Story Comprehension in Children with ADHD

A wealth of research is available examining children's story comprehension. However, little attention has been directed toward understanding the story comprehension of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The present paper attempts to integrate the developmental literature on children's story comprehension with the little that is known about the story comprehension processes of children with ADHD. This review is guided by a network model of story representation that emphasizes the structure of causal and enabling relations between story events. Examination of the available studies indicates that children with ADHD lag behind their peers in their understanding of causal relations, and that their attentional problems may contribute to difficulties in understanding factual information in the preschool years and causally related information in the elementary years. Some evidence also is presented suggesting that children with ADHD are less effective in taking advantage of story structure features in guiding their recall of story events. Suggestions for future research are offered that would elaborate our knowledge of the developmental progression in the processing of complex information by children with ADHD.     

精细阐述在先行信息通达中的作用

先前研究发现,在篇章阅读理解中,先行信息与当前信息的合适与否是影响其通达的重要因素。本研究进一步引入精细阐述因素,通过窗口阅读及命名探测技术,以含错误信息的文章为阅读材料,探讨在篇章阅读理解中,精细阐述、信息的合适与否两者相比,何者对先行信息的通达速度影响更大。结果发现,如果错误信息受到精细阐述,在遇到相关的回指词时该信息会比合适、但未受精细阐述的先行信息更快得以通达,表明精细阐述在先行信息通达过程中具有相当重要的作用。     

The Role of Comprehension Processes in Communication and Persuasion

The impact of media communications on attitude formation and change clearly depends on how the messages are comprehended. Although the role of comprehension processes in communication and persuasion has a long history in social psychology (cf. Hovland, Janis, & Kelley, 1953 Hovland, C. I., Janis, I., & Kelley, H. H. (1953). Communication and persuasion. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. [Google Scholar]; McGuire, 1964 McGuire, W. J. (1964). Inducing resistance to persuasion. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 191–229). New York, NY: Academic Press. [Google Scholar], 1968 McGuire, W. J. (1968). Personality and susceptibility to social influence. In E. F. Borgatta & W. W. Lambert (Eds.), Handbook of personality theory and research (pp. 1130–1187). Chicago, IL: Rand McNally. [Google Scholar], 1972 McGuire, W. J. (1972). Attitude change: An information processing paradigm. In C. G. McClintock (Ed.), Experimental social psychology (pp. 108–141). New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. [Google Scholar]; Wyer, 1974 Wyer, R. S. (1974). Cognitive organization and change: An information-processing approach. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. [Google Scholar]), it has received little attention in media research. In this article, we discuss both theory and research that have implications for how the comprehension of communication at early stages of processing can impact attitudinal responses to media communications, including print and broadcast advertising, narrative television programming, newspaper articles, political messages, and donation appeals.     

Comprehension Strategies in Math Problem and Story Contexts

Two experiments were conducted to explore possible differences in inferential processing in math problem and story contexts. The subjects in both studies were fourth- and fifth-grade non retarded children and mildly retarded adolescents. In Experiment 1 subjects received a series of ambiguous passages designed to permit qualitative (story-based) inferences and quantitative (computational) inferences under one of three instructional set conditions (story set, math set, or neutral set). Results indicated that qualitative inferences were processed more accurately under story and neutral set instructions than under math set instructions. However, the accuracy of quantitative inferences was not affected by set condition. Experiment 2 represented a further effort to examine effects of set on math problem-solving performance. When the manipulation of set (math or story) was strengthened by embedding target items in a series of either story passages or math problems, the accuracy of quantitative inferences was facilitated under math set conditions. Results were consistent with the notion that different comprehension strategies are employed in contexts that encourage the interpretation of texts as either math problems or stories.     

兴趣对不同理解水平的作用

1　引言　　兴趣影响学习的作用机制及其效果是教育心理学研究的一个十分重要的问题 ,近二十年来已引起越来越多的研究者的重视。目前在这一领域研究得比较多的问题是兴趣对文本理解的作用 ,这是兴趣影响学习的一个重要方面。在国外对这一课题的研究主要有二条途径 ,即分别研究个体对某一话题的兴趣和基于文本内容的兴趣对文本的保持与理解的影响。最近几年 ,我们在兴趣的信息—目标理论指导下 ,形成了第三条研究途径 ,即在兴趣测量中 ,以被试对具体阅读活动的兴趣为指标 ,研究实际阅读情景中出现的兴趣对文本理解的作用 (章凯、张必隐 ,1 9…     

Examining the Relationship Between Text Processing and Text Comprehension in Fourth Grade Readers

