Different Cognitive Correlates of Early Learning of Spelling of Different Target Types in Korean Hangul Among First Language Children and Adult Foreign Language Learners

Abstract

This study examined whether different cognitive correlates are associated with spelling of different target types, such as phonologically consistent and inconsistent syllables, of Korean Hangul among 94 five-year-old first language (L1) Korean children and 41 foreign language (FL) learners who are Hong Kong Chinese college students. Korean children performed tasks of spelling, along with measures of syllable and phoneme coda awareness, phonological and orthographic working memory, morphological awareness, vocabulary, and orthographic knowledge. Among Korean 5-year-old children, coda awareness and orthographic working memory explained unique variance in spelling of phonologically consistent syllables, whereas syllable and coda awareness, orthographic working memory, orthographic knowledge, and vocabulary all explained unique variance in spelling of inconsistent syllables. When Chinese college students were tested on spelling of Korean Hangul as a foreign language, along with a battery of tasks in Korean similar to those administered to the L1 children, only orthographic working memory significantly explained spelling of consistent syllables, whereas only vocabulary knowledge explained spelling of inconsistent syllables. In both groups, spelling accuracy was lower in phonologically inconsistent than in consistent Hangul syllables. These findings suggest that different cognitive demands are involved in early spelling of phonologically consistent and inconsistent syllables in Korean Hangul among L1 and FL learners.

Keywords

Hangul spelling different target types vocabulary orthographic working memory

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Alloway

T. P.

Pickering

S. J.

Gathercole

S. E.

(2006). Verbal and visuospatial short-term and working memory in children: Are they separable? Child Development, 77(6), 1698–1716. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2006.00968.x

Baddeley

A. D.

(2000). The episodic buffer: A new component of working memory? Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 4(11), 417–423. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01538-2

Berninger

V. W.

Abott

R. D.

Jones

Wolf

B. J.

Gould

Anderson-Youngstrom

Shimada

Apel

(2006). Early development of language by hand: Composing, reading, listening, and speaking connections; three letter-writing modes; and fast mapping in spelling. Developmental Neuropsychology, 29(1), 61–92. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15326942dn2901_5

Bowers

P. G.

Wolf

(1993). Theoretical links among naming speed, precise timing mechanisms and orthographic skill in dyslexia. Reading and Writing, 5(1), 69–85. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01026919

Brown

G. D. A.

Deavers

R. P.

(1999). Units of analysis in nonword reading: Evidence from children and adults. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 73(3), 208–242. https://doi.org/10.1006/jecp.1999.2502

Buchwald

Rapp

(2009). Distinctions between orthographic long-term memory and working memory. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 26(8), 724–751. https://doi.org/10.1080/02643291003707332

Caravolas

Hulme

Snowling

M. J.

(2001). The foundations of spelling ability: Evidence from a 3-year longitudinal study. Journal of Memory and Language, 45(4), 751–774. https://doi.org/10.1006/jmla.2000.2785

Castles

Coltheart

(1993). Varieties of developmental dyslexia. Cognition, 47(2), 149–180. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-0277(93)90003-E

Chiappe

Glaeser

Ferko

(2007). Speech perception, vocabulary, and the development of reading skills in English among Korean- and English-speaking children. Journal of Educational Psychology, 99(1), 154–166. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.99.1.154

10.

Cho

J.-R.

(2017). Early literacy policy and practice in Korea. In Kucirkova

Snow

Grover

McBride

(Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of early literacy education: A contemporary guide to literacy teaching and intervention in a global context (pp. 200–209). Routledge.

11.

Cho

J.-R.

Chiu

(2015). Rapid naming in relation to reading and writing in Korean (Hangul), Chinese (Hanja) and English among Korean children: A 1-year longitudinal study. Journal of Research in Reading, 38(4), 387–404. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12020

12.

Cho

J.-R.

Kim

Y. S.

Park

S. G.

(2017). Korean Test of Literacy Diagnosis (K-TOLD). Korea Guidance.

13.

Cho

J.-R.

McBride-Chang

(2005). Levels of phonological awareness in Korean and English: A 1-year longitudinal study. Journal of Educational Psychology, 97(4), 564–571. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.97.4.564

14.

Cho

J.-R.

McBride-Chang

Park

S.-G.

(2008). Phonological awareness and morphological awareness: Differential associations to regular and irregular word recognition in early Korean Hangul readers. Reading and Writing, 21(3), 255–274. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-007-9072-z

15.

Coltheart

Rastle

Perry

Langdon

Ziegler

J. C.

(2001). DRC: A dual route cascaded model of visual word recognition and reading aloud. Psychological Review, 108(1), 204–256. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295x.108.1.204

16.

