Effects of Differing Proportions and Locations of Difficult Vocabulary on Text Comprehension. Technical Report No. 202.

ABSTRACT 'Two .e.xpeniments 1..s-me.ssed ta=s1 affect of vocat_ary difficulty eta me.smres of -1.mmt compresion-free reca,I1, summary -ect=--:-, and ssnntence re=oomition. 17= =he first experimant, the effect of -iffezEzng z=nportions of rare-rrard substitutiomsi were examined. in sixthorat7,a studs t. It was ramid that a hig& rate of difficult vo/caOrlary (ate subst-mrce word in th_ree) was reguir-7,d before re a efts onl compansion were -e-nident. In the second experiment, diffrit vocabular7 was placed in important text elements in are form of tle paszaores, and in unrmportant alemmts of another form of tie passages tha:' 71 sixth grade students read. These two forms we:::=Lc Int-t-ed with satsy vocabulary =arms in their= effects on three comtrtei=i;ibc:Lon measures (total recall, summarization, and sentence reco,oriti_t-). Onllitr on .t.:e summary measure was there an overall effect 7'c= Irt".m.-thula.. in important elements. These experimental mstaLts may be exr::ained by the "m-::,:mimum effort principle" Lr rtl?,(1Tc'!h 11 at is, a reader will avoid deep processing of difficult or u,'Jfamiliar words as much as possible, lifithou-: loss of the main themes o: t2te rtzi-..ssace being read. The "minimUm effo-zt principle" also worm : ve-t*dict that the presence of difficult words in important proposition would result substantial losses at the point of compreHensirm. (RL)

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