The causal role of phoneme awareness and letter-sound knowledge in learning to read: combining intervention studies with mediation analyses.

Journal article

There is good evidence that phoneme awareness and letter-sound knowledge are reliable longitudinal predictors of learning to read, though whether they have a causal effect remains uncertain. In this article, we present the results of a mediation analysis using data from a previous large-scale intervention study. We found that a phonology and reading intervention that taught letter-sound knowledge and phoneme awareness produced significant improvements in these two skills and in later word-level reading and spelling skills. Improvements in letter-sound knowledge and phoneme awareness at the end of the intervention fully mediated the improvements seen in children's word-level literacy skills 5 months after the intervention finished. Our findings support the conclusion that letter-sound knowledge and phoneme awareness are two causal influences on the development of children's early literacy skills.

Authors: Hulme, C; Bowyer-Crane, C; Carroll, J; Duff, F; Snowling, M

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: Psychological science
• Volume: 23
• Issue: 6
• Pages: 572-577
• Publication date: 2012-06-01
• DOI: 10.1177/0956797611435921
• EISSN: 1467-9280
• ISSN: 0956-7976
• Language: English
• Keywords: Humans; Educational Status; Child, Preschool; Reading; Phonetics; Psycholinguistics; Learning; Models, Psychological; Awareness