Previous research indicates that children comprehend more of high- than low-interest material when given both types of material. In this study fifth grade children each received either high-interest or low-interest cloze passages but not both. Results indicated that the interest effect is not dependent on a contrast phenomenon. (HOD)

After reviewing the evidence that boys in American elementary schools are far more likely than girls to have serious reading problems, this report considers two lines of investigation into this discrepancy. The first line of investigation is based on the hypothesis that the predominance of female teachers in elementary schools is responsible for…

Previous research has indicated that children comprehend more of material of high interest than material of low interest, when each child is given a mixture of both types. In the present study of fifth-grade children, each child received either all high-interest material or all low-interest material. Interests were assessed using a picture-rating…

Recent research indicates that boys read as well as girls if given high-interest material but read more poorly if given low-interest material. This study investigated possible factors contributing to the facilitating effect of interest of boys. Two experiments were performed to learn whether high-interest topics are associated with traditionally…

To assess whether black children comprehend more of high- than low-interest reading material, whether the performance discrepancy between white and black children is reduced under high-interest conditions, and to determine the degree of similarity of the interests of white and black children, a study involving 33 black and 33 white fifth graders…