Teaching readers about the structure of scientific text.

Adults may have difficulty in reading and retaining scientific text because they are unaware of the text's top-level structure. Experiment 1 revealed that college students had difficulty in sorting passages into categories on the basis of text structures, such as generalization, enumeration, sequence, classification, and compare/contrast. In Experiment 2, junior college chemistry students either received approximately 8 hr of training in how to discriminate among and use text structures found in their chemistry textbook (trained group) or engaged in unrelated activities (control group). All students took matched pretests and posttests in which they read biology passages and then freely recalled the passages and answered comprehension questions. On the recall test, the trained group showed a substantial pretest-to-posttest gain in recall of high conceptual information but not in recall of low conceptual information, whereas the control group showed no substantial gains. On the comprehension test, the trained group showed a substantial pretest-to-posttest gain in answering application questions and a lesser gain in answering literal questions, whereas the control group showed no substantial gains. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive processes as predictors of word recognition and reading comprehension in learning-disabled and skilled readers: Revisiting the specificity hypothesis.

Examines how cognitive processes interrelate as well as predict learning-disabled (LD) readers' word recognition and reading comprehension performance. Correlations between phonological, orthographic, semantic, metacognitive, and working memory measures with reading performance were examined in LD and skilled readers (aged 8–12 yrs). LD Ss were deficient on all cognitive processes compared with skilled Ss, but these differences do not reflect IQ scores. Reading ability group differences emerged on a component composed primarily of working memory measures (referred to as "g") as well as unique components, suggesting that these differences emerge on both general and specific (modular) processes. G best predicts reading comprehension for both groups, and phonological awareness best predicts skilled Ss' pseudoword reading, whereas g best predicts LD Ss' pseudoword performance. Overall, LD Ss' information processing difficulties were described within a general working memory model that views such children as having difficulty accessing and coordinating both general and specific processes. Results suggest that the cognitive processes that contribute to reading deficits are best understood in the context of their combination with other operations rather than in isolation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Techniques that help readers build mental models from scientific text: Definitions pretraining and signaling.

In Exp I, the effects of definitions pretraining on 32 undergraduates' understanding of an unfamiliar scientific passage was investigated. In Exp II, the effects of signaling were studied with 30 undergraduates. In Exp III, the role of combined definitions pretraining and signaling was tested with 64 female undergraduates. Results show that definitions pretraining and signaling enhanced recall of conceptual information directly related to the cause-and-effect system, enhanced creative problem-solving performance, and decreased verbatim memory and primacy memory for the material. Two scientific passages are appended. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Teaching reading to poor readers in the intermediate grades: A comparison of text difficulty.

The authors compared the influence of text difficulty--reading-level matched or grade-level matched--on the growth of poor readers' reading ability over 18 weeks of 1-to-1 tutoring. Forty-six 3rd-5th graders, including 25 with disabilities, were assigned randomly to 1 of 2 tutoring approaches or a control condition. Significant differences favored tutored children. Between approaches, the only significant difference was oral reading fluency, which favored students who read material at their reading level. Students who began with lower fluency made stronger gains in text matched to reading level; students with higher fluency profited from both treatments. When the 3 groups were combined, fluency was the strongest contributor to reading comprehension outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effects of accelerated reading rate on memory for text among dyslexic readers.

The author tested the hypothesis that gains in reading performance occurring among dyslexic children during individually paced accelerated reading are partially attributable to changes in short-term memory (STM) processing. Dyslexic children's performance on a series of standard STM-sensitive tasks administered during both self- and fast-paced reading conditions confirmed this hypothesis. The findings provided strong support for a causal role of STM functioning in text processing but indicated that reading acceleration enhanced STM only when dyslexic children were able to rely on contextual cues. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Flashcards revisited: Training poor readers to read words faster improves their comprehension of text.

Forty-two below-average readers, between 7 and 10 years of age, were given single-word training, phrase training, or no training. Trained children learned to decode target words quickly and accurately, using flashcards; untrained children only discussed the target words and read them once. Trained and untrained children read aloud passages containing target words and were tested on their comprehension. Trained children had better comprehension than did the untrained children when questioned about passages and asked to retell them. Results suggest that an emphasis on rapid word recognition benefits poor readers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comprehension of students with and without learning disabilities: Identification of narrative themes and idiosyncratic text representations.

