Passage Comprehension Research Articles

The impact of language ability and text variables on sixth-grade students' comprehension

ABSTRACTThis study examined differences between normally achieving students and learning-disabled students with specific problems in reading comprehension (i.e., poor comprehenders) on measures of language ability, including overall ability, auditory processing, receptive and expressive language, and syntactic ability related to text retellings. Differences were related to performance on free and probed comprehension of expository passages varying in syntactic structure and discourse type. Poor comprehending students differed from normally achieving students on all language measures and in the manner in which reader-related and text-related variables predicted comprehension. Results support the positive role of syntactic ability in text comprehension, differences in free and probed recall responses, and the facilitating effect of structured text on recall.

Developmental dyslexia, neurolinguistic theory and deviations in brain morphology

Although some form of central nervous system involvement is presumed, evidence establishing a relationship between dyslexia and neurological dysfunction has been correlational. Recently, neuroimaging and postmortem studies have begun to provide direct evidence implicating neuropathological structures in dyslexia. This article reviews computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies examining deviations in brain morphology which appear to be associated with neurolinguistic functioning. Methodological and technical issues are discussed. Based on their own and others research, the authors conclude that dyslexies show variations in specific brain regions, namely, reversed or symmetrical plana temporale (L ≤ R), smaller insular length bilaterally, and symmetrical frontal regions. Moreover, recent studies by the senior author and colleagues suggest that specific reading tasks are associated with specific variations in brain morphology. Symmetrical frontal widths was related to poorer passage comprehension, and reversed frontal area symmetry was related to poor word attack skills. Though many conceptual and technical issues remain unresolved, neuroimaging procedures appear to provide direct evidence supporting the importance of deviations in normal patterns of brain morphology in dyslexia.

Comprehension of synthetic speech produced by rule: word monitoring and sentence-by-sentence listening times.

Previous comprehension studies using postperceptual memory tests have often reported negligible differences in performance between natural speech and several kinds of synthetic speech produced by rule, despite large differences in segmental intelligibility. The present experiments investigated the comprehension of natural and synthetic speech using two different on-line tasks: word monitoring and sentence-by-sentence listening. On-line task performance was slower and less accurate for passages of synthetic speech than for passages of natural speech. Recognition memory performance in both experiments was less accurate following passages of synthetic speech than of natural speech. Monitoring performance, sentence listening times, and recognition memory accuracy all showed moderate correlations with intelligibility scores obtained using the Modified Rhyme Test. The results suggest that poorer comprehension of passages of synthetic speech is attributable in part to the greater encoding demands of synthetic speech. In contrast to earlier studies, the present results demonstrate that on-line tasks can be used to measure differences in comprehension performance between natural and synthetic speech.

Dyslexia and brain morphology: Relationships between neuroanatomical variation and neurolinguistic tasks

This study, in contrast to previous studies of morphological differences between dyslexics and normals, examined the relationship between performance on neurolinguistic tasks and measures of brain morphology in 10 dyslexics, 10 clinic-comparison Attention Deficit Disorder/Hyperactive (ADD/H) children, and 10 normal control children. The dyslexics were found to be significantly deficient on automatic and confrontational naming, word attack (nonword reading), and passage comprehension tasks as compared to the ADD/H and normal groups. Relationships between differences in neurolinguistic function and variations in brain morphology were found only in the dyslexic group. Smaller right frontal width appeared to be related to significantly poorer passage comprehension for the dylexic group. In addition, reversed asymmetry or symmetrical anterior area (L⩾R) was also related to significantly poorer word attack skills for the dyslexic group. These effects were not present for the other two groups. Reversed or symmetrical planum temporale length (L⩽R), despite group membership, was significantly related to lower verbal comprehension on the WISC-R, indicating that the planum temporale are involved in language processing. The results of this study demonstrated that the neurolinguistic functional deficits in dyslexics may be related to significant structural differences in the frontal and temporal lobes. Further, consistent with neurobiological theory, the inclusion of the clinic comparison (ADD/H) children suggests that these structure-function relationships may be unique to the dyslexic syndrome.

