) and typical development (TD) across time, (2) the importance of speeded word recognition as a latent class indicator of RD and TD, and (3) possible early indicators of students with late-emerging RD. Analyses were based on a longitudinal sample of 177 students, some of whom had been assigned randomly to small-group tutoring in either fall or spring of 1st grade. At the end of 1st, 2nd, and 4th grades, students were assessed on word identification, sight word efficiency (SWE), and passage comprehension. Latent transition analysis models were developed to examine classification transitions from 1st to 4th grade and 2nd to 4th grade. Results indicated that RD/TD classification was relatively stable across time, however 5 students were consistently identified as having late-emerging RD. Findings indicated that SWE measured in 2nd grade reduced the number of false negatives for RD and was therefore important for the classification of RD. Finally, although students with late-emerging RD had poorer listening comprehension skill at the start of 1st grade and smaller word reading fluency slopes during 1st grade compared to TD children, these indicators did not reliably distinguish students with late-emerging RD from TD due to high rates of false positives.

Most earcons do not interfere with spoken passage comprehension

AbstractA cross‐modal dual attention experiment was completed by 198 undergraduates in three blocks that each consisted of an orientation task and a concurrent listening task. For the orientation task, participants located regions on an LCD that were cued by speech or one of four types of symbolic auditory cues (i.e. earcons); the concurrent task required participants to listen to and answer questions about GRE sample test passages. Results indicated the orientation task had no effect on comprehension of the passages compared to a passage‐only control for four of the five auditory cue types. All auditory cues resulted in high performance for the orientation task, with speech and complex sounds exhibiting the highest performance. Implications for auditory display design and for assistive technologies for visually impaired persons are discussed. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Early Listening and Speaking Skills Predict Later Reading Proficiency in Pediatric Cochlear Implant Users

Previous studies have reported that children who use cochlear implants (CIs) tend to achieve higher reading levels than their peers with profound hearing loss who use hearing aids. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influences of auditory information provided by the CI on the later reading skills of children born with profound deafness. The hypothesis was that there would be a positive and predictive relationship between earlier speech perception, production, and subsequent reading comprehension. The speech perception and production skills at the vowel, consonant, phoneme, and word level of 72 children with prelingual, profound hearing loss were assessed after 48 mos of CI use. The children's reading skills were subsequently assessed using word and passage comprehension measures after an average of 89.5 mos of CI use. A regression analysis determined the amount of variance in reading that could be explained by the variables of perception, production, and socioeconomic status. Regression analysis revealed that it was possible to explain 59% of the variance of later reading skills by assessing the early speech perception and production performance. The results indicated that early speech perception and production skills of children with profound hearing loss who receive CIs predict future reading achievement skills. Furthermore, the study implies that better early speech perception and production skills result in higher reading achievement. It is speculated that the early access to sound helps to build better phonological processing skills, which is one of the likely contributors to eventual reading success.

Comparing the Effectiveness of Two Reading Intervention Programs for Children With Reading Disabilities

The effectiveness of two reading intervention programs (phonics-based and inductive learning) was investigated with 63 First Nations children identified as poor readers in Grades 3 and 4 in Study 1, whereas in Study 2, the efficacy of booster sessions for inductive learning or PREP (PASS Reading Enhancement Program) was examined. The major dependent variables in Study 1 were pretest to posttest changes following intervention on reading tests for word reading and word decoding. Other dependent variables comprised tests of phonological awareness, rapid naming speed, and cognitive tests of Planning, Attention, Successive, and Simultaneous processing (PASS). Results of Study 1 showed a significant improvement on both reading tasks following inductive learning intervention, among children below the median in comparison with those above the median. The phonics-based program resulted in similar improvement in only one of the reading tasks, word decoding. Results are discussed in terms of approaches to reading intervention for children with persistent reading difficulties. In Study 2, the important dependent variables were word reading and word decoding, as well as passage comprehension. Results showed that PREP participants evidenced continued improvements in their reading skills, notably in comprehension.

Attention training for reading impairment in mild aphasia: A follow-up study

Non-linguistic cognitive skills have recently become an area of focus in aphasia research. One skill that has received in-depth investigation is the role of attention in language tasks. In applying the resource allocation theory to aphasic language deficits, researchers have described performance variablity in language tasks that may result from insufficient capacity, inefficient allocation, or inappropriate allocation of attentional resources [16]. The present study was designed as a follow-up to a recent study examining direct attention training as a treatment for reading impairment in mild aphasia [3]. A treatment program was implemented to target complex attention skills for an individual with mild reading difficulties secondary to aphasia. Results revealed modest gains in reading rate and comprehension. A decrease in the variability of comprehension of longer complex reading passages was noted, suggesting a more efficient allocation of the participant's attentional resources. The positive gains noted for this individual's reading skills were felt to be the result of improvement in allocation of attentional resources rather than improvement in linguistic skills. The findings of this study add to the growing body of literature pertaining to the value of expanding assessment and treatment protocols for individuals with aphasia to include both linguistic and cognitive measures.