This research investigates the relationship among various processing behaviors and their link to comprehension. Thirty-four students from three fourth-grade classrooms orally read the first chapter of a short story. The reading was followed by an unaided recall and probes by the researcher. Each clause as finally read was evaluated for semantics (acceptable/unacceptable) and maintenance of author's meaning (yes/no). Finally, words read per minute and number of total, corrected, and uncorrected miscues was calculated. The impact of miscues on retelling performance on the clause and story event level was evaluated using nonparametric, parametric, and multivariate analyses. On the clause level, findings indicate that a similar proportion of clauses were recalled irrespective of whether the clause had been read with no miscues, corrected miscues, or uncorrected miscues. There was a significant difference, however, in the proportion of recalled clauses depending on miscue type. Uncorrected semantically unacceptable/meaning disrupting clauses were less likely to be recalled, whereas clauses containing uncorrected miscues that did not change meaning were more likely to be recalled than clauses read with no miscues. On the story level, strong retellings were associated with fewer meaning changing and meaning disrupting miscues and with more corrected miscues and reading speed. Total number of miscues, miscues that did not change meaning, and reading grade level were not significantly associated with strong story retellings. These findings suggest that the concept of accuracy may not be as significant as miscue meaningfulness and that speed is best understood as part of a matrix of behaviors associated with strong comprehension.     

Depending on My Mood: Mood-Driven Influences on Text Comprehension

Reading comprehension is a critical component of success in educational settings. To date, research on text processing in educational and cognitive psychological domains has focused predominantly on cognitive influences on comprehension, and in particular, those influences that might be derived from particular tasks or strategies. However, there is growing interest in documenting the influences of emotional factors on the processes and products of text comprehension, because these factors are less likely to be associated with explicit reading strategies. The present study examines this issue by evaluating the degree to which mood can influence readers' processing of text. Participants in control, happy-induced, or sad-induced groups thought aloud while reading expository texts. Happy, sad, and neutral moods influenced the degree to which readers engaged in particular types of coherence-building processes in the service of comprehension. Although reading strategies clearly influence processing, understudied factors that are less explicitly goal-driven, such as mood, can similarly impact comprehension activity. These findings have important implications for the role of mood on reading instruction and evaluation.     

Making Reading More Difficult: A Degraded Text Microworld for Teaching Reading Comprehension Strategies

We present an empirical study that investigated seventh-, ninth-, and eleventh-grade students’ understanding of the infinity of numbers in an interval. The participants (n = 549) were asked how many (i.e., a finite or infinite number of numbers) and what type of numbers (i.e., decimals, fractions, or any type) lie between two rational numbers. The results showed that the idea of discreteness (i.e., that fractions and decimals had “successors” like natural numbers) was robust in all age groups; that students tended to believe that the intermediate numbers must be of the same type as the interval endpoints (i.e., only decimals between decimals and fractions between fractions); and that the type of interval endpoints (natural numbers, decimals, or fractions) influenced students’ judgments of the number of intermediate numbers in those intervals. We interpret these findings within the framework theory approach to conceptual change.     

Phonemic Processes in Children's Listening and Reading Comprehension

Two experiments were conducted to investigate the role of phonemic activation in children's listening and reading comprehension. Phonemically confusing stories were presented in a listening comprehension task to kindergarten and second-grade children and in a reading comprehension task to second-grade children only. Rhymes induced phonemic confusion more consistently than did alliteratives in both the listening and reading tasks at both grade levels, suggesting that rhyme is inherently more confusing than alliteration, and furthermore, that phonemic information is activated in similar ways when children listen and when they read silently. Children's reading skill was also assessed to examine a possible relationship between reading skill and phonemic sensitivity, but no significant interactions between children's reading skill and their sensitivity to phonemic confusion were found in the reading task. In the listening task, all groups showed phonemic confusion in gist recall scores, but prereaders were less likely than readers to exhibit susceptibility to phonemic confusion in verbatim recall scores.     

阅读理解的风景模型:整合的观点

阅读理解是构建篇章有效而连贯的心理表征的过程,研究者提出了许多模型,分别去解释阅读结果的心理表征和阅读的加工过程.风景模型则同时考虑了阅读的加工过程与心理表征,并描述了二者之间的动态、交互作用,整合了以往的理论模型.大量实验证据验证了风景模型的心理真实性,并发现它可以应用到各种阅读情景中.     

