听写困难儿童在笔画加工中的整体干扰效应

听写困难是指儿童阅读正常而听写落后的现象,是一种常见的儿童学习障碍类型。听写困难儿童的字形表征缺陷可能来源于局部字形加工中的整体干扰。分别从整体字形干扰和整体语音干扰两个角度来考察听写困难儿童在笔画加工中的整体干扰机制。整体字形干扰研究表明,笔画加工过程受到整体字形的干扰,这种干扰发生在所有儿童身上,但对听写困难儿童的干扰效应更为明显;整体语音干扰研究表明,在笔画加工过程中,正常儿童受到整体语音的显著干扰,而听写困难儿童并未受到整体语音的干扰。综合整体字形干扰和整体语音干扰的结果,提出听写困难儿童的整体字形加工能力缺陷假说和笔画的视觉加工模式假说,究竟哪一种假说更为合理,还有待进一步研究     

不同编码对听写困难儿童字形记忆的促进效应

听写困难是一种发生率较高的儿童学习障碍现象。实验考察笔画语音编码和动作编码对听写困难儿童字形记忆水平的影响。结果发现, 笔画语音编码对听写困难儿童的字形记忆成绩没有明显影响, 但却明显促进了正常儿童的字形记忆成绩; 与之相对, 动作编码对正常儿童的字形记忆成绩没有明显影响, 但却明显促进了听写困难儿童的字形记忆成绩。上述现象, 既可能源于编码加工阶段, 也可能源于字形表征的提取阶段。     

听写困难儿童在部件加工中的整字字形干扰特点

听写困难是指儿童阅读正常而听写落后的现象,是儿童学习障碍的一种类型。本研究通过两个系列实验,对比听写困难儿童不同水平部件表征的激活速度差异,间接考察了听写困难儿童在部件加工过程中的二级整体干扰效应。结果表明,听写困难儿童在部件的加工过程中未发现二级整体干扰效应,而正常儿童存在明显的整体干扰效应。出现这一结果,既可能是因为听写困难儿童存在整体字形表征的一般缺陷,也可能是因为听写困难儿童存在二级整体字形表征的加工延迟。     

前摄干扰对汉语听写困难儿童字形工作记忆的影响

字形工作记忆（O-WM）是书写加工过程中汉字部件的临时存储点,其重要功能之一是保证部件表征的区分性特征。关于汉语O-WM的研究主要来自脑损伤个案,目前还没有关于汉语听写困难儿童是否存在O-WM损伤的报道。本研究采用两个实验,分别探讨视觉和语音前摄干扰对听写困难儿童汉字部件再认的影响。结果发现：（1）听写困难儿童的部件判断存在视觉前摄干扰效应,而正常儿童没有表现出视觉前摄干扰效应（实验一）;（2）两组儿童均没有出现明显的语音前摄干扰效应（实验二）。该结果表明,汉语听写困难儿童O-WM在保证部件视觉表征的区分性功能上存在缺陷,并支持汉语O-WM中汉字部件的表征是以字形为基础的观点。     

充分加工条件下听写困难儿童的整体字形加工特点

听写困难是指儿童能够认读不能听写的现象。前期研究表明,在快速加工条件下,听写困难儿童存在整体字形加工缺陷。本研究使用学习-回忆方法,考察在充分加工条件下,听写困难儿童的整体字形加工特点。实验结果表明,在充分加工条件下,听写困难儿童不仅能够加工并形成双部件合体字的整体字形表征;而且,也能够在同字形组织水平上,形成多部件合体字的整体字形表征。因此,在充分加工条件下,听写困难儿童的整体字形加工能力正常。     

听写困难儿童的整体字形加工特点

听写困难是指儿童能够认读不能听写的现象。本研究以部件启动和整字启动任务中的探测字命名反应时差值,作为整体字形加工水平的指标,间接考察了听写困难儿童的整体字形加工特点。结果发现,听写对照组被试的整体字形加工在呈现时间为75 ms和300 ms时发生,而在150 ms时没有发生;听写困难组被试的整体字形加工仅在75 ms时发生,而在150 ms和300 ms时未发生。两组被试在75 ms时的整体字形加工水平之间没有显著差异。结果表明,听写困难被试仅仅在早期知觉阶段存在整体字形加工,而在词汇加工阶段的整体字形加工缺乏或延迟。     

阅读障碍儿童汉字认知特点研究

运用多重评估法从760名小学3年级学生中选取了30名阅读与记字困难学生和30名正常学生为被试,分别研究了儿童视觉能力、听知觉能力和字形-音及字形义通道联结能力的识字认知特点。研究结果表明,阅读障碍儿童基本语音辩别能力不存在落后,而在视觉辨别、字形长时记忆、语音短时记忆以及形音和形义联结长时记忆上都存在程度不同的落后。研究还发现,阅读障碍儿童具有对汉字做浅层次机械加工和视觉加工的倾向。     

听写障碍儿童的字形输出错误特点

阅读正常而听写落后的听写障碍是一种特殊的学习障碍类型,相关研究非常缺乏.本研究首先根据听写错误分类,考察了听写障碍儿童在认读正确的听写错误中,各种错误类型分布特点.发现,(1)对于所有被试来说,零反应都是一种主要的错误形态;(2)听写障碍被试的零反应比例明显高于总体平均成绩.为了进一步考察障碍组较高零反应的原因,本研究考察了字形提示对听写成绩的影响.结果,(3)障碍组被试的提示有效率明显高于对照组.这表明,听写障碍儿童形音表征联结的缺陷可能是导致大量的零反应的主要原因.     

