The purpose of this study was to examine comprehension by deaf students of stories presented in Signed English (SE) and American Sign Language (ASL), under three modal conditions manual-only, manual plus oral, and manual plus oral plus aural. It was predicted that: (1) an increase in comprehension would correspond to an increase in the number of modes used in presenting the stories; (2) ASL would be a more efficient method of communication than SE; (3) there would be an interaction effect between language and mode of presentation; and (4) in unbalanced bilinguals a translation to the dominant language would occur when a story was presented in the subordinate language. Thirty-six deaf subjects from the British Columbia provincial School for the Deaf participated in the study; their mean age was 16 years 7 months, and their average hearing threshold level in the better ear was 99.8 decibels with a range of 83 decibels to 113 decibels. All subjects had a minimum of five years. experience as students in total communication programs using SE. Three ghost stories (mean readability level = Grade 2.7) were videotaped under all modal conditions for each of the languages. In the experimental task, subjects were shown a different story under each of the three modal conditions; but each subject was given stories in only one language. After each viewing the subject's retelling was videotaped. Data analyses showed that: there was no significant treatment effect for mode of presentation; subjects reproduced stories presented in ASL better than SE stories; there was an interaction between language and modes, where adding speechreading to the manual-only modality led to higher comprehension scores in the SE presentations; and a majority of subjects retold ASL and SE stories in ASL. The results support ASL as being the more effective method of communication for signing deaf students who have extensive training in total communication and Signed English. It is suggested that total communication classes adopt an ASL-English bilingual program to enhance classroom communication and assist in the development of oral and aural skills, and that speech always accompany the use of SE. Suggestions were made for future research activities. / Education, Faculty of / Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department of / Graduate

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An iterative case-study approach was used in this investigation of reading processes used by mature experienced readers. Six retired schoolteachers (aged 55 plus) were interviewed to obtain comprehensive data on their reading interests, attitudes, and life long reading habits. A combination of modified cloze and guided introspection procedures were used to examine the reading behaviours exhibited across multiple and varied texts. / Scoring procedures were developed which considered sentence, partial text, and whole text level acceptability of modified cloze responses. As well, a framework which considered whether responses were mainly text-based or knowledge-based was developed for analyzing the guided introspection data. / Results indicated that although attitudes towards reading were constant across total lifespan, reasons for reading and reading interests changed. Differences in processes used to comprehend text were apparent across both subjects and texts. Subjects exhibited similar sentence and partial text scores, but whole text level scores differed. Guided introspection protocols indicated mainly interactive response processing rather than either text-based or knowledge-based processing. Mode of processing changed across texts depending on reader interest in text topics. / Results indicated the value of the iterative case-study design for obtaining intensive data on reading processes. As well, the procedures developed for collecting and analyzing data were useful for examining how readers construct and reconstruct meaning as they read.

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This study was designed to examine the ability to use prior knowledge in text comprehension and knowledge integration. The focus of the research was on effects of different degrees of subjects' theoretical knowledge in the domain of biochemistry on their comprehension of written technical materials describing experimental procedures and results, and the ability to integrate such new text derived information with prior theoretical knowledge considered by experts to be relevant to the topic. Effects of cues on the accessibility and use of prior knowledge were also examined. Pre-test questions testing the extent of subjects' prior knowledge of photosynthesis, and a "cue article" specifically designed to prime subjects' relevant prior knowledge of photosynthesis, served as cues in the study. / A theoretical model of experts' knowledge was developed from a semantic analysis of expert-produced texts. This "expert model" was used to evaluate the extent of students' theoretical knowledge of photosynthesis, and its accessibility while applying it to the experimental tasks. College students and university graduate students served as subjects in the study, permitting a contrast of groups varying in prior knowledge of and expertise in chemistry. / Statistical analyses of data obtained from coding subjects' verbal protocols against text propositions and the expert model revealed that prior knowledge and comprehension contribute significantly to predicting knowledge integration, but they are not sufficient for this process to take place. It appears that qualitative aspects and specific characteristics of subjects' knowledge structure contribute to the process of integration, not simply the amount of accumulated knowledge. There was also evidence that there are specific inferential processes unique to knowledge integration that differentiate it from test comprehension. Cues manifested their effects on performance on comprehension tasks and integrative tasks only through their interactions with other factors. Furthermore, it was found that textual complexity placed specific constraints on students' performance: the application of textual information to the integrative tasks and students' ability to build conceptual frame representations based on text propositions depended on the complexity of the textual material. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.)

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