In an interview organized around the comprehension of a story adapted from a natural text and the identification of story theme, adolescent students with learning disabilities (LDs) performed below the level of same-age students without LDs and at the same level as younger students without LDs matched on standardized reading comprehension scores. However, on 1 sensitive measure of theme identification (incipient awareness of theme), the LDs scored below the younger students without LDs as well. The LDs also made more idiosyncratic importations during their summarizing and discussing of the story, and such importations were associated with poorer theme identification. The findings suggest that LDs have specific difficulty with "getting the point," perhaps because they build up less effective text representations through the inappropriate use of background knowledge or intrusion of personal points of view. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Resilient readers? University students who are poor recoders but sometimes good text comprehenders.

The authors screened 194 university students to determine whether some could comprehend text well despite very poor recoding skills, measured by pseudoword reading. Most of the 17 poorest recoders had never been identified as reading disabled. We classified 6 poor recoders as "resilient readers" because their text comprehension scores were average or above, relative to the sample as a whole. They were indistinguishable from 6 matched typical readers on measures of text comprehension derived from oral-reading think-aloud protocols. There was no evidence that the resilient readers relied on superior verbal ability or working memory to compensate for poor recoding. The resilient readers were poor at spelling, reading isolated words, and reading text rapidly, but they showed adequate phonemic awareness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

There are at least two kinds of poor readers: Whole-word poor readers and recoding poor readers.

Current theories of reading are used to predict the existence of at least 2 subtypes of poor readers, and results from 3 experiments with 27 good and 13 poor readers (Primary Mental Abilities Test) from the 3rd grade support this claim. Recoding poor readers relied heavily on a sound-based code and on submorphemic units while reading single words, whereas whole-word poor readers did not. It is argued that only an individual-differences framework coupled with current theory is rich enough to characterize reading disorders adequately. (French abstract) (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Task dependent variations of ocular lateropulsion in Wallenberg''s syndrome

The eye movements of a patient with a left lateral medullary infarct (Wallenberg's syndrome) were recorded using the scleral search coil in magnetic field technique. When asked to look at spontaneously appearing targets, saccades to the left were generally accurate but those to the right reached the target by multiple step refixation saccades. Large amplitude rightward saccades were possible between two continuously visible targets or when making voluntary saccades in the dark. Vertical saccades, up or down, between spontaneously appearing targets were always associated with a leftward eye movement (lateropulsion). Voluntary vertical saccades between continuously visible targets showed that upward movements had left lateropulsion but downward movements were normal. Vertical voluntary saccades in the dark were oblique, upward saccades showing left lateropulsion and downward saccades rightward deviation. The aberrant horizontal components of normal oblique saccades. Possibly impaired assessment of verticality with incorrect eye position information produced by the infarct accounts for the lateropulsion in saccades in Wallenberg's syndrome.     

Classification and validation of behavioral subtypes of learning-disabled children.

63 1st and 2nd graders recently identified as having a learning disability (LD) and 66 normally developing Ss matched by grade, sex, and race with LD Ss were rated by teachers on the 60-item Classroom Behavior Inventory and observed using a time-sampling schedule of classroom activity norms. Analysis identified 7 distinct behavioral subtypes of LD Ss. In Cluster 1, 28.6% Ss had deficiencies in task-oriented behavior and independence. In Cluster 2 (25.4% of Ss) and Cluster 5 (9.5% of Ss), 2 variations of normal classroom behavior were represented. In Cluster 2, Ss had slightly elevated ratings on considerateness and introversion, while in Cluster 5, Ss were seen as slightly less considerate and more hostile. In Cluster 3, mild attention deficits in 14.3% of Ss were combined with high ratings on distractibility and hostility and low ratings on considerateness. In Cluster 4, 11% of Ss were withdrawn and overly dependent with low ratings on independence and extraversion and high ratings on dependence and introversion. In Cluster 6, 6.3% of Ss showed a pattern of a mild version of a global behavior disorder. In Cluster 7 (3 males), Ss were impaired on all classroom behaviors. (31 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sociometric differences between learning-disabled and nonhandicapped students: Effects of sex and race.

The relation of sex and race to learning-disabled (LD) children's popularity and rejection by peers was investigated by comparing the number of positive and negative peer nominations received by 76 LD and 669 nonhandicapped (NH) White and Black children in Grades 3 through 5. Results indicated less popularity and greater rejection for LD students. Furthermore, a Group?×?Sex?×?Race interaction for negative nominations was found, indicating that White LD girls were most disliked of the LD group. It was suggested that greater dislike of White LD girls may be due to discrepancies between the achievement of LD children and their same-sex, same-race peers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Readability of readers.

