Rhyming versus Repetition in Children\u27s Stories: The Role of Reading Strategies in New Word Recognition

There is a lack of research that focuses on how the structure of children\u27s storybooks contributes to reading development. Although many parenting sites express the benefits of reading rhyming stories to one\u27s children, there is a lack of empirical research to support this claim. The goal of the present study was to determine whether exposure to rime or repetition strategies would enhance children\u27s ability to correctly pronounce novel words and non-words. In this study, the clue word paradigm created by Goswami (1988) was used to determine if children could more successfully use the orthographic analogy strategy in a story context, following exposure to a rime or repetition training paradigm. The results of this study indicate that the participants tested did not utilize the orthographic analogy strategy described by Goswami (1988), regardless of whether they were in the rime or repetition condition. Potential explanations for these findings are discussed, as well as the possible limitations of this study and areas for future research

Are word representations abstract or instance-based? Effects of spelling inconsistency in orthographic learning

In Experiment 1, 62 10-year-old children studied printed pseudowords with semantic information. The items were later represented in a different format for reading, with half of the items spelled in the same way as before and half displayed in a new phonologically equivalent spelling. In a dictation test, the exposure to an alternative spelling substantially increased the number of errors that matched the alternative spelling, especially in good spellers. Orthographic learning predicted word identification when accuracy on orthographic choice for words was controlled. In Experiment 2, the effects on dictation responses of exposure to a misspelling versus the correct spelling, and the interactive effect of spelling ability, were confirmed relative to a no-exposure control in adults. The results support a single-lexicon view of reading and spelling and have implications for abstractionist and instance-based theories of orthographic representations

The influence of individual differences on reading in readers of consistent compared to inconsistent orthographies

Languages differ in terms of how consistently they reflect spelling-sound relationships, and research has found that this may lead to differences in naming (reading aloud) processes. Readers themselves differ from each other in terms of relevant task performance, such as nonword decoding ability, vocabulary knowledge, spelling ability and reading experience. Such tasks tap into individual differences which have also been shown to influence the reading aloud process. The present study investigated whether language-related differences in reading aloud persisted even when reading-related individual differences were taken into account, and how effects of individual differences may vary between languages. The comparison necessitated a number of preparatory tasks to facilitate cross-language comparison. This included the computation of spelling-sound consistencies for both languages, the collection of German age-of-acquisition ratings and the creation of comparable measures to capture reading experience in both languages. For the naming study, reading aloud reaction times (RTs) on a set of 85 cognates were compared between skilled readers of English and German. Readers also completed tasks to assess individual differences. Linear mixed-effects modelling analysis showed that language differences remained, but that individual differences contributed additionally to explaining reading performance. To further examine how individual differences may impact differently on naming RTs between languages, the same data set was split four times into those who had scored higher and lower in each of the four individual differences (ID) tasks. Each ID group was then analysed separately. This resulted in eight different analyses. The language effect remained significant for all ID groups. Variations in effect patterns between different ID groups were observed. Effect patterns were more similar between languages for those readers who had scored higher in the ID tasks. Strong nonword decoders emerged as the fastest reader group for both languages, indicating that nonword decoding indexes a vital processing mechanism for skilled readers of different languages. As no significant interactions were found involving language or language and IDs for this group, strong decoders seemed to be most similar in their naming across the two languages. Although semantics were used by readers of both languages, person-level semantic knowledge was more beneficial for readers of the opaque script, especially when decoding skills were weaker. Good spelling ability facilitated naming in both languages, but differences between languages became apparent in weaker spellers, as those reading English were more influenced by other IDs, such as decoding skill. Unexpectedly, print exposure was not the strongest modulator out of all individual differences. Together the results suggest that alongside language differences, individual differences are important factors to be considered to account for a universal process of reading aloud

Modeling item-level spelling variance in adults : Providing further insights into lexical quality

Purpose The lexical quality (LQ) hypothesis predicts that a skilled reader’s lexicon will be inhabited by a range of low- to high-quality items, and the probability of representing a word with high quality varies as a function of person-level, word-level, and item-specific variables. These predictions were tested with spelling accuracy as a gauge of LQ. Method Item-response based crossed random effects models explored simultaneous contributions of person-level (e.g. participant’s decoding skill), word-level (e.g. word’s transparency rating), item-specific (e.g. participant’s familiarity with specific word), and person-by-word interaction predictors (e.g. decoding by transparency rating interaction) to the spelling of 25 commonly misspelled irregular English words in 61 undergraduate university students (M = 19.4 years, 70.49% female, 39.34% Hispanic, 81.97% White). Results Substantial variance among individuals in item-level spelling accuracy was accounted for by person-level decoding skill; item-specific familiarity, proportion of schwas correctly represented, and correctly identifying the word from its mispronunciation; and an interaction of transparency rating by general decoding skill. Conclusions Consistent with the LQ hypothesis, results suggest that one’s ability to form a high-quality lexical representation of a given word depends on a complex combination of person-level abilities, word-level characteristics, item-specific experiences, and an interaction between person- and word-level influences