title: Understanding the Microstructure and Macrostructure of Passages Among Chinese Elementary School Children.
abstract: Understanding the microstructure and macrostructure of passages is important for reading comprehension. What cognitive-linguistic skills may contribute to understanding these two levels of structures has rarely been investigated. The present study examined whether some word-level and text-level cognitive-linguistic skills may contribute differently to the understanding of microstructure and macrostructure respectively. Seventy-nine Chinese elementary school children were tested on some cognitive-linguistic skills and literacy skills. It was found that word reading fluency and syntactic skills predicted significantly the understanding of microstructure of passages after controlling for age and IQ; while morphological awareness, syntactic skills, and discourse skills contributed significantly to understanding of macrostructure. These findings suggest that syntactic skills facilitate children's access of meaning from grammatical structures, which is a fundamental process in gaining text meaning at any level of reading comprehension. Discourse skills also allow readers to understand the cohesive interlinks within and between sentences and is important for a macro level of passage understanding.
authors.affiliation: Department of Counselling and Psychology, Hong Kong Shue Yan University, Wai Tsui Crescent, Braemer Hill, North Point, Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Lap-Yan
authors.initials: LY
authors.lastname: Lo
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, The University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam Road, Pokfulam, Hong Kong, China. shhoc@hku.hk.
authors.forename: Connie Suk-Han
authors.initials: CS
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Social Sciences, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Yau-Kai
authors.initials: YK
authors.lastname: Wong
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Education, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Sha Tin, Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: David Wai-Ock
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Chan
authors.affiliation: Department of Special Education and Counselling, The Hong Kong Institute of Education, Tai Po, Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Kevin Kien-Hoa
authors.initials: KK
authors.lastname: Chung
mesh_terms: D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology*; D032882:Comprehension / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006723:Hong Kong; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007807:Language Tests; D008297:Male; D011932:Reading
keywords: Discourse skills; Macrostructure; Microstructure; Reading comprehension; Syntactic skills