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A critical aspect of the non-native students' academic adjustment in English-speaking countries is their English language ability, including their reading fluency and comprehension. Even when these students are considered proficient readers of English at an advanced level, they display different reading processes when dealing with the complex input of a second language (L2) text, as compared with their native English reading classmates. Despite the importance of comprehending highly sophisticated academic reading in international education, there is a lack of research in the field as to how advanced L2 readers cope with the texts with which the highly educated native speakers engage. This study, therefore, examined meaning construction processes of highly proficient L2 readers during reading the texts that vary in degree of cohesion. To describe readers' approaches to text cohesion and also recognize readers' perceptions of their own process, the study used a close observation of reading processes of nine highly proficient graduate students at a U.S. university with the use of qualitative research methods. The students participated in two interviews - pre-reading interview and post-reading cognitive interview - and two think-aloud verbal protocol sessions. Participants read one high-cohesive and one low-cohesive text during the think-aloud sessions, and then shared the meaning they constructed from the texts and also their thinking about the texts. The data from the instruments were analyzed qualitatively using a grounded theory approach. The results of the study reveal that the readers' meaning representation processes emerging as the result of reader and text interaction display differences at the local and global levels of processing of the high- and low-cohesive text. The processing differences between the readers are most apparent in texts with low text cohesion. The low cohesive text allowed the readers, especially, the creators of meaning, to conduct more elaborative processing compared to their performance with the high-cohesive one, in which all readers attempted to create a catalogue of facts trusting the explicitly provided text cohesion features. These results have implications for theories of text processing as well as the design of materials and instruction used for advanced L2 readers and lower level L2 readers.

Language play has an important position in the use of language. Cook (in Lucas, 2005) makes the argument that language play is even one of the primary uses of language. Partly due to the focus on research in second language learning, advanced L2 users’ language processing gets little attention in research on language use (Shaw & McMillion, 2008). Therefore, there is limited knowledge regarding the reading processes of this group.  While Shaw and McMillion (2008) show that there is no difference in language proficiency between L1 and advanced L2 readers, Paradis (2009) argues that there indeed is a difference in processing among L1 and advanced L2 speakers. Gernsbacher and Robertson (1995) examined the differences in processing between more and less skilled L1 readers using ambiguous words and puns. However, this kind of research has not been done for L1 and advanced L2 readers.  A study concerning the speed and ability in pun recognition was carried out to investigate whether any differences could be found between L1 and advanced L2 readers, with the same language proficiency. Tests in accuracy and speed in recognizing puns were carried out with university students in Stockholm and Los Angeles, while a survey investigating degree of amusement was distributed online.  Initial hypotheses assumed that L1 readers, compared to L2 readers, would be both more skilled and faster at identifying a number of categories of puns as well as perceiving all categories of puns as being more amusing. Results show support for some of these hypotheses: L1 speakers were faster and more accurate in finding certain categories of puns. However, other categories showed no difference, and results were not able to prove differences in degree of amusement between the two groups. Questions about other categorizations of puns are raised, as well as further research opportunities.