This study was designed 1) to provide an assessment of linguistic variables which affect the way in which children process verbal data when they read, and 2) to evaluate certain explicit and implicit claims emerging from research and opinion in the areas of readability analysis and psycholinguistics. A repeated measurement design for high and average achieving third and fourth graders yielded data which indicate that grammatical complexity is often an aid to comprehension and recall rather than a hindrance. The results are discussed in light of the implications they provide for writing children's reading material, further readability analysis, and developing models of performance for language users.
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