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Decoding, knowledge, and strategies in comprehension of expository text
Author(s) -
SAMUELSTUEN MARIT S.,
BRÅTEN IVAR
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
scandinavian journal of psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.743
H-Index - 72
eISSN - 1467-9450
pISSN - 0036-5564
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9450.2005.00441.x
Subject(s) - comprehension , psychology , decoding methods , cognitive psychology , linguistics , computer science , telecommunications , philosophy
We examined the relative contribution of decoding, topic knowledge, and strategic processing to the comprehension of social science text in a sample of Norwegian junior high school students. Additionally, we examined the interaction of topic knowledge with strategic processing on students’ text comprehension, and whether poor word‐level skill could be effectively compensated for by higher‐level processing involving knowledge or strategies. Multiple regression analysis indicated that students’ prior knowledge about the topic of the text contributed most to their comprehension. Students’ reported use of organization and monitoring strategies contributed less but still significantly to text comprehension, as did their word decoding skills. However, no interaction between topic knowledge and strategic processing was found. Analyses of variance and post‐hoc comparison tests, supplemented by a descriptive analysis, suggested that the coexistence of poor decoding skill and good text comprehension may be related to much topic knowledge, good strategy use, or both.