Reader-Text Interactions: How Differential Text and Question Types Influence Cognitive Skills Needed for Reading...

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Psychology
• Educational Psychology
• Developmental Psychology

Background:

• Reading comprehension varies with text and question types.
• Reader characteristics like word recognition and background knowledge influence comprehension.
• Cognitive skills (semantic/syntactic awareness, inferencing, planning/organizing) are linked to reading comprehension but not fully explored across text/question types.

Purpose of the Study:

• To explore relationships between reader characteristics, text types, and question types in children aged 10-14.
• To compare children's comprehension of narrative, expository, and functional texts.
• To examine differences in literal versus inferential question comprehension.

Main Methods:

• Analyzed cognitive skills (semantic/syntactic awareness, inferencing, planning/organizing) contribution to comprehension.
• Examined performance across narrative, expository, and functional text types.
• Assessed comprehension of literal and inferential questions.

Main Results:

• Significant main effects of text type and question type on comprehension.
• An interaction effect showed that the relationship between question types differed across text types.
• Higher-order cognitive skills, particularly inferencing and organization, significantly contributed to comprehending complex texts and questions.

Conclusions:

• Inferencing and planning/organizing skills are vital for reading comprehension in later elementary and middle school students.
• These skills are particularly important for understanding expository texts and answering inferential questions.
• Early development of these higher-order cognitive skills may better prepare students for complex texts in higher grades.