声符和义符在形声字语音、语义提取中的作用

采用眼动技术记录汉语阅读者在形声字的语音、语义提取中对声符和义符的注意规律, 考察形声字部件的位置、功能和正字法意识对汉字认知的影响。结果表明：(1)在汉字的视觉加工中, 阅读者对部件空间位置的注意加工优势受到声旁位置的调节。对左形右声结构的汉字, 被试更多地注意字的右边, 对右形左声结构的汉字, 被试更多地注意字的左边; (2)在汉语阅读者的正字法规则中, 存在着“左侧释义、右侧释音”的部件的位置-功能联结。(3)在通达形声字的语音、语义的过程中, 与义符相比, 声符具有注意资源的优势, 这种优势在语音提取任务中更加明显：声符无需依赖义符的信息便可以相对独立地激活整字的语音, 但声符需要义符的配合才能够提取整字的语义。     

声符和义符在形声字语音、语义提取中的作用――来自部件知觉眼动研究的证据

采用眼动技术记录汉语阅读者在形声字的语音、语义提取中对声符和义符的注意规律,考察形声字部件的位置、功能和正字法意识对汉字认知的影响。结果表明:(1)在汉字的视觉加工中,阅读者对部件空间位置的注意加工优势受到声旁位置的调节。对左形右声结构的汉字,被试更多地注意字的右边,对右形左声结构的汉字,被试更多地注意字的左边;(2)在汉语阅读者的正字法规则中,存在着"左侧释义、右侧释音"的部件的位置-功能联结。(3)在通达形声字的语音、语义的过程中,与义符相比,声符具有注意资源的优势,这种优势在语音提取任务中更加明显:声符无需依赖义符的信息便可以相对独立地激活整字的语音,但声符需要义符的配合才能够提取整字的语义。     

The roles of family history of dyslexia,language, speech production and phonological processing in predicting literacy progress

It is well established that speech, language and phonological skills are closely associated with literacy, and that children with a family risk of dyslexia (FRD) tend to show deficits in each of these areas in the preschool years. This paper examines what the relationships are between FRD and these skills, and whether deficits in speech, language and phonological processing fully account for the increased risk of dyslexia in children with FRD. One hundred and fifty‐three 4–6‐year‐old children, 44 of whom had FRD, completed a battery of speech, language, phonology and literacy tasks. Word reading and spelling were retested 6 months later, and text reading accuracy and reading comprehension were tested 3 years later. The children with FRD were at increased risk of developing difficulties in reading accuracy, but not reading comprehension. Four groups were compared: good and poor readers with and without FRD. In most cases good readers outperformed poor readers regardless of family history, but there was an effect of family history on naming and nonword repetition regardless of literacy outcome, suggesting a role for speech production skills as an endophenotype of dyslexia. Phonological processing predicted spelling, while language predicted text reading accuracy and comprehension. FRD was a significant additional predictor of reading and spelling after controlling for speech production, language and phonological processing, suggesting that children with FRD show additional difficulties in literacy that cannot be fully explained in terms of their language and phonological skills.     

The nature of rhyme processing in preliterate children

Background. Rhyme awareness is one of the earliest forms of phonological awareness to develop and is assessed in many developmental studies by means of a simple rhyme task. The influence of more demanding experimental paradigms on rhyme judgment performance is often neglected. Addressing this issue may also shed light on whether rhyme processing is more global or analytical in nature. Aims. The aim of the present study was to examine whether lexical status and global similarity relations influenced rhyme judgments in kindergarten children and if so, if there is an interaction between these two factors. Sample. Participants were 41 monolingual Dutch-speaking preliterate kindergartners (average age 6.0 years) who had not yet received any formal reading education. Method. To examine the effects of lexical status and phonological similarity processing, the kindergartners were asked to make rhyme judgements on (pseudo) word targets that rhymed, phonologically overlapped or were unrelated to (pseudo) word primes. Results. Both a lexicality effect (pseudo-words were more difficult than words) and a global similarity effect (globally similar non-rhyming items were more difficult to reject than unrelated items) were observed. In addition, whereas in words the global similarity effect was only present in accuracy outcomes, in pseudo-words it was also observed in the response latencies. Furthermore, a large global similarity effect in pseudo-words correlated with a low score on short-term memory skills and grapheme knowledge. Conclusions. Increasing task demands led to a more detailed assessment of rhyme processing skills. Current assessment paradigms should therefore be extended with more demanding conditions. In light of the views on rhyme processing, we propose that a combination of global and analytical strategies is used to make a correct rhyme judgment.     

