DOCUMENT RESUME ED 373 305 CS 011 804 AUTHOR Booth, James R.; Hall, William S. TITLE Relationship of Reading Comprehension to the Cognitive Internal State Lexicon. Reading Research Report No. 14. INSTITUTION National Reading Research Center, Athens, GA.; National Reading Research Center, College Park, MD. SPONS AGENCY Office of Educational Research and Improvement (ED), Washington, DC. PUB DATE 94 CONTRACT 117A20007 NOTE 44p. PUB TYPE Reports Research/Technical (143) EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Higher Education; Intermediate Grades; Reading Achievement; *Reading Comprehension; Reading Research; Secondary Education; Vocabulary Development; *Word Recognition IDENTIFIERS District of Columbia; University of Maryland ABSTRACT A study compared students' cognitive word knowledge of the cognates of "think" and "know" within a theoretical framework focused on hierarchical levels of meaning. Subjects were 31 fifth, 32 seventh, and 21 tenth graders attending single-gender private schools in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, and 70 college undergraduate students in an introductory psychology course at the University of Maryland. Cognitive words form a category within the internal state lexicon and may be central to accessing, monitoring, and transforming internal states, all of which seem to be processes critical to reading comprehension. Cognitive word knowledge was positively correlated with achievement scores. The correlations with cognitive word knowledge were higher for verbal (vocabulary and readint comprehension) than quantitative achievement scores, and cognitive word knowledge increased with age. However, the order of acquisition of cognitive words depended on a complex interaction between the frequency of the cognitive word in established word frequency counts, the level of meaning as determined by the conceptual difficulty hierarchy, and whether the cognitive word was a cognate of "think" or "know." (Contains 61 references, 6 tables, and 3 figures of data. The cognitive word task is attached.) (Author/RS) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** Relationship of Reading Comprehension to the Cognitive Internal State Lexicon James R. Booth William S. Hall University of Maryland U S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Lth.cat. na Resca rn anc$ ou.er, EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERICI ti(Ths document ' ',eon reproduced as :ton o. organization received from I originating it Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not nocessanty represent offival OERI position or policy National NRRC Reading Research Center READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 14 Spring 1994 AVAILABLE PEST COPY NRRC National Reading Research Center Relationship of Reading Comprehension to the Cognitive Internal State Lexicon James R. Booth William S. Hall University of Maryland College Park READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 14 Spring 1994 The work reported herein is a National Reading Research Project of the University of Georgia was supported under the Educational Research and and University of Maryland. 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Georgia Barbara Palmer Athens-Clarke County Schools Mount Saint Mary's CoPege Athens, Georgia Susan Sonnensrhein University of Maryland Baltimore Mike Pickle Jane West County Georgia Southern University University of Georgia Steve Stahl Jessie Pollack Steve White University of Georgia Maryland Department of Education University of Georgia Baltimore, Maryland Anne Sweet Allen Wigfield Office of Educational Research Sally Porter University of Maryland College Park and Improvement Blair High School Silver Spring, Maryland Shelley Wong Liqing Tao University of Maryland College Park University of Georgia Michael Pressley State University of New York Ruby Thompson at Albany Clark Atlanta University About the Authors James R. Booth is a graduate student in Devel- William S. Hall is a Professor of Developmental opmental Psychology at the University of Mary- Psychology and Chair of the Department of Psy- land College Park. chology at the University of Maryland College Park. Please address all correspondence to Wil- liam S. Hall, Department of Psychology, Universi- ty of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742. National Reading Research Center Universities of Georgia and Maryland Reading Research Report No. 14 Spring 1994 Relationship of Reading Comprehension Lexicon to the Cognitive Internal State James R. Booth University of Maryland College Park William S. Hall University of Maryland College Park Cognitive words such as think and know form Abstract. The authors compared fifth-, sev- a category within the internal state lexicon enth-, and tenth-graders, and college under- (Hall & Nagy, 1986) and may be central to graduates' cognitive word knowledge of the accessing, monitoring, and transforming our cognates of think and know within a theoret- internal states (Scholnick & Hall, 1991). Many ical framework focused on hierarchical cognitive words are polysemous and can be de- levels