How should i read this word?: The influence of vowelization in a deep language orthography on online text comprehension

Abstract

This study examined whether online text vowelization of words in context facilitates reading in Hebrew, which is a deep orthography language. The study compared the effect of vowelization on reading among native and non-native Hebrew speakers. In Study 1, 44 participants performed a self-paced reading - cumulative presentation task [9], that includes a 2 (voweled/non-voweled) X 2 (frequent/non-frequent) X 2 (homographs/unambiguous words) X 2 (location of words: beginning or middle/end of sentence) design. Study 2 was conducted in order to deal with some of the methodological problems in study 1. Eighty-six participants performed the same task. Results indicated that vowelization does not facilitate reaction times of homographs for both Hebrew and non-Hebrew speakers. The results are discussed in relation to previous studies and the participants' characteristics. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.