Two college educators, one a philosophy teacher, the other, a composition teacher, undertook a naturalistic study of students' initiation in an introduction to philosophy course. The philosophy teacher found it difficult to articulate his disciplinary ways of knowing, and both researchers had trouble identifying their tacitly held views of…

The annotated titles in this bibliography are intended to introduce the novice to current or significant work on the application of cognitive psychology methodologies to the writing process. The bibliography is arranged in four sections: (1) an overview of the topic that includes anthologies, essays and papers; (2) relevant publications of Linda…

This paper reports the findings of a study of the publication practices of professional journals in education and psychology. The data are based on responses of 98 editors who completed and returned questionnaires that described their activities in 1978. The data are arranged according to the following topics: (1) why people write, (2) breaking…

Addressing basic writing not only as a practical problem and humane responsibility, but also as a challenging area for research and theorizing, this book reviews, interprets, and applies the growing body of work in second language acquisition. Chapter 1 presents 6 hypotheses constituting an attempt to develop a cohesive theory of writing…

In order to assess the effects of wordprocessing on the writing of first-year students in a college of applied arts and technology, a project at Seneca College of Applied Arts and Technology in Ontario, Canada followed a large population of students as they entered college, were taught to use wordprocessing in their writing, and used it throughout…

In order to study the theory and practice of collaborative writing, a three-stage research project was initiated. The first stage of research involved a questionnaire sent to 200 randomly selected members of six major professional associations. On a separate sheet accompanying the first questionnaire, respondents were asked to indicate whether…

A study investigated what fourth grade students understand about composing personal narrative discourse. Specifically, the study explored what the subjects understood about structuring personal narrative texts and about evaluating a narrated experience for an audience. Subjects were 13 fourth grade students, and the methodology consisted of…

In a study exploring how writers use audience awareness and how that awareness is related to the writer's age, four eighteen-year-old and four nine-year-old writers were assigned letters to write for two different audiences: a friend and a great aunt whom they had never met. Thinking-aloud writing protocols were produced at the time of writing. At…

The composing processes of apprehensive and nonapprehensive college freshmen writers were explored in a case study of two female students. The two students, one a high apprehensive and the other a low apprehensive writer, completed a questionnaire that elicited information about their attitudes toward writing, writing concerns, time spent writing,…

A study tested the hypothesis that essay examination topics specifying full rhetorical contexts are superior to less information-laden versions of the same topics. Subjects were 360 college students who were given 45 minutes to write essays on 6 topics phrased at 3 information (or specificity of rhetorical context) levels--high, low, and moderate.…

In view of research findings that unskilled writers are rule-based rather than context-based in revision of their written work, a study was conducted of the stage between writing a rough draft and the teacher conference to determine how inexperienced writers would articulate their performance and evaluate their strategies for revision. An…

A study of the relationship between the quantity of writing assignments and writing apprehension involved 352 college students enrolled in 20 classes in eight discipline areas. Writing apprehension was measured by using the Daly-Miller writing apprehension inventory as a pretest and posttest. Tasks involving learning-centered writing (writing…

Notes that the research consequences of current problems in composition bibliography have not been widely understood. Explores four special features of the composition field that have made bibliographic control difficult: (1) field demarcation; (2) taxonomy and terminology; (3) publication format, purpose, and intended audience; and (4)…

Focusing specifically on the theories offered by language development theorist L. S. Vygotsky and evolutionary theorist Terrence Deacon, this paper examines the ways in which theories of language in composition studies coincide and differ with the theories currently being researched in neurobiology and physical anthropology. This examination…

How learning is understood in everyday schooling and conceptualized in research varies a great deal, as does the way in which writing is used for enhancing learning. This paper reviews recent research conducted mainly in Europe, North America, and Australia to outline what kind of challenges research is facing at the moment. The paper begins with…