Abstract
Background: Chinese words are morpho-syllabic based where each syllable/ character corresponded to one morpheme, hence, morphological awareness is significant for Chinese learning in nature. Furthermore, previous studies showed that the compounding strategy is a highly productive way to form new words in Chinese. In the current study, a treatment designed to promote morphological awareness was conducted on a group of children with reading difficulties in Chinese. The result is expected to help to elucidate the relationship between morphological awareness and Chinese reading abilities.
Methods: A total of 20 children reported to have difficulties learning to read Chinese were recruited. The children were initially assigned to the Treatment group and the Control group. The Treatment group received 12 treatment sessions designed to promote their awareness of relationship between compound words and their constituent morphemes in terms of meaning relatedness, using explicit instructions. Pre- and post-treatment outcome measures of compound word naming tests designed to measure the effects of morphological productivity, boundedness and semantic transparency were conducted. Finally, a standardized Chinese character naming test was conducted on each children before and after treatment.
Results: Results indicated significant morphological productivity, boundedness, and semantic transparency effects observed among the Treatment group but not the Control group after treatment. Yet, the two groups demonstrated comparative levels of improvement in the standardized Chinese character naming test across time.
Conclusion: The significant morphological effects observed among the Treatment group indicated their improved morphological awareness after the treatment sessions. That the Treatment group did not outperform the Control group in the standardized Chinese character naming test suggested that their improved morphological awareness did not result in improved Chinese character naming abilities. This observation is considered to be consistent with the literature that morphological awareness of Chinese were observed to have stronger relationship with reading comprehension than word decoding.
Methods: A total of 20 children reported to have difficulties learning to read Chinese were recruited. The children were initially assigned to the Treatment group and the Control group. The Treatment group received 12 treatment sessions designed to promote their awareness of relationship between compound words and their constituent morphemes in terms of meaning relatedness, using explicit instructions. Pre- and post-treatment outcome measures of compound word naming tests designed to measure the effects of morphological productivity, boundedness and semantic transparency were conducted. Finally, a standardized Chinese character naming test was conducted on each children before and after treatment.
Results: Results indicated significant morphological productivity, boundedness, and semantic transparency effects observed among the Treatment group but not the Control group after treatment. Yet, the two groups demonstrated comparative levels of improvement in the standardized Chinese character naming test across time.
Conclusion: The significant morphological effects observed among the Treatment group indicated their improved morphological awareness after the treatment sessions. That the Treatment group did not outperform the Control group in the standardized Chinese character naming test suggested that their improved morphological awareness did not result in improved Chinese character naming abilities. This observation is considered to be consistent with the literature that morphological awareness of Chinese were observed to have stronger relationship with reading comprehension than word decoding.
| Original language | English |
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| Publication status | Not published / presented only - Jul 2023 |
| Event | 19th International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Association Conference - Salzburg, Austria Duration: 4 Jul 2023 → 7 Jul 2023 |
Conference
| Conference | 19th International Clinical Phonetics and Linguistics Association Conference |
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| Country/Territory | Austria |
| City | Salzburg |
| Period | 4/07/23 → 7/07/23 |