The Signed Reading Fluency of Students Who Are Deaf/Hard of Hearing

Reading fluency in deaf children whose primary mode of communication is visual, whether English-like or American Sign Language, is difficult to measure since most measures of fluency require a child to read aloud. This article opens the discussion of a new construct, namely, signed reading fluency (i.e., rendering of printed text in a visually fluent manner) in children with hearing loss whose primary means of expressive language includes some form of sign. Further, it describes the development of an assessment rubric to measure signed reading fluency. A comparison of fluency scores and scores on tests of vocabulary and text comprehension of 29 middle school students who attended a school for the deaf indicated that signed reading fluency, as defined and measured by this instrument, correlates highly both with word and passage comprehension.

The Relationship Between Text Comprehension and Second Language Incidental Vocabulary Acquisition: A Matter of Topic Familiarity?

The study reported in this article describes second language (L2) vocabulary learning outcomes associated with adult L2 reading comprehension processes, thus connecting L2 learning with the complex cognitive and linguistic processing involved in reading. The study aimed to determine whether background knowledge moderated the relationship between passage comprehension and lexical input processing outcomes, such as intake and receptive gain and retention of target‐word meanings. The primary theoretical contribution concerns the nature of the relationships that obtained between passage comprehension and lexical input processing. Overall, the results suggest that as learners become more efficient in engaging in the various processing activities required during L2 reading, they experience greater memory for linguistic elements encountered during reading, such as orthographic forms and semantic aspects of new lexical items. The results support connectionist models of L2 reading and conclusions concerning efficiency in lower level text processing (e.g., see Koda, 2005; Nassaji, 2002). Reading is a complex cognitive activity, involving simultaneous linguistic processing such as pattern recognition, letter identification, lexical access, concept activation, syntactic analysis, propositional encoding, sentence comprehension, and intersentence integration, as well as the activation of prior knowledge, information storage, and comprehension monitoring. The prior knowledge that is accessed is largely determined by the quality of the textbase that is constructed during reading, which is affected by the individual's efficiency in carrying out the various text‐processing operations listed above.The finding that background knowledge did not moderate the relationship between comprehension and receptive retention of meaning provides further support for the robust role of text‐processing efficiency in bootstrapping processes, such as those involved in mapping new linguistic forms to familiar concepts already stored in memory. The secondary finding with regard to intake of the target words corroborates the main finding, demonstrating that efficient text processing skills are also essential to other aspects of lexical input processing, such as establishing and retrieving the connections between new linguistic forms and the specific contexts in which they were encountered. The study also expands upon previous reading and research in the area of methodological innovations applied to incidental learning research paradigms, for instance, by measuring intake and episodic memory and the relationships between text processing and language learning outcomes. In addition, through the concurrent investigation of the impact of several factors on lexical input processing, the study sets the stage for more complex modeling of the processes that contribute to L2 development.

Learner‐Based Factors in L2 Reading Comprehension and Processing Grammatical Form: Topic Familiarity and Working Memory

This study examines how topic familiarity and working memory capacity affect beginning Spanish learners' reading comprehension and their processing of future tense morphology. Participants included 94 adult learners from an accelerated, beginning Spanish course. In addition to completing a computerized version of a reading span test as a measure of working memory capacity, all learners read texts about familiar or unfamiliar topics and completed recall protocols to measure passage comprehension. They also completed form recognition and tense identification tests to determine processing of future tense morphology. The results revealed consistent effects for topic familiarity on all tasks. Although differences in working memory capacity played some role in learners' comprehension and processing grammatical form, significant findings for working memory emerged depending on participants' previous knowledge about text topics.

Identifying a Multivariate Screening Model to Predict Reading Difficulties at the Onset of Kindergarten: A Longitudinal Analysis

The purpose of this followup study was to determine the long-term predictive validity of theoretically coherent reading measures administered during fall and winter of kindergarten. Seventy-nine children were screened using measures representing letter identification, phonological awareness, phonological memory, and rapid automatized naming. Reading achievement was measured at the end of grades 1 through 4 on passage comprehension, oral reading fluency, sight-word recognition, and phonemic decoding. A multivariate screening model incorporating letter identification, phonological awareness, and rapid automatized naming emerged as the most parsimonious model for predicting long-term reading achievement. This screening model yielded the highest correlations with oral reading fluency as the outcome measure. There was no practical significance between the fall and winter screening over the four-year period using this model. Results are interpreted as confirming the importance of a multivariate screening approach using letter identification, phonological awareness, and rapid automatized naming at the earliest time frame in kindergarten.

