Theory of mind is thought to improve reading comprehension through narrative processing. By being able to know what a character is thinking or why they are doing something, reading comprehension is enhanced in fiction. This is a framework and still needs more research to prove it's causality. It is also thought that this could be a reciprocal relationship with reading comprehension improving theory of mind.

Theory of Mind and Reading Comprehension

Genre theory has emerged as a result of Halliday's (1978) study on the relationship between language and its social context. The relationship between cultural environment, the purpose of our communication, and the genres we use in language form the basis of genre theory. 

This theory emphasizes that language and meaning of communication are interactive, thus making it difficult to separate the two ideas. Genre may be considered as reflecting socio-linguistic interactions within society.

Research suggests that genre is a useful tool in enabling educators to categorize texts on the basis of their form and meaning, and genre may have more to do with reading comprehension success/failure than one might initially believe.

Reading Comprehension and Genre Theory

Boston College

Stanford University

Gaining understanding of a written text by coming to a conclusion of its meaning. Comprehension occurs based off of the reader's prior knowledge of language and ability to make inferences.

Reading Comprehension

Dore, Rebecca & Amendum, Steve & Golinkoff, Roberta & Hirsh-Pasek, Kathy. (2018). Theory of Mind: a Hidden Factor in Reading Comprehension?. Educational Psychology Review. 30. 10.1007/s10648-018-9443-9. 

Theory of Mind: a Hidden Factor in Reading Comprehension?

Stamboltzis, A., & Pumfrey, P. (2000). Reading across Genres: a Review of Literature. Support for Learning, 15(2), 58. https://doi-org.ezproxy.lib.uconn.edu/10.1111/1467-9604.00146

Reading Across Genres: A Review of Literature

The way children understand a story they are listening to or reading. Narrative processing develops throughout childhood depending on how a child can follow a character in a story.

Narrative Processing

- Assessing and measuring reading comprehension

Learning Analytics of Academic Performance

Moderate-emerging and high-chronic victims of peer victimization have lower reading scores at the start of school, but this goes away by 12th grade. Reading performance is not as affected by peer victimization as math performance is.

Peer Victimization and Reading Performance

Factors Affecting Reading Comprehension

Reading Comprehension in Experiment Design

- SAT
- ACT
- GRE
- LSAT
- MCAT
- GMAT
- TOEFL

Reading Comprehension in Standardized Tests

- Reading comprehension is very much related to cognitive psychology 
- Reading is a complex human behavior that requires higher cognitive demands 
- Reading comprehension is important for basic skills such as completing tax forms, reading menus, scholastic achievement, and more. 


Reading Comprehension + Cognitive Psychology

- Text Chunking
- Text Line Length
- Line-length variability

Text Format Factors Related to Reading Comprehension

- Question Answering Test: Students answer a worksheet of questions about a reading passage
- Recall Measures: Students retell the contents of a passage in their own words
- Oral Passage Reading Test: Students are timed while reading out loud; examiners score them
- Cloze Technique: Student writes or says missing words that have been deleted from a passage

Reading Comprehension Measures

Application questions, as contrasted to questions that repeated examples or questions on names of significant people, yield the greatest general facilitative effect on learning by prompting the student to inspect and comprehend thetext more thoroughly. 

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