Title Page
Abstract
Contents
Chapter 1. Introduction 19
1.1. Motivation for the Study and Statement of the Problem 19
1.2. Definition of the Terms 30
1.3. Research Questions 33
1.4. Significance of the Study 38
1.5. The Outline of the Thesis 40
Chapter 2. Literature Review 42
2.1. Oral Reading Fluency 42
2.1.1. Theoretical Frameworks of Oral Reading Fluency 42
2.1.2. The Constructs of Oral Reading Fluency 46
2.2. The Nature of Reading Prosody 49
2.2.1. Connection of Speech Prosody to Reading Prosody 50
2.2.2. Assessment of Reading Prosody 54
2.2.3. Characteristics of Prosodic Features 63
2.3. Reading Prosody and Reading Comprehension 74
2.3.1. Reading Prosody as a Predictor of Reading Comprehension 74
2.3.2. The Directionality of the Relationship between Reading Prosody and Reading Comprehension 78
Chapter 3. Methodology 82
3.1. Participants 82
3.2. Reading Assessment and Procedures 84
3.2.1. General Assessment Procedure 85
3.2.2. Decoding Skill Measurement 86
3.2.3. Text Reading Efficiency Measurement 86
3.2.4. Reading Comprehension Assessment 88
3.3. Reading Prosody Measurement 91
3.3.1. Intrasentential Pausal Ratio/Duration 92
3.3.2. Ungrammatical Pause Ratio 94
3.3.3. Intersentential Pause Duration 96
3.3.4. Pitch Changes at the Sentence-final Position 97
3.3.5. Overall Intonation Contour 100
3.4. Statistical Analysis 103
3.4.1. Statistical Analysis for RQ 1 103
3.4.2. Statistical Analysis for RQ 2 106
3.4.3. Statistical Analysis for RQ 3 110
Chapter 4. Results 117
4.1. Descriptive Statistics and Correlation 117
4.2. Differences in Reading Prosody Features Depending on Reading Skill 126
4.3. Dimensionality of Oral Reading Fluency 137
4.4. Reading Prosody as a Predictor of Reading Comprehension 140
4.4.1. Unique Contributions of Reading Prosody to Reading Comprehension Beyond the Decoding Skills 141
4.4.2. Reading Prosody as a Mediator to Reading Comprehension 145
4.4.3. Predictability of Reading Prosody Beyond Text Reading Efficiency 149
4.4.4. Summary of the Results on Predictability of Reading Prosody for Reading Comprehension 155
Chapter 5. Discussion 157
5.1. Different Characteristics of Reading Prosody Features as a Function of Fluency Skills 157
5.2. Oral Reading Fluency as a Unitary Construct 165
5.3. Roles of Reading Prosody in Reading Comprehension 167
Chapter 6. Conclusion 174
6.1. Major Findings 174
6.2. Pedagogical Implications 176
6.3. Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research 180
References 184
Appendices 200
Appendix A. Consent Form 200
Appendix B 201
Reading Material A Modified from May (2014) 201
Reading Material B Modified from May (2014) 202
Appendix C 203
Parameter Estimate Coefficients of the Two-Dissociable-Constructs Model of ORF 203
Graphic Illustration of CFA Results of Two-Dissociable-Constructs Model of ORF 204
국문초록 205
Table 2.1. NAEP Oral Reading Fluency Scale 56
Table 2.2. Multidimensional Fluency Scale 58
Table 2.3. Comprehensive Oral Reading Fluency Scale 60
Table 2.4. Features of Reading Prosody Measured in the Previous Studies 65
Table 3.1. A Flesch-Kincaid Grade Levels of MCSAT RC Passages 90
Table 3.2. Comparisons of Three Groups on Reading Comprehension and Fluency Skill 105
Table 3.3. CFA Goodness - of - fit Indices 109
Table 3.4. Factor Loading for the Two Components 114
Table 4.1. Descriptive Statistics of the Variables (N=90) 118
Table 4.2. Bivariate Correlation among the Variables 125
Table 4.3. Descriptive Statistics of Reading Prosody Features by Groups 127
Table 4.4. Difference of Reading Prosody Features Depending on L2 Fluency Skills 128
Table 4.5. Post - hoc Comparisons of L2 Reading Prosody Features across the Three Fluency Skill Groups 133
Table 4.6. The Model Fit Indices of Two Alternative Models 137
Table 4.7. Parameter Estimate Coefficients of the Unitary-construct Model 139
Table 4.8. Comparison of the Models with Different Pause Variables 142
Table 4.9. Contributions of Reading Prosody to RC Beyond Decoding Skills 144
Table 4.10. Model Summary of the Mediation Analysis 148
Table 4.11. Contributions of Reading Prosody to RC Beyond TRE 150
Table 4.12. Overlap between Reading Prosody and TRE 152
Table 4.13. Alternative Model for the Contribution of Reading Prosody to RC 153
Figure 3.1. Spectrographic Representation of Measurement of Pause Features 95
Figure 3.2. Spectrographic Representation of Measurement of Sentence-final Pitch Declination 99
Figure 3.3. Spectrographic Representation of Measurement of Pitch_SD 102
Figure 3.4. Unitary-Construct Model of ORF 107
Figure 3.5. Two-Dissociable-Constructs Model of ORF 108
Figure 3.6. The Hypothesized Mediation Model of Reading Prosody 115
Figure 4.1. Frequency of Pitch_SD 121
Figure 4.2. Frequency of Pitch_SF 121
Figure 4.3. Frequency of IntraP_ratio 122
Figure 4.4. Frequency of UGP_ratio 122
Figure 4.5. Frequency of IntraP_duration 123
Figure 4.6. Frequency of InterP_duration 123
Figure 4.7. Differences of Pitch_SD across Groups 131
Figure 4.8. Differences of Pitch_SF across Groups 131
Figure 4.9. Differences of IntraP_ratio across Groups 131
Figure 4.10. Differences of UGP_ratio across Groups 132
Figure 4.11. Differences of IntraP_duration across Groups 132
Figure 4.12. Differences of InterP_duration across Groups 132
Figure 4.13. Comparison of Pause Patterns between the Two Participants of Different Fluency Skills 135
Figure 4.14. The Unitary-construct Model of ORF 140
Figure 4.15. RC by Standardized Residual Scatter Plot 143
Figure 4.16. The Mediation of PAUSE between Decoding Skills and Reading Comprehension 148