Orthographic Knowledge Important in Comprehending Elementary Chinese Text by Users of Alphasyllabaries
Orthographic knowledge in Chinese was hypothesized to affect elementary Chinese text comprehension (four essays) by 80 twelve-year-old ethnic alphasyllabary language users compared with 74 native Chinese speakers at similar reading level. This was tested with two rapid automatized naming
tasks; two working memory tasks; three orthographic knowledge tasks in Chinese; and equivalent tasks in English. Multivariate analyses of covariance showed that the two groups were differentiated on most of the linguistic and cognitive tasks. Confirmatory factor analyses found four factors
as hypothesized: text comprehension, verbal working memory, orthographic knowledge in Chinese, and orthographic knowledge in English. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that orthographic knowledge in Chinese explained a considerable amount of individual variation in elementary
Chinese text comprehension.
Document Type: Research Article
Affiliations: 1: Department of Educational Psychology & Special Education, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada 2: Faculty of Education, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Road Hong Kong, China
Publication date: 01 May 2011
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