Cognitive Attributes of Adequate and Inadequate Responders to Reading Intervention in Middle School

Abstract.

No studies have investigated the cognitive attributes of middle school students who are adequate and inadequate responders to Tier 2 reading intervention. We compared students in Grades 6 and 7 representing groups of adequate responders (n = 77) and inadequate responders who fell below criteria in (a) comprehension (n = 54); (b) fluency (n = 45); and (c) decoding, fluency, and comprehension (DFC; n = 45). These students received measures of phonological awareness, listening comprehension, rapid naming, processing speed, verbal knowledge, and nonverbal reasoning. Multivariate comparisons showed a significant Group-by-Task interaction: the comprehension-impaired group demonstrated primary difficulties with verbal knowledge and listening comprehension, the DFC group with phonological awareness, and the fluency-impaired group with phonological awareness and rapid naming. A series of regression models investigating whether responder status explained unique variation in cognitive skills yielded largely null results consistent with a continuum of severity associated with level of reading impairment, with no evidence for qualitative differences in the cognitive attributes of adequate and inadequate responders.

Notes

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jeremy Miciak

Jeremy Miciak, PhD, is an assistant research professor at the Texas Institute for Measurement, Evaluation, and Statistics at the University of Houston. He holds a doctorate in special education from The University of Texas at Austin. His research interests include issues of definition, identification, and treatment of learning disabilities, particularly among students from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds.

Karla K. Stuebing

Karla K. Stuebing, PhD, is a retired research professor at the Texas Institute for Measurement, Evaluation, and Statistics at the University of Houston. Her research interests include measurement and classification issues in the fields of reading and learning disabilities.

Sharon Vaughn

Sharon Vaughn, PhD, is the H. E. Hartfelder/Southland Corp. Regents Chair in Human Development and the Executive Director of The Meadows Center for Preventing Educational Risk, an organized research unit at The University of Texas at Austin. She is the recipient of numerous awards including the Council of Exceptional Children (CEC) Research Award, the American Educational Research Association Special Interest Group Distinguished Researcher Award, The University of Texas Distinguished Faculty Award and Outstanding Researcher Award, and the Jeannette E. Fleischner Award for Outstanding Contributions in the Field of LD from CEC. She is the author of more than 35 books and 250 research articles.

Greg Roberts

Greg Roberts, PhD, is Director of the Vaughn Gross Center for Reading and Associate Director of The Meadows Center for Preventing Educational Risk. He directs all data related activities for the Centers. He has been principal investigator or coinvestigator on over a dozen research projects funded by the Institute of Education Sciences, National Institutes of Health, and others. Trained as an educational research psychologist, with expertise in quantitative methods, Dr. Roberts has directed evaluation projects of programs in education, social services, and health care. He has over 50 publications in peer-reviewed journals. He has published in multidisciplinary Tier 1 journals using structural equation models, meta-analysis, and multilevel models.

Amy E. Barth

Amy Elizabeth Barth, PhD, is an assistant professor in special education at the University of Missouri–Columbia. Dr. Barth, a speech–language pathologist, is currently completing the third year of a 5-year K08 Mentored Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Her interests include the identification and treatment of students with language and reading disabilities.

Jack M. Fletcher

Jack M. Fletcher, PhD, is the Hugh Roy and Lillie Cranz Cullen Distinguished Professor and Chair, Department of Psychology, at the University of Houston. Dr. Fletcher, a child neuropsychologist, has conducted research on children with learning and attention disorders, as well as brain injury. He served on the 2002 President's Commission on Excellence in Special Education. Dr. Fletcher received the Samuel T. Orton Award from the International Dyslexia Association in 2003 and was a corecipient of the Albert J. Harris Award from the International Reading Association in 2006.