Costa

Fischer-Baum

Capasso

Miceli

Rapp

(2011). Temporal stability and representational distinctiveness: Key functions of orthographic working memory. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 28(5), 338–362. https://doi.org/10.1080/02643294.2011.648921

17.

de Bree

van den Boer

. (2019). Knowing what we don’t know: Cognitive correlates of early spelling of different target types. Reading and Writing, 32(8), 2125–2148. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-019-09936-9

18.

Geva

Wade-Woolley

Shany

(1997). Development of reading efficiency in first and second language. Scientific Studies of Reading, 1(2), 119–144. https://doi.org/10.1207/s1532799xssr0102_2

19.

Geva

YaghoubZedeh

(2006). Reading efficiency in native English-speaking and English-as-a-second language children: The role of oral proficiency and underlying cognitive-linguistic processes. Scientific Studies of Reading, 10(1), 31–57. https://doi.org/10.1207/s1532799xssr1001_3

20.

Gujarati

D. N.

(1995). Basic econometrics (3rd ed.). McGraw-Hill.

21.

Harrison

Goegan

L. D.

Jalbert

McManus

Sinclair

Spurling

(2016). Predictors of spelling and writing skills in first- and second-language learners. Reading and Writing, 29(1), 69–89. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-015-9580-1

22.

Juul

(2005). Knowledge of context sensitive spellings as a component of spelling competence: Evidence from Danish. Applied Psycholinguistics, 26(2), 249–265. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0142716405050162

23.

Kim

A. H.

Choi

H. N.

Kim

J.-H.

(2010). Spelling skills of students with and without spelling difficulties in Korea: Focusing on spelling accuracy and error patterns. Korean Journal of Special Education, 45, 203–223.

24.

Kim

H.-S.

(2005). Frequency survey of the use of modern Korean language 2. National Institute of Korean Language.

25.

Kim

Y.-S.

(2010). Componential skills in early spelling development in Korean. Scientific Studies of Reading, 14(2), 137–158. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888430903034812

26.

Kim

Y.-S.

Cho

J.-Y.

Park

S.-G.

(in press). The Korean Test of Language and Literacy Skills (K-TOLLS). Korea Guidance.

27.

Kim

Y.-S. G.

(2015). Developmental, component-based model of reading fluency: An investigation of word reading fluency, text reading fluency, and reading comprehension. Reading Research Quarterly, 50(4), 459–481. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.107

28.

Kim

Y.-S. G.

Petscher

Park

(2016). Examining word factors and child factors for acquisition of conditional sound-spelling consistencies: A longitudinal study. Scientific Studies of Reading, 20(4), 265–282. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2016.1162794

29.

Kim

Y.-T.

Chang

H.-S.

Yim

S.-S.

Paek

H.-J.

(2004). Picture vocabulary test. Seoul Community Rehabilitation Center.

30.

Landerl

Wimmer

(2008). Development of word reading fluency and spelling in a consistent orthography: An 8-year follow-up. Journal of Educational Psychology, 100(1), 150–161. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.100.1.150

31.

Lee

(2018). The effect of the morphological characteristics on Korean spoken word recognition: Comparing simple words and compounds words. The Korean Journal of Cognitive and Biological Psychology, 30(1), 35–51. https://doi.org/10.22172/cogbio.2018.30.1.003

32.

Lervåg

Hulme

(2010). Predicting the growth of early spelling skills: Are there heterogeneous developmental trajectories? Scientific Studies of Reading, 14(6), 485–513. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888431003623488

33.

J. C. M.

Tong

McBride

S.-H.

Waye

M. M. Y.

(2018). Delayed copying is uniquely related to dictation in bilingual Cantonese-English-speaking children in Hong Kong. Writing Systems Research, 10(1), 26–42. https://doi.org/10.1080/17586801.2018.1481902

34.

McBride

(2016). Children’s literacy development. Oxford University Press.

35.

McBride-Chang

Cho

J. R.

Liu

Wagner

R. K.

Shu

Zhou

Cheuk

S.-M.

Muse

(2005). Changing models across cultures: Associations of phonological awareness and morphological structure awareness to vocabulary and word recognition in second graders from Beijing, Hong Kong, Korea, and United States. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 92(2), 140–160. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2005.03.009

36.

McBride-Chang

Treiman

(2003). Hong Kong Chinese kindergartners learn to read English analytically. Psychological Science, 14(2), 138–143. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9280.t01-1-01432

37.

