Perfetti´s knowledge and process categories in L1 reading: an experiment

Abstract

Perfetti et al. (1996) classify the components of reading comprehension into two main categories: process and knowledge categories. While lexical processes, working memory capacity, inference making and comprehension monitoring are situated in the first one, word knowledge and domain knowledge are placed in the second one. This paper aims at showing the relevance of the types of knowledge that make up the second category to the overall reading comprehension process, as well as the interdependence between both categories. In order to do so, a comparison was made between the strategies used by eight adult readers while answering specific questions related to vocabulary inference as part of an L1 reading test carried out through the verbal protocol technique. Participants were divided into two groups of reading proficiency, according to their scores on the test. Data analysis ratified the intrinsic relationship between word meanings and domain knowledge on reading comprehension processes, more specifically on lexical inferencing.