Levels of Reading Comprehension Across Text Types: A Comparison of Literal and Inferential Comprehension of Expository and Narrative Texts in Iranian EFL Learners

The purpose of this study was to investigate two levels of reading comprehension, namely literal and inferential, of two text types of narration and exposition in Iranian EFL learners. The elicitation instruments were four expository texts and four narrative ones. One hundred eighty upper-intermediate EFL learners were assigned the reading passages followed by both literal and inferential multiple-choice items. Paired-samples t tests were run to provide answers to the research questions of this study. From an inter-text-type angle, the results demonstrated that the participants meaningfully outperformed on the expository texts at the level of literal comprehension. Yet, regarding inferential comprehension, there was no significant difference between the two text types. The results, from an intra-text-type perspective, also revealed that in the expository texts, literal comprehension meaningfully outweighed inferential comprehension, whereas no significant difference was observed between literal and inferential comprehension in the narrative texts. Finally, probable explanations and interpretations for the obtained results were provided.     

Text Comprehension Training for Disabled Readers: An Evaluation of Reciprocal Teaching and Text Analysis Training Programs

Forty-six reading disabled adolescents were randomly assigned to one of three 25-hr instructional programs. Two programs provided training in expository text comprehension, and a third offered training in academic problem solving and organizational and study skills (an alternative treatment control). One reading comprehension program was designed to remediate a deficient knowledge base, forcing disabled readers to elaborate and further process new text knowledge, focusing on both specific informational content in a text and knowledge of text structure per se. The second program was patterned after the Palincsar and Brown (1984) reciprocal teaching techniques and focused on training four text comprehension strategies used by skilled comprehenders. Both the “knowledge-base” and the “strategy” training approaches were associated with significant improvement in disabled readers' comprehension skills, although training effects did not generalize across all aspects of reading comprehension performance. Strategy-trained readers applied the trained strategies with equal success on instructed and uninstructed text materials, providing strong evidence of transfer of learning. Knowledge-base readers also demonstrated successful transfer of specifically trained procedures (semantic mapping, text analysis) to unfamiliar text. In both programs, the best outcomes were obtained when specific strategies and operations were targeted for training.     

文本检索模型综述

文本检索是信息检索一个重要的分支。随着互联网信息的迅速膨胀,如何检索到用户最需要的信息变得越来越关键。文本检索模型是文本检索中的核心技术,其性能直接影响到搜索引擎的检索质量。本文对当前的经典检索模型及其研究进展进行介绍,并分析各个模型之间的优缺点。     

A Developing Model Of Exploratory Psychotherapeutic Research: The Process Within The Process

A method to facilitate exploratory or discovery-oriented psychotherapy process research is presented. The personal and professional contexts out of which the need for this new approach to psychotherapy process research arose are described. Several changes in scientific values and beliefs that have occurred as a consequence of the development and use of this methodology are noted.     

The Cognitive Organisation of Human Errors: A Gestalt Theory Perspective

Les erreurs humaines sont étudiées dans le cadre théorique de la gestalt theory comparée aux théories de l'erreur cognitive. II est démontré que les processus ou actes de cognition erronée ne sont pas toujours les conséquences de la routine, mais plutôt la suite naturelle d'une organisation de la forme, indépendante du fait qu'une certaine ligne d'action ait été apprise ou non. Des exemples issus des champs de la perception visuelle, de la pensée et de l'action dirigées vers un but sont présentés, dans lesquels le principes de la gestalt, finalité, bon déroulement et proximité conditionnent l'apparition d'échecs. Est aussi mis en discussion le fait que les erreurs pouvaient être ou pas considérées comme évaluation positive, comme elles pourraient être l'indication de la résolution d'un problème de production et dans certaines situations, fournir de l'information sur la manière la plus facile d'approcher un but.
Human errors are discussed within the theoretical framework of gestalt theory as compared with cognitive error theories. It is argued that erroneous cognitive processes or actions are not always the consequence of routinisation, but instead are a natural consequence of gestalt organisation independent of whether or not a certain line of action has been learned. Examples from the fields of visual perception, thinking, and goal-directed action are presented, in which the gestalt principles of closure, good continuation, and proximity are conditions governing the emergence of failures. Also discussed is the issue of whether or not errors should be given positive evaluation, as they may be a cue for productive problem solving and may, in certain situations, provide information as to the smoothest path to approaching a goal.     

Expository Text Comprehension: Helping Primary-Grade Teachers Use Expository Texts to Full Advantage

This study investigated the effectiveness of an instructional program designed to teach expository text comprehension during guided reading. Participants included 72 second graders in six classrooms, organized into four guided reading groups in each class (n = 24). The six classes were randomly assigned to one of three groups: Text Structure, Content, and No Instruction. The Text Structure group focused on text structure awareness. The Content group focused on background knowledge and vocabulary. The No Instruction group carried out their regular instruction. Findings suggest that text structure is an effective strategy for promoting expository text comprehension and that young children benefit from well-structured texts.