LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 15:11 November 2015
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.
         C. Subburaman, Ph.D. (Economics)
         N. Nadaraja Pillai, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.
Assistant Managing Editor: Swarna Thirumalai, M.A.

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Study of Inferential Ability in Primary School Children

Usha. A. Dalvi, M.Sc. Speech Language Pathology
N.S. Varsha, M.Sc. Audiology and Speech Language Pathology

Abstract

The inferential ability of typically developing second and third standard children has been explored in this study. There is a need to study about the inferential ability in reading of children as it would predict their comprehension abilities. This area has received very little attention in Indian context. This cross sectional study aimed to investigate the inferential ability of second and third standard participants, to find the differences in the performance between both the standards, between the gender and finally between good and poor readers. A total of 80 participants with 40 from second standard and the other 40 from third standard maintaining equal gender ratio were selected for the study. The participants were categorized as good and poor readers. The causal inferential ability was explored using developed reading passages where the participant had to select the target word as the appropriate option after reading the passage.

On statistical analysis, it was found that all the participants made some amount of inferences but no significant differences were found between the inferential ability of second and third standard participants and also between the genders. Although statistically there was no significant difference between standard wise performances but qualitatively differences was present. That is there was a steady increase in the performance of third standard participants. The percentage of high inferences increased for third standard indicating their inferential ability is improving.

Keywords: Inferential ability, causal inference, reading comprehension

Introduction

Inference is an assertion relating to the text that is directly connected to the representation of the text and that was not given in the text itself. Inference making ability is the core of understanding process. Inferencing ability develops with experience and age. Oakhill (1982, 1984) found that inability of making inferences as a cause of reading comprehension difficulty. It is important to study the inferential ability of children as it would let us predict their comprehension abilities also this skill is very important in achieving academic proficiency. Also this area has been less explored in the Indian context. Due to these underlying reasons there is a need to explore the inferential ability in children.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Usha. A. Dalvi, M.Sc. Speech Language Pathology
Associate Professor
SRM Medical College Hospital and Research Centre
Kattankulathur 603 203
Kancheepuram District
Tamil Nadu
India
ushadt@yahoo.co.in

N. S. Varsha, M.Sc. Audiology and Speech Language Pathology
SRM Medical College Hospital and Research Centre
Kattankulathur 603 203
Kancheepuram District
Tamil Nadu
India
svarsh1921@gmail.com

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