TY - GEN
T1 - Cohesion and structural organization in high school texts
AU - Lightman, Erin J.
AU - McCarthy, Philip M.
AU - Dufty, David F.
AU - McNamara, Danielle S.
PY - 2007
Y1 - 2007
N2 - Recent research in reading comprehension supports the hypothesis that readers are aided by textual cohesion. Traditional readability formulas are not able to effectively assess levels of textual cohesion, nor do they account for potential comprehension obstacles caused by differences in genre. This research employs the computational tool, Coh-Metrix, to assess distributions of both cohesion and difficulty within chapters of expository and narrative texts. We sampled representative sections from the beginning, the middle, and the end of each chapter in three science textbooks, four history textbooks, and six narrative texts. The results suggest that the three domains differ significantly in terms of structural organization and levels of difficulty and cohesion. Differences between these results are discussed.
AB - Recent research in reading comprehension supports the hypothesis that readers are aided by textual cohesion. Traditional readability formulas are not able to effectively assess levels of textual cohesion, nor do they account for potential comprehension obstacles caused by differences in genre. This research employs the computational tool, Coh-Metrix, to assess distributions of both cohesion and difficulty within chapters of expository and narrative texts. We sampled representative sections from the beginning, the middle, and the end of each chapter in three science textbooks, four history textbooks, and six narrative texts. The results suggest that the three domains differ significantly in terms of structural organization and levels of difficulty and cohesion. Differences between these results are discussed.
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M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:34547827186
SN - 1577353196
SN - 9781577353195
T3 - Proceedings of the Twentieth International Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society Conference, FLAIRS 2007
SP - 235
EP - 240
BT - Proceedings of the Twentieth International Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society Conference, FLAIRS 2007
T2 - 20th International Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society Conference, FLAIRS 2007
Y2 - 7 May 2007 through 9 May 2007
ER -