The Effects of Computer-Mediated Texts on the Vocabulary Learning and Comprehension of Intermediate-Grade Readers

The authors investigated whether intermediate-grade readers' vocabulary learning and comprehension would be affected by displaying texts on a computer screen that provided the meanings of difficult words. Sixty sixth-grade subjects read two informational passages containing several target words that had been identified as difficult. Subjects were assigned to four treatment conditions. In two of the conditions they read the passages on printed pages accompanied by either a standard dictionary or a glossary comprised of the target words. In the remaining two conditions they read the passages on a computer screen that provided either optional or mandatory assistance with the meanings of the target words. The results indicate that subjects who read passages with computer assistance scored significantly higher on a vocabulary test that measured subjects' knowledge of the target words. Subjects who read the passages on the computer screen with mandatory assistance also outperformed other subjects on a test measuring comprehension of the experimental passages. In addition, subjects free to select which of the target words they would investigate chose to do so more often when the computer provided assistance. The authors conclude that these results support and help explain previous studies that have found increases in comprehension when computer-mediated texts have been used to expand or control readers' options for acquiring information.

Cognition and academic achievement: The relationship of the Cognitive Levels Test, the Keymath Revised, and the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests-Revised

This study evaluated the ability of the Cognitive Levels Test to estimate current achievement in mathematics (as measured by the KeyMath Revised) and reading (as measured by the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests-Revised) among a group of normal children attending a private school. The validity coefficients resulting from the analysis indicated that the Cognitive Levels Test scores were moderately to highly correlated with the WRMT-R and KMR, respectively. Repeated-measures analyses of variance yielded no significant main effect for the CLT/KMR scores, but did identify a main effect for the CLT/WRMT-R scores. Follow-up multiple comparisons revealed one significant difference between the various mean scores: The CLT Verbal Reasoning mean was significantly greater than the WRMT-R Passage Comprehension mean. Given the substantial correlations and generally nonsignificant differences between mean scores, the results were judged as strong evidence of the validity of the CLT for the purpose of estimating math and reading achievement.

Effects of instruction on beginning reading skills in children at risk for reading disability

Children identified in kindergarten as being at risk for reading disability were taught in grades one and two using one of two methods of reading instruction, a structured phonics code-emphasis approach or an approach emphasizing use of context. At the end of first and second grade, children were tested on measures of achievement in word identification, word attack, passage comprehension and spelling. Those in the Code group earned uniformly higher scores on all achievement measures at the end of first and second grades. At the end of first grade, statistically significant differences between groups were found on nonword reading and spelling of phonetically regular words. At the end of second grade, significant differences were found in reading of polysyllabic real words and decoding of monosyllabic and polysyllabic nonsense words. It was concluded that reading instruction does have an important impact on acquisition of early reading skills, and that structured, systematic phonics instruction results in more favorable outcome than does a context emphasis approach.

The Effect of Prereading, Rhetorically-Oriented Frameworks on the Recall of Two Structurally Different Expository Texts

Research in both first and second language reading has undertaken the study of discourse structure and the influence of the rhetorical organization of the text on readers' passage comprehension. A considerable amount of research has also examined the effect of text adjuncts of various kinds on passage comprehension. The present study explored the effect of providing novice foreign language readers information about the rhetorical structure of an expository text as a text adjunct. Two passages were tested under each of three conditions: no framework, minimal framework, and expanded framework. Results indicate that an expanded framework is an effective text adjunct for the comprehension of expository prose.

Outsiders: American Short Stories for Students of ESL

I At a time when increasing numbers of teachers are reconsidering the place of literature in the ESL classroom, two recent anthologies, Jean Mullen's Outsiders and John Povey's Literature for Discussion, are welcome contributions. Not only do both authors make available to ESL teachers a number of modern short stories, but they also have attempted to take into account current insights into reading comprehension. Current research in reading suggests that meaning lies not in the text itself but rather in the interaction between the graphemes on the page and the schema in the reader's mind (Carrell 1982). These schema are the structured totality of the past personal experiences, cultural assumptions, and background knowledge of the reader. Current views on reading emphasize that the ability to understand the language of the text, while obviously necessary, cannot by itself fully explain or predict the extent to which the reader will understand the text. Beyond syntactic competence, important factors which appear to contribute to the comprehensibility of a text are shared schema and difficulty of vocabulary. Numerous studies (e.g., Johnson 1981, Carrell 1982) have shown that comprehension and recall of reading passages depend upon the reader's familiarity with the subject. Because the impact and appreciation of the literary text depend heavily upon the shared cultural assumptions of the writer and reader, this theoretical framework has important implications for teaching literature. The most obvious implication of schema theory for reading methodology is that pre-reading activities should be provided to insure that the cultural assumptions of ESL students and those of the writer are similar. In fact, it has been suggested that the more pre-reading activities there are to familiarize the reader with a text and its cultural assumptions, the easier the text will be to read (Hudson 1982). The question of vocabulary is more complex. On the one hand, vocabulary difficulty seems to affect comprehension (Carrell 1982). On the other, specifically teaching the vocabulary of a text seems to