Writing abilities and the role of working memory in children with symptoms of attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder

The writing abilities of children with ADHD symptoms were examined in a simple dictation task, and then in two conditions with concurrent verbal or visuospatial working memory (WM) loads. The children with ADHD symptoms generally made more spelling mistakes than controls, and the concurrent loads impaired their performance, but with partly different effects. The concurrent verbal WM task prompted an increase in the phonological errors, while the concurrent visuospatial WM task prompted more non-phonological errors, matching the Italian phonology, but not the Italian orthography. In the ADHD group, the children proving better able to cope with a concurrent verbal WM load had a better spelling performance too. The ADHD and control groups had a similar handwriting speed, but the former group’s writing quality was poorer. Our results suggest that WM supports writing skills, and that children with ADHD symptoms have general writing difficulties, but strength in coping with concurrent verbal information may support their spelling performance.     

Effective brain connectivity in children with reading difficulties during phonological processing

Using Dynamic Causal Modeling (DCM) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we examined effective connectivity between three left hemisphere brain regions (inferior frontal gyrus, inferior parietal lobule, fusiform gyrus) and bilateral medial frontal gyrus in 12 children with reading difficulties (M age=12.4, range: 8.11-14.10) and 12 control children (M age=12.3, range: 8.9-14.11) during rhyming judgments to visually presented words. More difficult conflicting trials either had similar orthography but different phonology (e.g. pint-mint) or similar phonology but different orthography (e.g. jazz-has). Easier non-conflicting trials had similar orthography and phonology (e.g. dime-lime) or different orthography and phonology (e.g. staff-gain). The modulatory effect from left fusiform gyrus to left inferior parietal lobule was stronger in controls than in children with reading difficulties only for conflicting trials. Modulatory effects from left fusiform gyrus and left inferior parietal lobule to left inferior frontal gyrus were stronger for conflicting trials than for non-conflicting trials only in control children but not in children with reading difficulties. Modulatory effects from left inferior frontal gyrus to inferior parietal lobule, from medial frontal gyrus to left inferior parietal lobule, and from left inferior parietal lobule to medial frontal gyrus were positively correlated with reading skill only in control children. These findings suggest that children with reading difficulties have deficits in integrating orthography and phonology utilizing left inferior parietal lobule, and in engaging phonological rehearsal/segmentation utilizing left inferior frontal gyrus possibly through the indirect pathway connecting posterior to anterior language processing regions, especially when the orthographic and phonological information is conflicting.     

Deaf and hearing children's plural noun spelling

The present study examines deaf and hearing children's spelling of plural nouns. Severe literacy impairments are well documented in the deaf, which are believed to be a consequence of phonological awareness limitations. Fifty deaf (mean chronological age 13;10 years, mean reading age 7;5 years) and 50 reading-age-matched hearing children produced spellings of regular, semiregular, and irregular plural nouns in Experiment 1 and nonword plurals in Experiment 2. Deaf children performed reading-age appropriately on rule-based (regular and semiregular) plurals but were significantly less accurate at spelling irregular plurals. Spelling of plural nonwords and spelling error analyses revealed clear evidence for use of morphology. Deaf children used morphological generalization to a greater degree than their reading-age-matched hearing counterparts. Also, hearing children combined use of phonology and morphology to guide spelling, whereas deaf children appeared to use morphology without phonological mediation. Therefore, use of morphology in spelling can be independent of phonology and is available to the deaf despite limited experience with spoken language. Indeed, deaf children appear to be learning about morphology from the orthography. Education on more complex morphological generalization and exceptions may be highly beneficial not only for the deaf but also for other populations with phonological awareness limitations.     

Segmentation of spoken words into syllables by English-speaking children as compared to adults

Given the importance of syllables in the development of reading, spelling, and phonological awareness, information is needed about how children syllabify spoken words. To what extent is syllabification affected by knowledge of spelling, to what extent by phonology, and which phonological factors are influential? In Experiment 1, six- and seven-year-old children did not show effects of spelling on oral syllabification, performing similarly on words such as habit and rabbit. Spelling influenced the syllabification of older children and adults, with the results suggesting that knowledge of spelling must be well entrenched before it begins to affect oral syllabification. Experiment 2 revealed influences of phonological factors on syllabification that were similar across age groups. Young children, like older children and adults, showed differences between words with "short" and "long" vowels (e.g., lemon vs. demon) and words with sonorant and obstruent intervocalic consonants (e.g., melon vs. wagon).