This collection of abstracts is part of a continuing series providing information on recent doctoral dissertations. The 16 titles deal with the following topics: adolescent reading preferences for type of theme and sex of protagonist; empirical studies in response to literature; bibliographic control of American literature from 1920 to 1975; the depiction of American Indians in recent children's literature; images of women in the leisure reading choices of young people; instruments for assessing children's reading interests; Philip Larkin's poetry; an English literature survey; training teacher assistants to use Black literature for children; storytelling; an interdisciplinary curriculum design; Appalachian literature; children's response to metaphor in poetry; primary pupils' book handling skills and storytelling abilities; the initial teaching alphabet; and children's responses to three styles of art used to illustrate fairy tales. (FL)