The role of meta‐cognitive cues on the comprehension of proficient and poor readers

Abstract

We explored whether performance differences exist between proficient and poor readers on implicit text information. Next, we explored whether indices of meta‐cognitive monitoring predicted reading performance. Finally, we examined whether poor and proficient readers exhibited distinct meta‐cognitive profiles with respect to reading comprehension ability. Chilean undergraduate students ( N = 146) completed a task on inconsistency detection within texts and a standardised reading comprehension performance measure, which we used, along with confidence in performance judgements, to calculate meta‐cognitive monitoring accuracy. Our results confirmed that proficient readers outperformed poor readers on nearly all measures of interest, except global retrospective meta‐cognitive monitoring judgements, and that proficient readers performed significantly better on items related to implicit information of texts than poor readers. Additionally, when combined in a single group, number of inconsistencies correctly detected and repaired and accurate global evaluation of learning judgements significantly predicted reading performance whereas retrospective global and local meta‐cognitive monitoring judgements did not. Of special significance to our investigation, when separated in two groups, poor and proficient readers exhibited unique meta‐cognitive profiles. Proficient and poor readers employ different meta‐cognitive strategies, and poor readers benefit more from strategies than proficient readers.