of meaning. Cognitive words form a fined along a hierarchy from simple perception category within the internal state lexicon and to complex planning (Frank & Hall, 1991; may be central to accessing, monitoring, and Hall, Scholnick, & Hughes, 1987). According transforming our internal states, all of which to this hierarchy, the higher the level of mean- seem to be processes critical to reading ing the more conceptually demanding the comprehension. Cognitive word knowledge more internal processing is required. We argue was positively correlated with achievement that cognitive words may be centrally involved scores. The correlations with cognitive word in the development of skilled reading compre- knowledge were higher for Verbal (voca- bulary and reading comprehension) than hension. Cognitive words can provide a medium that Quantitative achievement scores, and cogni- makes it possible to engage in metacognitive tive word knowledge increased with age. such as acts relevant to the reading process, However, the order of acquisition of cogni- generating a goal for reading, communicating tive words depended on a complex interac- the intended meaning of a text, and evaluating tion between the frequency of the cognitive one's level of understanding. Similarly, cogni- word in established word frequency counts, tive words can equip the reader with a vehicle the level of meaning as determined by the by which to evaluate different comprehension conceptual difficulty hierarchy, and whether strategies critically or to reflect on the logical the cognitive word was a cognate of think or organization and interdependence of the com- know. 2 James R. Booth & William S. Hall ponents of a text. Our elaborated cognitive standing (Shatz et al., 1983), but they do not word lexicon allows us to make fine-grained understand the distinctions between many distinctions between cognitive states. Cognitive cognitive words, such as remember, know, and words "convey shades of meaning which add guess, until approximately four years of age succinctness and precision to the lexicon" and (Johnson & Wellman, 1980). At around five supply us with "a greater capacity for descrip- years of age, children can differentiate between tion and definition" (Corson, 1985, p. 61). know and think (Johnson & Maratsos, 1977; While skilled reading comprehension requires Moore, Bryant, & Furrow, 1989), know and the use of all of the aforementioned skills, guess (Miscione, Marvin, O'Brien, & Green- direct empirical evidence for the claim that berg, 1978; Moore et al. 1989), and remember cognitive ward knowledge is central to the and forget (Johnson, 1981). development of reading comprehension is Fine-grained distinctions between other sparse (see Olson & Torrance, 1986, 1987). cognitive words are not learned until later. The present study sought to remedy this Seven-year-olds' judgment of the truth of the situation by providing an empirical test of the complement of the cognitive words pretend, hypothesized relationship between cognitive know, and think are determined primarily by word knowledge and reading comprehension. the plausibility of the complement and only In pursuit of this aim, a task was designed to secondarily by the factivity of the verb (Olson measure knowledge of the cognates of think & Torrance, 1986); the think and guess dis- and know while simultaneously varying the tinction is not attained until children are eight dimensions of established frequency in the years old (Moore et al., 1989). Furthermore, English language (Carroll, Richman, & Dav- children do not understand believe, which can ies, 1971) and the level of meaning difficulty be both factive and nonfactive, until after age (Frank & Hall, 1991). The degree of chil- seven (Abbeduto & Rosenberg, 1985), and dren's knowledge of the 'gnitive words was even high school and college students have expected correlate highly with reading to incomplete knowledge of more complex cog. achievement scores. tive words such as predict, interpret, infer, Certain cognitive words, such as think and conclude, and assume (Astington & Olson, know, appear very early in a child's lexicon. 1990). Children begin to use cognitive words at about All cognitive words are not acquired simul- three years of age (Bretherton & Beeghly, taneously, in part because certain cognitive 1982), but their use remains infrequent and words differ semantically in specific but subtle limited primarily to pragmatic functions. For For example, know, respects. remember, example, Shatz, Wellman, and Silber (1983) forget, and guess refer to the accessibility of found that the earliest use of cognitive words is knowledge (Hall et al., 1987); pretend, guess, for pragmatic or conversational purposes , such and know involve presuppositions of disbelief, as in directing the action. By the end of their uncertainty, and belief (Macnamara, Baker, & third year, children begin to use cognitive Olson, 1976); see and know refer to internal words in a way that suggests semantic under- versus external experience (Wellman & Estes, NATIONAL READING RESEARCH CENTER, READING RESEARCH REPORT NO. 14 10