Investigates normative longitudinal change in student writing during college. Selects nine measures as good representatives of nine factors--factors of independent and bound ideas, idea elaboration and substantiation, local cohesion, establishment of logical boundaries, free modification, fluency, and vocabulary. Finds that eight of the nine…

This paper provides additional discussion and interpretation of the original findings of a study examining the development of writing skills across college years. The paper focuses on six interpretive problems from the mass of primary data in an attempt to clarify issues and block off false interpretive trails. The paper discusses: (1) the…

To determine whether the development of writing skills changes across college years, a study examined the writing of average-age college freshmen, sophomores, and beginning juniors. Writing samples were obtained during the first week of the first semester, last week of the first semester, first week of the third semester, and first week of the…