How Disciplinary Experts Read

• In Event: Adolescents Learning With Text in the Academic Disciplines

Abstract

Experts in different fields of study such as history, mathematics, or chemistry read in different ways. I asked experts to read and then answer a question asking whether or not they paid attention to the author. Note their answers.
From a historian reading an essay about whether or not Lincoln was a great president:
I saw, oh…I don’t know him very well, but he [the author] is part of a right-wing group of southern conservatives who is a secessionist. I’m not sure that the best model for thinking about Lincoln as a president is one that comes from a racist. So I have my critical eyes up a little bit, so it’s a bit of a stretch to be friendly to, so I wanted to make sure to read it fairly.
From a chemist reading a journal article discussing a scientific experiment:
I pay attention in two ways: who wrote it and what is their affiliation, to see, is this somebody I recognize in the field, and also, I suppose, where the affiliation is, which, right or wrong, gives more or less credibility. If it’s from a third world country, it may have a little less, I’d read it with a little more suspicion than if it came from a highly ranked university. I look to see who is the individual and see whether or not I’ve encountered their research in the past.
The historian’s recognition of the author’s political stance was a guide to how he should proceed with the reading of the text. He recognized the potential for a particular kind of bias, and chose to take this into account while attempting to maintain an objective appraisal of the credibility of the argument the author was making. The chemist wanted to know about how advanced the laboratory was in which the experiment took place. He presumed that a highly regarded chemist from a well-funded laboratory at a competitive research university would engage in high quality experiments. A chemist without top-notch measurement tools isn’t likely to produce the most credible results. Why does it matter that there is a difference in the way an author is viewed? Researchers have found that an author’s expertise is often used to determine whether or not that author’s message should be believed (Horai, Naccari, & Fatoullah, 1974; Austin & Dong, 1994). Researchers also know that approaching a text with a particular point of view (based on belief or background knowledge or confidence in the message) affects how individuals read and what they learn from texts. Therefore, the difference matters because it helps to determine the way in which a text is approached, the confidence one has in the information gleaned from reading, and how readers use that information.

Author

• Cynthia R. Shanahan, University of Illinois at Chicago