Date of Award

12-4-2015

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Teacher Education

First Advisor

Linda Dorn

Abstract

There has been a virtual wave of studies investigating influences of African American English on academic achievement. Many of these studies have taken a sociolinguistic stance citing language stratification and low perception of the language as causes for the success and failures of these students. Others have suggested that the language used in family and community settings are not congruent with the academic language in school. In this study, I investigated the influences of African American English on reading achievement from a psycholinguistic perspective. This study analyzed the oral language, linguistics, and the cognitive processing behaviors of African American students during reading to determine the impact on reading outcomes. This was accomplished by correlating reading outcomes including fluency and comprehension with the use of language during reading and in writing. A Pearson r was conducted using the SPSS. The data in this study concluded that the African American English used during reading and in writing had a statistical significant correlation to reading fluency and reading comprehension.

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