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A comparison of comprehension and production abilities of good and poor readers

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Eva G. Bar-Shalom ,
Stephen Crain  and
Donald Shankweiler
Eva G. Bar-Shalom*
Affiliation:
University of Connecticut, Storrs
Stephen Crain*
Affiliation:
University of Connecticut and Haskins Laboratories
Donald Shankweiler*
Affiliation:
University of Connecticut and Haskins Laboratories
*
Eva Bar-Shalom, 249 Wormwood Hill Rd., Mansfield Center, CT 06250
Eva Bar-Shalom, 249 Wormwood Hill Rd., Mansfield Center, CT 06250
Eva Bar-Shalom, 249 Wormwood Hill Rd., Mansfield Center, CT 06250
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Abstract

Research from several sources indicates that reading disability is often associated with difficulty in comprehending some complex spoken sentences, including those with relative clauses. The present study exploits a new methodology, elicited production, to identify the source of comprehension difficulties of poor readers. Both the elicited production task and a conventional act-out task were employed in a study of 30 children (aged 7-8), who were selected for reading ability. On the act-out task, the poor readers displayed a high error rate on two relative clause structures (SO and OO relatives), as had been found by Mann, Shankweiler, and Smith (1984), but these structures were elicited from the poor readers as successfully as from the good readers (on more than 80% of trials).

Type
Articles
Information
Applied Psycholinguistics , Volume 14 , Issue 2 , April 1993 , pp. 197 - 227
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

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References

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