The Flesch count readability formula was applied to general readers in psychology intended to be used in combination with regular psychology tests. Results indicate that "… the books are of about the same degree of difficulty, all being difficult according to Flesch's standards… . Some of the most readable work was done by such writers as Kohler, Freud, Munn, Murphy, James McKeen Cattell and Lashley." Among the more difficult to read are Lewin, Pavlov, Carmichael, and Cruze. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

WISC-R discrimination of learning-disabled and emotionally disturbed children: An intragroup and intergroup analysis.

Reanalyzed WISC-R subtest scores in R. S. Dean's (see record 1979-05122-001) study of learning-disabled and emotionally disturbed children. A Pearson correlation between subtest means and a Spearman rank-order correlation between the ranks of the subtests revealed a marked similarity between the groups. Results support J. M. Sattler's (see record 1980-12193-001) contention that Dean's data do not present evidence of a perceptual organization deficit in learning-disabled children. (3 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Causal attributions of learning-disabled children: Developmental patterns and relation to academic progress.

The relation of school-identified learning-disabled (LD) children's achievement attributions to their academic progress and an examination of developmental patterns of their attributional styles were investigated in these longitudinal studies. Attributions were measured with two scales on which children attributed hypothetical academic failure situations to causes that varied on dimensions of locus, stability, and controllability. Academic progress was indexed by changes in achievement test scores over a 2-year span and by teachers' ratings of students' success and classroom behavior. In accordance with Weiner's theory of achievement motivation, LD children who attributed failures to variant, controllable causes made the greatest achievement gains and were rated by teachers as exhibiting the most appropriate classroom behavior. Comparison of developmental patterns of attributions between LD and nondisabled children did not support the hypothesis that LD children enter a self-perpetuating failure cycle; nor were previously reported findings of sex differences within the LD group replicated. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assessing text representations with recognition: The interaction of domain knowledge and text coherence.

Readers construct at least 2 interrelated mental representations when they comprehend a text: a textbase and a situation model. Two experiments were conducted with recognition memory to examine how domain knowledge and text coherence influence readers' textbase and situation-model representations. In Experiment 1, participants made remember-know judgments to text ideas. Knowledge and coherence interacted to influence remember judgments differently than know judgments. In Experiment 2, the authors used the process-dissociation procedure to obtain recollection and familiarity estimates. Knowledge and coherence interacted to influence recollection estimates but not familiarity estimates. The authors claim that recollection and familiarity can be used as markers of the different processes involved in constructing a textbase and a situation model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Distinguishing learning-disabled and emotionally disturbed children on the WISC-R.

Isolated the distinctive WISC-R subtest patterns that would differentiate the performance of emotionally disturbed and learning-disabled children. A stepwise discriminant analysis was used to evaluate the subtest scores of 60 learning-disabled 6–13 yr olds and a matched sample of 60 emotionally disturbed children. Four subtests of the WISC-R differentiated significantly between diagnostic categories. Learning-disabled Ss performed predictively poorer on the Block Design, Picture Arrangement, and Object Assembly subtests and higher on Vocabulary than their emotionally disturbed counterparts. Results are interpreted as a deficit in perceptual organization for children with specific learning problems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparative analysis of attentional deficits in hyperactive and learning-disabled children.

Compared 14 boys (aged 7–9 yrs) with attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity (ADDH), 12 with learning disability (LD), 12 with ADDH-LD, and 13 normal boys on measures of sustained attention, selective attention, and span of apprehension. Unique patterns of attentional deficits were associated with each of the diagnostic groups. The ADDH Ss with and without learning disabilities exhibited sustained attention deficits. The LD Ss evidenced selective attention deficits on a speeded classification task. The LD and ADDH-LD Ss evidenced recall difficulties on a paired-associate task, regardless of distractor presence. The 3 clinical groups performed more poorly than did the normal group on the span of apprehension measure. Although attentional deficits were most pervasive in the ADDH-LD group, multivariate composites of attentional variables were sensitive to the ADDH and LD dimensions. (34 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Story comprehension and recall in learning-disabled versus normal college students.

24 learning-disabled (LD) and 24 normal college students rated stories on the importance of their idea units. LD Ss showed significantly less agreement on their importance ratings than the normal Ss. Ss also selected 12 idea units as retrieval cues, one group before and the other after recall. This task showed that normal Ss selecting cues after recall used a different strategy than those selecting cues before recall; LD Ss did not vary their cue-selection strategy as a function of experience. In spite of these differences, recall increased significantly at higher importance levels for both ability groups, and recall did not differ for LD and normal Ss who selected retrieval cues after recall. Cue selection before recall, however, depressed performance of LD Ss relative to that of the normal Ss. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)