COMPLEX SENTENCE COMPREHENSION WITHIN A SOUTH AFRICAN ADOLESCENT POPULATION
Date
2006-11-14T11:08:15Z
Authors
Van Rooyen, Dannielle Sharon
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Abstract
South African Speech-Language Pathologists are assessing and treating many adolescents
with varying speech and language difficulties. This task is complicated by the fact that it
is currently largely unknown what the language abilities of mainstream adolescents are.
Some research has suggested declining language abilities, as well as significant effects of
grade, gender and language background on cognitive academic language skills. As
individuals grow older, the demands of the classroom environment become greater,
forcing adolescents to use complex language skills in order to learn. This research paper
aimed to assess the complex sentence comprehension abilities of a sample of South
African adolescents, through the use of the Grammar/Listening subtest of the Test of
Adolescent Language, developed by Hammill, Brown, Larsen, and Wiederholt (1980).
Additionally, the effects of grade, gender, language, time spent reading for school and
recreationally each week, number of television programmes watched per week, length of
time spent playing computer or video games per day, preferred learning styles
(group/alone and auditory/visual/both), most recent English and school report marks, and
use of cellular telephones, were used to determine related factors and educational
variables which might be linked to each other. Additionally, a working memory measure
was included, in order to ascertain that this factor was not having a negative effect upon
the comprehension scores. It was found that gender was an over-riding factor throughout
the study. Females tended to do better on the complex sentence comprehension test, and
also spent more time reading for school each week, obtained better English and school
report marks, preferred to learn alone, and sent more sms’s. Males were only inclined to
play more computer or video games per week. In opposition to the initial hypothesis that
these learners would perform poorly on the TOAL subtest, it was found that participants
generally performed within the average limits of the test. Correlations, one-way
ANOVA’s, chi squared analyses and t-tests were performed for the secondary aims, in
order to determine any relationships between the variables. Overall, though, gender was
the key variable in the study, which is in line with other literature in the field. Home
language and educational level had minimal effects. Further research has been
recommended.
Description
Faculty of Arts
School of Human and Community Development
0000613a
Tel: 011 849 3853
Keywords
Complex Sentence Comprehension, Adolescents, Academic Language Proficiency, Gender, Grade