Using the alternate forms A and B of the Watson-Barker Listening Test (WBLT), a study compared total scores and sub-scores for the audio versus the pilot video format, pre- versus post-instruction, and males versus females. Subjects consisted of 183 males and 292 females in a succession of upper-division college classes on listening at a…

Discusses the difficulties of testing listening comprehension in a second language and describes test procedures which try to overcome these difficulties used in a French course taught at the University College in Cardiff. The specific tests are note taking and summary writing, oral translation, and transcription. (SED)

Reports data that indicate there is an optimal rate of reading and listening to prose and that support interrelationships among accuracy, rate, and efficiency of comprehension. (AEA)

Tests the point of convergence of linguistic information from auditory and visual channels. Compares reaction times for auditory and visual stimuli consisting of sentences, syntactic nonsense strings, random words, and nonwords. Finds that listening and reading processing converge at the word level and that words processed aurally and visually…

Investigates the impact of varying levels of time compression on comprehensive, interpretive, and short-term listening. Finds that comprehensive listening performance deteriorates significantly as speech compression levels increase, while interpretive and short-term listening performance remain stable until a high degree of time compression is…

Discusses the importance of world knowledge in the comprehension of metaphor. Examines difficulties encountered by students when their cultural schemata are insufficient or inappropriate to ensure comprehension. Offers pedagogical solutions to these problems. (DMM)

Compared were a programmed approach to a conventional approach. (CH)

A study of the effects of using the MRM (message unit--verb unit--message unit) instructional system on reading comprehension was studied using 69 college freshmen, 37 in an experimental group and 32 in a control group. Both groups were engaged in a variety of activities designed to promote greater reading efficiency as a regular part of their…

The study of schema theory as part of the inquiry into the nature of language comprehension has drawn attention to the reader's central role in the construction of text-guided meaning. Contemporary schema theory represnts a major step in the effort to move away from a reductionist view of reading comprehension. Specifically, it focuses on wbat…

Examines the influence of interclause connectives on inference generation. Finds that readers incorporate causal knowledge-based inferences in the discourse representations for sentences containing a causal connective, and that connectives elicit inferences that are based on the connective's meaning. (SR)

Examines the relationship between lexical and grammatical knowledge to reading and listening comprehension. University students learning Spanish participated in the study. All participants performed the tests of lexical knowledge and grammatical knowledge respectively. Results suggest both similarities and differences between reading and listening…

In this study, rate controlled speech is defined as speech that is reproduced in less time or in more time than the time required for its original production. The particular comprehension skills of interest were: the ability to detect main ideas; the ability to determine supporting details; and the ability to draw conclusions. These skills were…

Investigates three types of cues [semantic, syntactic (intensional), and adjacency] to subjects of verbs in English sentences. Finds that, when the adjacency strategy does not apply, even highly literate native speakers have great difficulty in correctly comprehending subject-verb correspondences. Discusses findings in context of the relationship…

The language teaching method presented here is an inter-related set of techniques for teaching target comprehension skills directly to students on both university and high school levels. Three elements of the method are discussed: (1) the basics of a comprehension-based classroom; (2) the expanded speaking component; and (3) the expanded reading…

Criteria for operationalizing reading come from three considerations: the purposes for reading, the linguistic units interpreted as basic, and the cognitive processes assumed to underlie reading comprehension. One purpose of reading is objectification, in which the reader is an interpreter and verifier of an author's symbolic representation of…