A fundamental question in psycholinguistic research concerns the universality of comprehension strategies. We investigated this issue by examining the so-called "subject preference" in Turkish, a language which allows for a natural (unmarked) object reading of an initial ambiguous argument. Using event-related brain potentials (ERPs), we observed…

Offers classroom teachers a way to use listening activities to improve students' comprehension, a procedure that has worked well with a group of children in grades K-3. (JC)

Written for researchers and graduate students, this book--a collection of essays by cognitive scientists, socio- and psycholinguists, and English, reading, and language arts educators--explores theoretical and research questions associated with the relationships among oral and written language, listening and reading, and speaking and writing. The…

Recent research has shown that effective second-language reading involves an interaction of the reader with the text. This interactive view has relevance for other areas of second-language processing, including listening comprehension, writing, and English for special purposes. Future research is needed in metacognition, relationships among…

Compressed speech (speed listening), in which audiotapes are speeded up, is examined in this paper along with its relationship to the reading process. Among the topics discussed first are the close relationship between reading and listening, the rationale behind compressed speech, and the use of compressed speech in business communication, special…

This paper presents a model delineating attributes which enable a literate reader to successfully participate in a pluralistic society. The paper outlines the model as building upon and defining the traditional skills and schema views of reading comprehension which include maturity, attitudes, dispositions, intellectual abilities, knowledge, and…

Documents the effects of midlife major employment change on the listening comprehension of professional adults. Indicates that adult educators must encourage the development of patience because learning to think and listen in new situations takes time. (JOW)

Determines the nature of time constraints under which readers generate superordinate goal inferences. Provides support for a global-coherence model of inference generation which argues for the importance of causal information in constructing a coherent text representation. (HB)

Discusses the differences among current researchers interested in inferences, including the types of inferences studied and the methodologies used. Presents a theoretical and methodological framework for organizing empirical investigations of inferential processes of reading. (HB)

Sex differences in school learning are examined with a focus on how the variable of gender affects the teaching, learning, development, and behavior of children. The initial entries in this collection of articles focus on reading: the reading interests of girls and boys, sex bias and stereotyping in reading tests, and the influence of gender,…

Two experiments were conducted to test three hypotheses related to comprehension. The hypotheses were: that actions are harder to modify than states; that implications or inferences from modified concepts would also change in memory; and that propagation of modifications would be less likely to states than to actions. The first experiment tested…

Discusses a learning strategy, employing imaginal processes and verbal mediations procedures, designed to improve reading comprehension in 24 learning disabled students. Indicates significant gains and improvement in reading comprehension over a 15 week treatment period. (MM)

Outlines the concept of working memory, with particular reference to a hypothetical subcomponent, the articulatory loop. Discusses the role of the loop in fluent adult reading, then examines the reading performance of adults with deficits in auditory verbal memory, showing that a capacity to articulate is not necessary for the effective…

Outlines a cognitive process model of abstracting, indexing, and classification that is based on text comprehension processes. Text comprehension for indexing versus other purposes is discussed, including conceptual and perceptual processing; conceptual knowledge and the development of expertise are discussed; and characteristics of short-term and…

A complete analysis of a story's structure must rely on more than a simple grammar of story components; it requires a consideration of the characters' plans as they are stated or implied in the story. Furthermore, these plans are recognized as the characters' beliefs, and beliefs about interactions among plans are crucial determinants of a story's…