McBride

Yip

(2018). Identifying the unique role of orthographic working memory in a componential model of Hong Kong kindergartners’ Chinese written spelling. Reading and Writing, 31(5), 1083–1108. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-018-9829-6

38.

Nag

Snowling

M. J.

(2012). Reading in an alphasyllabary: Implications for a language universal theory of learning to read. Scientific Studies of Reading, 16(5), 404–423. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2011.576352

39.

Oullette

G. P.

Sénéchal

(2008). A window into early literacy: Exploring the cognitive and linguistic underpinnings of invented spelling. Scientific Studies of Reading, 12(2), 195–219. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888430801917324

40.

Pak

Cheng-Lai

Tso

Shu

Anderson

(2005). Visual chunking skills of Hong Kong children. Reading and Writing, 18(5), 437–454. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-005-6575-3

41.

Raynolds

L. B.

Uhry

J. K.

(2010). The invented spellings of non-Spanish phonemes by Spanish-English bilingual and English monolingual kindergarteners. Reading and Writing, 23(5), 495–513. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-009-9169-7

42.

Russak

Fragman

(2014). Spelling development in Arabic as a foreign language among native Hebrew speaking pupils. Reading and Writing, 27(2), 359–381. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-013-9448-1

43.

Seymour

P. H. K.

Aro

Erskine

J. M.

(2003). Foundation literacy acquisition in European orthographies. British Journal of Psychology, 94(2), 143–174. https://doi.org/10.1348/000712603321661859

44.

Simpson

G. B.

Kang

(1994). The flexible use of phonological information in word recognition in Korean. Journal of Memory and Language, 33(3), 319–331. https://doi.org/10.1006/jmla.1994.1015

45.

Simpson

G. B.

Kang

(2004). Syllable processing in alphabet Korean. Reading and Writing, 17(1–2), 137–151. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:READ.0000013808.65933.a1

46.

Taylor

(2014). Spelling and literacy in Chinese, Korean, and Japanese (rev. ed.). John Benjamins Publishing Co.

47.

Tong

McBride-Chang

Shu

Wong

A. M.

(2009). Morphological awareness, orthographic knowledge, and spelling errors: Keys to understanding early Chinese literacy acquisition. Scientific Studies of Reading, 13(5), 426–452. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888430903162910

48.

Tong

Yip

J. H. Y.

(2015). Cracking the Chinese character: Radical sensitivity in learners of Chinese as a foreign language and its relationship to Chinese word reading. Reading and Writing, 28(2), 159–181. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-014-9519-y

49.

Treiman

(2017). Learning to spell words: Findings, theories, and issues. Scientific Studies of Reading, 21(4), 265–276. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2017.1296449

50.

Treiman

Cassar

Zukowski

(1994). What types of linguistic information do children use in spelling? The case of flaps. Child Development, 65(5), 1318–1329. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1994.tb00819.x

51.

Treiman

Kessler

(2006). Spelling as statistical learning: Using consonantal context to spell vowels. Journal of Educational Psychology, 98(3), 642–652. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.98.3.642

52.

Treiman

Kessler

Bick

(2002). Context sensitivity in the spelling of English vowels. Journal of Memory and Language, 47(3), 448–468. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0749-596X(02)00010-4

53.

Treutlein

Schöler

Landerl

(2017). Recoding strategies of German learners of English as a foreign language. Reading and Writing, 30(6), 1215–1230. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-016-9719-8

54.

Verhoeven

(2000). Components in early second language reading and spelling. Scientific Studies of Reading, 4(4), 313–330. https://doi.org/10.1207/S1532799XSSR0404_4

55.

Wagner

R. K.

Muse

A. E.

Tannenbaum

K. R.

(2007). Vocabulary acquisition: Implications for reading comprehension. Guilford Press.

56.

Wang

McBride-Chang

Chan

(2014). Correlates of Chinese kindergarteners’ word reading and writing: The unique role of copying skills? Reading and Writing, 27(7), 1281–1302. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-013-9486-8

57.

Wimmer

Mayringer

(2002). Dysfluent reading in the absence of spelling difficulties: A specific disability in regular orthographies. Journal of Educational Psychology, 94(2), 272–277. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.94.2.272

58.

Ziegler

J. C.

Goswami

(2005). Reading acquisition, developmental dyslexia, and skilled reading across languages: A psycholinguistic grain size theory. Psychological Bulletin, 131(1), 3–29. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.131.1.3

59.

Ziegler

J. C.

Pech-Georgel

Dufau

Grainger

(2010). Rapid processing of letters, digits, and symbols: What purely visual-attentional deficit in developmental dyslexia? Developmental Science, 13(4), F8–F14. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2010.00983.x