Suggests that literature may have a place in the composition class, but that composition teachers may have to unteach some of the reading skills students have learned. (DD)

The improvement of college students' reading rate and comprehension is a major educational concern. Many students arrive at college unprepared for the massive amount of required reading. This study presents several attempts to improve vocabulary, reading rate, and comprehension and addresses tangential issues related to the improvement of reading…

Results of a study of the reading rate of 435 students varying from grade four through college support the theory that individuals typically read at a constant rate rather than adjusting their rate to the difficulty level of the material. (AEA)

Reports on a study that demonstrated that college students are flexible in their reading and readily adjust their reading rates in accordance with the payoffs of a task. In particular, propositions expressing case relations were more likely to be retained than those expressing descriptive information. (HOD)

Uses a novel word-reading efficiency measure to determine if articulations or processing times associated with reading the word "aye" were enhanced through the phonological or orthographic qualities contained in the preceding word. Documents the importance of separating phonological and orthographic information in English homophones. (SG)

A study was conducted to examine the relationship of reading rate to comprehension on material read with a pacer and without a pacer. Two hundred paired scores were obtained in a college reading and study skills course in which students read both paced and nonpaced material alternately during class time and recorded their rate and comprehension…

The hypothesis of this study was that reading rate would be relatively constant (within a 15% range of the subject's mean reading rate) both within and across different difficulty levels of materials as long as the levels of difficulty remained at or below the subject's ability level. The subjects were 65 college students whose reading levels…

Findings indicate that, when skimming, readers find it difficult to perceptually select from a passage information that is relevant to their goal in skimming. There was a reaction time advantage for verification of gist-relevant information as opposed to details, which tended to increase with reading rate. (Author/PN)

The Summer Adventure in Learning (SAIL) program was developed to train prospective teachers in tutorial methods intended to improve reading achievement. The program's primary instructional objective was to decrease the pupil reading rate resulting in improved reading comprehension. (JN)

A study with 179 Australian college students casts doubts on the usefulness of the theoretical model of human information processing postulated by S. Lehrl and B. Fischer (1990). Instead of reflecting properties of a limited capacity system, the Basic Unit of Information Processing (BIP) seems to be a marker for reading speed. (SLD)

Concludes that the two reading courses offered by the education department at Clemson University are effective in increasing reading rate, vocabulary, and comprehension. (RB)

Although techniques of measuring reading rate have been studied and reported in the literature, actual practice is not always consistent with the findings. A study reexamined the reading rate issue in light of additional information regarding the test-taking experience provided directly by the test takers themselves. The purpose of the study was…

Teaching skimming techniques in a college compensatory reading course helped students gain in both speed and comprehension skills. (MKM)