Effect of Learning English as a Second Language on the Comprehension of Synthetic Speech in Ambient Noise

A study was undertaken to investigate the effect that learning English as a second language has on the comprehension of passages of synthetic speech in English in two listening environments: quiet and ambient noise. Participants were native speakers of English, Spanish and Vietnamese. Results indicated that participants had more difficulty comprehending the passages in ambient noise, but no significant comprehension differences were found attributable to the factor of native language.

Improving the Reading Comprehension of Middle School Students With Disabilities Through Computer-Assisted Collaborative Strategic Reading

This study investigated the effects of computer-assisted comprehension practice using a researcher-developed computer program, Computer-Assisted Collaborative Strategic Reading (CACSR), with students who had disabilities. Two reading/ language arts teachers and their 34 students with disabilities participated. Students in the intervention group received the CACSR intervention, which consisted of 50-min instructional sessions twice per week over 10 to 12 weeks. The results revealed a statistically significant difference between intervention and comparison groups' reading comprehension ability as measured by a researcher-developed, proximal measure (i.e., finding main ideas and question generation) and a distal, standardized measure (i.e., Woodcock Reading Mastery Test, Passage Comprehension). Effect sizes for all dependent measures favored the CACSR group. Furthermore, a majority of students expressed positive overall perspectives of the CACSR intervention and believed that their reading had improved.

Measures of Reading Comprehension:A Latent Variable Analysis of the Diagnostic Assessment of Reading Comprehension

This study compares 2 measures of reading comprehension: (a) the Woodcock-Johnson Passage Comprehension test, a standard in reading research, and (b) the Diagnostic Assessment of Reading Comprehension (DARC), an innovative measure. Data from 192 Grade 3 Spanish-speaking English language learners (ELLs) were used to fit a series of latent variable analyses designed to explicitly test the discriminant validity and differential determinants of the 2 measures. Findings indicated that the 2 measures are related (r =. 61) but distinct, and influenced by different factors. The DARC is less strongly related to word-level skills and more strongly related to measures of narrative language production and memory. Both tests are equally influenced by measures of nonverbal reasoning. These differential patterns of relations, which cannot be explained on the basis of differential reliabilities, reflect true differences in the processing demands of the tests for 3rd-grade ELLs.

The Contribution of Naming Speed to the Simple View of Reading

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether naming speed makes a contribution to the prediction of reading comprehension, after taking into account the product of word decoding and listening comprehension (i.e., the Simple View of Reading; (Gough, P.B. & Tunmer, W.E. (1986). Remedial and Special Education 7 ,6 - 10)), and phonological awareness. In grade 3, word decoding was measured with the Woodcock ((1998). Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests - Revised. Circle Pines, MN: American Guidance Services). Word Identification and Word Attack subtests, listening comprehension with the Woodcock (1991) (Woodcock Language Proficiency Battery - Revised. Chicago: Riverside Publishing Company) test of Listening Comprehension, naming speed with a picture naming task, and 4 measures assessed phonological awareness. Reading comprehension was assessed in grades 3, 4, and 5 with the Woodcock (1998) Passage Comprehension subtest and in grade 5 with the Gates- MacGinitie reading test. The Simple View was evaluated twice: first, with a pseudoword measure for decoding (Grapheme-Phoneme-conversion product) and, second, with a word identification measure for decoding (word recognition product). Hierarchical regression and commonality analyses indicated that the decoding and listening com- prehension products accounted for considerable variance in reading comprehension. Naming speed had a small but significant effect after accounting for the Grapheme- Phoneme-conversion product (2-3%), but little effect after accounting for the word- recognition product (0-2%). Subgroup analyses indicated that naming speed had its primary effect for less able readers. Commonality analyses supported the interpretation that naming speed contributes after the Grapheme-Phoneme-conversion product but not after the word recognition product because naming speed has already had its effect upon word recognition. These results indicate that it is important how the Simple View decoding term is defined, and that the Simple View may be incomplete, especially for less able readers.

Concurrent Validity of the Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency

Relationships between the Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency (TOSWRF; Mather, Hammill, Allen, & Roberts, 2004), a recently developed measure of fluency, and other operationalizations of reading, including subtests from the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills (CTBS; 1996), and the Woodcock-Johnson- III Tests of Achievement, (WJ-III; Woodcock, McGrew, & Mather, 2001), were determined by assessing the performance of 98 elementary students at risk for or identified with reading problems. Results yielded significant positive relationships between TOSWRF and CTBS Spelling (p < .01) and between TOSWRF and CTBS Reading and Language Composite scores (p < .05), when corrected for restriction in range. Relationships between TOSWRF and WJ-III subtests were also significant, whether corrected or uncorrected (e.g., Letter-Word Identification, Reading Fluency, Passage Comprehension, Spelling, and Broad Reading Cluster, p < .01). The TOSWRF has encouraging psychometric properties with potential for use in busy classrooms because of its efficiency (i.e., 3-minute administration), and versatility (i.e., individual or group administration options).