Poster #27 - Predictors of Adults' Monitoring and Comprehension: The Roles of Vocabulary, Prior Knowledge, and Item Difficulty

• In Event: 63.088 - MTCC Poster Session 14
  In Poster Session: 63.088-5 - Research in Self-Regulated Learning

Abstract

This study examined the links among adults’ vocabulary ability, prior knowledge, and monitoring of comprehension and how such reader characteristics may be affected by task features to support comprehension of expository text. Participants’ monitoring of performance based on less difficult comprehension items served a consistent mediating role between their vocabulary ability and their text comprehension. The mediating role of participants’ monitoring of more difficult comprehension items, however, depended on the extent of their prior knowledge of the text. The findings suggest that high-knowledge adult readers are less over-confident in their monitoring of more complex comprehension items, and that their monitoring ability conveys an important effect of their word knowledge on their text comprehension. Educational and empirical implications will be discussed.

Authors

• D. Jake Follmer, West Virginia University

• Rayne A. Sperling, The Pennsylvania State University