Predicting accuracy of comprehension from the relative difficulty of the material

The functional relationship between the relative difficulty of passages and the degree to which they are comprehended was investigated. Relative difficulty was defined as the accuracy level (A l ) of the reader minus the difficulty level (D l ) of the material when both were measured in grade equivalent (GE) units; relative difficulty was A l — D l . A total of 568 students in grades 3–12 and graduate school were given passages to read at difficulty levels varying from D L = 2 to D L = 17, and relative difficulty varied from −8 to +10. A standardized reading test—the Accuracy Level Test—was used to estimate A l for each student, and two different readability techniques were used to estimate D l for each passage. The students were asked to decide what percent of each passage they comprehended after they had read it, and this judgement constituted an estimate of the accuracy of comprehension. The percent of passage comprehension was found to be a linear function of the relative difficulty of the material. The accuracy of comprehension can be predicted quite precisely from a mathematical equation given a knowledge of the level of difficulty of the material and the level of ability of the individual.

The effects of emphasis on passage comprehension.

It may be inferred from reaction time studies that the location of emphasis on nouns and noun phrases facilitates their comprehension (understanding and memory). However, we know of no previous demonstration of improved passage comprehension in normal listeners associated with emphasis placement. The present experiment examined effects of emphasis on comprehension of 12 passages that were read aloud and tape recorded. Emphasis placement was varied by splicing sentences containing emphasized or nonemphasized noun phrases into passages without altering the wording of the passages. These passages, contrasting in emphasis, were presented to 60 listeners. Comprehension was measured with multiple-choice, recognition questions that required subjects to link ideas across sentences. Comprehension was accurate significantly more often when correct response alternatives had been emphasized (71%), than when incorrect alternatives had been emphasized (56%), or no emphasis occurred in passages (57%). Findings reflect enhanced comprehension of emphasized items in terms of their meaning links to other concepts presented in passages. Results support the pragmatic assumption that the role of emphasis is to delineate constituents important in discourse meaning.

Comprehension of natural and synthetic speech

Previous studies comparing the comprehension of natural and synthetic speech passages have produced conflicting results. All of these studies used successive measurement techniques in which subjects' comprehension was assessed after the presentation of a passage. However, comparative studies have found that successive methods are less sensitive than simultaneous “on‐line” measures. Successive measures are also known to be influenced by memory factors. Subjects in the present experiment monitored for word targets while they listened to short passages and then verified statements after each passage. Both monitoring and verification performance for passages of synthetic speech were depressed relative to passages of natural speech. There was a significant interaction between voice and text difficulty in the monitoring latency data, suggesting that both factors affect mechanisms drawing from the same limited processing resources. Finally, there was a significant interaction between voice and sentence type in t...

The effects of an interactive instructional strategy for enhancing reading comprehension and content area learning for students with learning disabilities.

This study investigated the effectiveness of an interactive vocabulary instructional strategy, semantic-feature analysis (SFA), on the content area text comprehension of adolescents with learning disabilities. Prior to reading a social studies text, students in resource classes either completed a relationship chart as part of the SFA condition or used the dictionary to write definitions and sentences as part of the contrast condition. Passage comprehension was measured on a multiple-choice test consisting of two types of items, vocabulary and conceptual. Comprehension was measured immediately following teaching and again 6 months after teaching. Prior knowledge for the content of the passage served as a covariate. Results indicated that students in the SFA instructional condition had significantly greater measured comprehension immediately following and 6 months after initial teaching. These results are discussed in relation to concept-driven, interactive strategies for teaching content and facilitating text comprehension.

On‐line measures of comprehension of natural and synthetic speech

Accumulated perceptual research comparing natural and synthetic speech indicates relatively large differences in tasks assessing acoustic‐phonetic processing, and small differences in tasks assessing higher levels of processing related to comprehension. Studies comparing comprehension of passages of fluent natural and synthetic speech have generally examined performance on questions presented after subjects have listened to a passage. Such postperceptual measures are known to be relatively insensitive to differences in “real‐time” processing operations. The present investigation employed an “on‐line” measure of processing, i.e., word monitoring, to study comprehension. Subjects in these studies were presented with three types of passages—(1) natural speech, (2) high‐quality synthetic speech, and (3) low‐quality synthetic speech—and were required to monitor for target words as well as verify postperceptual comprehension questions. Monitoring latencies and verification performance will be discussed in terms of differences in perceptual processing and comprehension of natural and synthetic speech. [Work supported by NSF.]

