The Controlled Instrument Procedure for Studying the Effect of Syntactic Sophistication on Reading: A Second Study

Abstract

Presents results from an experiment designed to extend the study of the relationship between the syntactic sophistication of the student and the material being read. A previous experiment had studied this relationship using passages based on actual students' writing. From the analysis of this writing, conversion tables were constructed to allow the preparation of new passages representing the same levels of writing (4th grade, 8th grade, 12th grade, and Skilled Adult), but without primary composition data. Vocabulary and content were the same in all passages. These new passages were read by students from grade four through twelve. When the results were compared with the previous experiment, a high correlation was found. The same trends were also observed: the intermediate grade students read the 4th grade writing best while students in grades eight through twelve read the 8th grade writing best but the 4th grade writing with much less comprehension.