Text simplification and comprehensible input: A case for an intuitive approach

Texts are routinely simplified to make them more comprehensible for second language learners. However, the effects of simplification upon the linguistic features of texts remain largely unexplored. Here we examine the effects of one type of text simplification: intuitive text simplification. We use the computational tool, Coh-Metrix, to examine linguistic differences between proficiency levels of a corpus of 300 news texts that had been simplified to three levels of simplification (beginner, intermediate, advanced). The main analysis reveals significant differences between levels for a wide range of linguistic features, particularly between beginner and advanced levels. The results show that lower level texts are generally less lexically and syntactically sophisticated than higher-level texts. The analysis also reveals that lower level texts contain more cohesive features than higher-level texts. The analysis also provides strong evidence that these linguistic features can be used to classify levels of simplified reading texts. Overall, the findings support the notion that intuitively simplified texts at the beginning level contain more linguistic features related to comprehensible input than intuitively simplified texts at the advanced level.

[1]  Joseph P. Magliano,et al.  Verb Aspect and Situation Models , 2000 .

[2]  Michael Wilson.  MRC Psycholinguistic Database , 2001 .

[3]  Effets Des,et al.  The Effects of Grammatical Complexity on Children ’ s Comprehension , Recall , and Conception of Certain Semantic Relations , 2022 .

[4]  Andy P. Field,et al.  Discovering Statistics Using SPSS , 2000 .

[5]  P. David Pearson.  The Effects of Grammatical Complexity on Children's Comprehension, Recall, and Conception of Certain Semantic Relations. , 1974 .

[6]  D. R. Hill.  Survey review: Graded readers , 1997 .

[7]  Alan Juffs.  Second language acquisition. , 2006, Wiley interdisciplinary reviews. Cognitive science.

[8]  Bernard Comrie,et al.  Time in language. , 2000 .

[9]  D. J. Young.  Linguistic Simplification of SL Reading Material: Effective Instructional Practice? , 1999 .

[10]  Nicola Brace,et al.  SPSS for psychologists: a guide to data analysis using SPSS for Windows (versions 9, 10 and 11). 2nd edition , 2007 .

[11]  Danielle S. McNamara,et al.  Assessing L2 reading texts at the intermediate level: An approximate replication of Crossley, Louwerse, McCarthy & McNamara (2007) , 2008, Language Teaching.

[12]  Christiane Fellbaum,et al.  Book Reviews: WordNet: An Electronic Lexical Database , 1999, CL.

[13]  Michael H. Long,et al.  Modifications That Preserve Language and Content. , 1993 .

[14]  Kenneth S. Goodman,et al.  What's Simple in Simplified Language?. , 1993 .

[15]  Ling Shi.  Second Language Teaching and Learning , 2000 .

[16]  Arthur C. Graesser,et al.  Component processes in text comprehension and some of their interactions , 1985 .

[17]  Heather Lotherington-Woloszyn.  Do Simplified Texts Simplify Language Comprehension for ESL Learners , 1993 .

[18]  C. A. Weaver,et al.  Psychology of Reading , 2012 .

[19]  Arthur C. Graesser,et al.  Dimensions of situation model construction in narrative comprehension. , 1995 .

[20]  David Malvern,et al.  Lexical Diversity and Language Development: Quantification and Assessment , 2004 .

[21]  R. Ellis.  Second language acquisition , 1997 .

[22]  Nicola Brace,et al.  SPSS for Psychologists: A Guide to Data Analysis Using Spss for Windows (Versions 12 and 13) , 2006 .

[23]  Joseph K. Torgesen,et al.  Repeated reading and reading fluency in learning disabled children. , 1985 .

[24]  Aud Marit Simensen.  Adapted Readers: How Are They Adapted?. , 1987 .

[25]  D. McNamara,et al.  Assessing Text Readability Using Cognitively Based Indices , 2008 .

[26]  John Roberts,et al.  The Communicative Approach to Language teaching , 2004 .

[27]  Scott Jarvis,et al.  vocd: A theoretical and empirical evaluation , 2007 .

[28]  W. Chafe.  Givenness, contrastiveness, definiteness, subjects, topics, and point of view , 1976 .

[29]  D. McNamara,et al.  A Linguistic Analysis of Simplified and Authentic Texts , 2007 .

[30]  Walter Kintsch,et al.  Reading rate and retention as a function of the number of propositions in the base structure of sentences , 1973 .

[31]  Patricia L. Carrell,et al.  Readability in ESL. , 1987 .

[32]  David Malvern,et al.  Lexical Diversity and Language Development , 2004 .

[33]  Jerry Greenfield.  Readability Formulas For EFL , 2004 .

[34]  Arthur C. Graesser,et al.  Coh-Metrix: Analysis of text on cohesion and language , 2004, Behavior research methods, instruments, & computers : a journal of the Psychonomic Society, Inc.

[35]  Charles A. Perfetti,et al.  The Acquisition of Reading Comprehension Skill , 2008 .

[36]  Danielle S. McNamara,et al.  Psycholinguistic word information in second language oral discourse , 2011 .

[37]  David K. Allen,et al.  A study of the role of relative clauses in the simplification of news texts for learners of English , 2009 .

[38]  Robert N. Kantor,et al.  On the Failure of Readability Formulas to Define Readable Texts: A Case Study from Adaptations. , 1982 .

[39]  S. Gaies.  The Investigation of Language Classroom Processes , 1983 .

[40]  Michael H. Long,et al.  THE EFFECTS OF SIMPLIFIED AND ELABORATED TEXTS ON FOREIGN LANGUAGE READING COMPREHENSION , 1994 .

[41]  D. R. Hill.  Graded readers in English , 2006 .

[42]  Wayne D. Gray,et al.  Basic objects in natural categories , 1976, Cognitive Psychology.

[43]  Adel I. Tweissi,et al.  The Effects of the Amount and Type of Simplification on Foreign Language Reading Comprehension. , 1998 .

[44]  Jacob Cohen,et al.  A power primer. , 1992, Psychological bulletin.

[45]  Danielle S. McNamara,et al.  Handbook of latent semantic analysis , 2007 .

[46]  David Singleton,et al.  Learning Foreign Languages from Authentic Texts: Theory and Practice , 1989 .

[47]  Danielle S. McNamara,et al.  Computational assessment of lexical differences in L1 and L2 writing , 2009 .

[48]  Douglas Biber,et al.  Representativeness in corpus design , 1993 .