The speech code and learning to read

Good and poor readers in the 2nd grade can be distinguished by the extent to which their recall of random letter strings is affected by the phonetic characteristics (rhyming or not rhyming) of the items. The recall performance of 16 mildly backward readers was less penalized by phonetic confusability than that of 17 superior readers, and 13 severely backward readers showed a still weaker effect of confusability. These results were obtained not only for visual presentation of the letter strings (Exps I-II) but also for auditory presentation (Exp III). Taken together, the findings support the hypothesis that good and poor readers differ in their use of phonetic coding in working memory, whatever the sensory route of access, and suggest that individual variation in coding efficiency may be a relevant factor in learning to read. It is suggested that a number of memory-related problems typical of poor readers may be manifestations of deficiencies in phonetic coding. (35 ref)