Imagery and the Comprehension of College History Texts: Free Response Measure

Previous publications of this experiment have based their significance on objective tests of comprehension. Now, with more relevant criteria for rating the essay answers, it is clear that imagery produces significant gains in comprehension of college history text passages – as measured by free-response tests. This experiment used original and revised passages from a standard American History college text. It tested the interest and the comprehension of these passages by 192 subjects who were entering freshmen at a well-known liberal arts college. The experiment compared the two treatments of four different war passages, presented in every combination and sequence in a completely balanced design. Analysis of variance established that significantly higher scores resulted from the revised treatments. This conclusion points a way, through the use of imagery, to improve college history texts and possibly others. This finding reinforces the conclusion that appropriate imagery enhances the readability of college history textbooks.

A Critical Thinking Map to Improve Content Area Comprehension of Poor Readers

A mapping strategy for thinking critically about expository text was used with six high school students who had difficulties in reading comprehension: Four were sophomores in a remedial reading program, and two were juniors in a special education program for the mildly retarded. Subjects read passages from an unfamiliar textbook on U.S. government history. The format was model- lead-test; that is, the teacher first modeled the strategy, then led the student in completing the map, and finally allowed the student to complete the map independently. The components of the critical thinking map were main idea of the passage, major points that support the main idea, other viewpoints, reader's conclusion, and relevance to a contemporary situation. All subjects improved substantially in daily comprehension of lessons. Remedial reading students showed maintained improvement over time. All subjects improved comprehension of passages from a different social studies text indicating ability to generalize to similar content. Four students also showed generalization of improved performance to reading in a different content area. All subjects improved in a standardized test of reading vocabulary and five of the six improved on a test of reading comprehension. All but one subject demonstrated improved generalization to nonverbal thinking tasks and all improved for verbal thinking.

The Effects of Altering the Ceiling Criterion on the Passage Comprehension Test of the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests

Forty adolescent subjects were administered the Woodcock Reading Mastery Tests. The Passage Comprehension Test for each subject was rescored using three different ceiling criteria: (a) five errors in six consecutive responses, (b) five errors in seven consecutive responses and (c) three consecutive errors. The three scoring methods were found to be equivalent to the scoring method recommended in the Woodcock Manual in terms of internal consistency reliability. Strong positive correlations were found between raw scores obtained by the four scoring methods and between each group of raw scores and an external measure. Analysis of variance revealed statistically significant differences between the raw score means. Bivariate regression equations were provided to allow raw scores obtained with each of the three scoring methods to be adjusted so they can be used to obtain percentile ranks and equivalent scores. Two alternative scoring methods reduced to a statistically significant degree the mean number of items administered with no loss in reliability or validity. Practical recommendations for diagnosticians are provided.

Learning to Spell While Reading: A Follow-Up Study

Eight pseudowords were presented to 29 undergraduate students within the context of four brief passages. Students were instructed to do one of three things: (a) learn the details of the stories, (b) learn both the story details (high priority) and the spellings of the pseudowords, or (c) learn both the word spellings (high priority) and the story details. Instructions to learn word spellings led to significantly better spelling performance without significantly affecting passage comprehension; however, even those students instructed to make the learning of word spelling a higher priority spelled only a mean of 4.9 of the 8 words correctly. The need for determining why students have such difficulty in learning to spell new words is discussed.

Strategy and abilities training for prose recall and comprehension in mentally retarded children.

This study compared the effects of training conditions, abilities, strategies, and a combination of abilities and strategies on the recall and comprehension of prose passages. The subjects were 45 educable mentally retarded children divided equally into the three conditions. Although there was significant pre- to post-test improvement within each condition for factual recall, no differences were observed among the conditions for either factual recall or comprehension.

The Effects of Vocabulary Instruction: A Model-Based Meta-Analysis

This paper reports a meta-analysis of studies concerned with the effects of vocabulary instruction on the learning of word meanings and on comprehension. This analysis was used to examine two questions: Does vocabulary instruction have a significant effect on children’s comprehension of text? What types of vocabulary instruction are most effective? In response to the first question, a mean effect size of .97 could be attributed to vocabulary instruction for comprehension of passages containing taught words and of .30 for global measures of comprehension, both of which are significantly different from zero. For the second question, it was suggested that the most effective vocabulary teaching methods included both definitional and contextual information in their programs, involved the students in deeper processing, and gave the students more than one or two exposures to the to-be-learned words. In addition, the mnemonic keyword method was found to have reliable effects on recall of definitions and sentence comprehension.