Thesis (Ed. D.)--Boise State University, 2003. / Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 57-64). Also available online via the ProQuest Digital Dissertations database.

No description available.

The purpose of this study was to investigate readers' processing of a short paragraph containing six embedded errors in order to test the predictive capacity of a psycholinguistic theory of the reading process and provide insight into readers' perceptual and semantic processing of meaningful text. Two hundred and forty junior high school and college subjects were randomly assigned to two groups. One group was instructed to read for meaning with no knowledge of the presence of the errors. The other group was instructed to read to detect the errors. After silently reading the passage all subjects were instructed to write a recall of the errors detected and a recall of the semantic content of the passage, after which they were permitted unlimited exposure to the passage in a second attempt to detect all the errors. In order to fulfill the main purposes of the study five research questions were developed involving twelve hypotheses. The research hypotheses were formulated on the basis of the Goodman Model of Reading and focused on possible differences across groups (meaning and error focus), across levels (junior high school and college), and across reading ability at the junior high school level (above and below average). The primary measures of the study were the mean number of errors detected under both limited and unlimited exposure conditions, the proportion of total possible detections made for individual errors under both limited and unlimited exposure, and passage recall scores. The data were subject to a number of analyses of variance, Tukey post hoc tests, and confidence interval calculations. The analyses resulted in the following principal findings: (1) Although error focus subjects detected significantly more errors than meaning focus subjects, all groups had difficulty detecting errors under both exposure conditions. (2) Passage recall scores revealed that all groups of subjects were drawn into processing the semantic content of the passage in spite of instructions. (3) More mature, efficient readers performed better on both error detection and comprehension than their counterparts. (4) As predicted on the basis of the underlying theoretical rationale, a powerful linear order of ease of detectability trend across the individual errors was revealed. In general the findings of the study provided considerable support for a psycholinguistic theory of the reading process in the form of the following major conclusions: the need to comprehend is central to the reading process; attention to meaning inhibits attention to fine graphic detail; accuracy in reading is a misnomer; readers do not process meaningful text letter by letter or word by word; cognitive processes influence perception; readers attend differentially to various syntactic and semantic components of text; more experienced, efficient readers display greater flexibility in their use of the process and are more easily able to change purposes during reading than their counterparts; reading is best described as an integrated, psycholinguistic process in which the reader, the text, and the message of the writer are important; the Goodman Model of Reading is a sound theoretical statement with considerable predictive capacity.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

The ability of dictionaries, either in printed or electronic form, to enhance text comprehension has not been systematically investigated. Consequently, in order to investigate whether dictionary support improves text comprehension, this study compared readers' first-language (L1) and second-language (L2) text comprehension across three dictionary conditions and two proficiency levels. Recall, dictionary usage and reading times were the measures employed. Subjects were anglophone members of the Canadian Armed Forces military personnel with high-intermediate to advanced French second-language skills. / Procedural texts were used: subjects read both an L1 and an L2 text in each of three conditions: (a) no dictionary access; (b) access to hard-copy dictionaries; and (c) access to on-line computerized dictionaries. The number of words looked up varied greatly by language, by proficiency level and by dictionary modality, with a far greater number of words accessed in L2 than in L1, by intermediate- than by advanced-level readers and in the on-line rather than in the hard-copy dictionary condition. The variance in dictionary usage was explained by the two-way interactions between language, proficiency level and dictionary condition. / Reading times were higher for intermediate-level readers than for advanced-level readers, and when L2 rather than L1 texts were read. These reading time results are consistent with the patterns of dictionary consultation, where intermediate L2 reading produced the most look-ups. / Most readers expressed a preference for on-line dictionaries, reporting that the ease of access led to faster and better text comprehension, but this impression was not confirmed by the findings. Analyses of recall protocols indicated that there was no main effect for the type of dictionary consulted. Similar levels of recall were found on all passages read with access to dictionaries, regardless of the language of presentation. Significantly lower recalls were found on passages read with no access to dictionaries, with L2 recall lower than L1 recall. This study indicates that the type of dictionary accessed does not significantly influence comprehension. The high number of L2 dictionary look-ups does suggest that readers may use dictionaries to compensate for weaker second language vocabulary skills, resulting in similar levels of text comprehension across languages.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 1989. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Auburn University, 2005. / Abstract. Vita. Includes bibliographic references (ℓ. 62-72, 102-104)

Thesis (M.A.). / Written for the Dept. of Educational and Counselling Psychology. Title from title page of PDF (viewed 2008/07/29). Includes bibliographical references.