The Morphological Awareness Test for Mainland Chinese School-age Children: Development and Validation of a New Test

Abstract

There is a pressing need for a developmentally appropriate morphological awareness assessment that can be effectively implemented in mainland Chinese elementary classrooms. To address this, we developed the Chinese Morphological Awareness Test (CMAT), specifically designed for mainland Chinese students in Grades 1–6. The CMAT is grounded in developmentally appropriate morphological awareness concepts and can be administered to entire classes. This study evaluated the CMAT with a cohort of 1,544 students across Grades 1–6. The CMAT, designed as a four-factor model, exhibited acceptable reliability and validity. These findings provide initial psychometric support for the CMAT, highlighting its ease of administration and scoring. By filling a critical gap, this tool provides a practical assessment to evaluate morphological awareness in mainland Chinese school-age students, with the potential to inform the development of targeted interventions. The study also discusses the limitations of this tool and suggests directions for future research.

Keywords

morphological awareness assessment elementary school validity reliability

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Abu-Rabia

(2007). The role of morphology and short vowelization in reading Arabic among normal and dyslexic readers in grades 3, 6, 9, and 12. Journal of Psycholinguistic Research, 36(2), 89–106. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-006-9035-6

Amenta

Badan

Brysbaert

(2021). LexITA: A quick and reliable assessment tool for Italian L2 receptive vocabulary size. Applied Linguistics, 42(2), 292–314. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amaa020

Anderson

R. C.

Y.-M.

Chen

Shu

(2013). Learning to see the patterns in Chinese characters. Scientific Studies of Reading, 17(1), 41–56. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2012.689789

Bean

G. J.

Bowen

N. K.

(2021). Item response theory and confirmatory factor analysis: Complementary approaches for scale development. Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work, 18(6), 597–618. https://doi.org/10.1080/26408066.2021.1906813

Brimo

(2016). Evaluating the effectiveness of a morphological awareness intervention: A pilot study. Communication Disorders Quarterly, 38(1), 35–45. https://doi.org/10.1177/1525740115604592

Bryant

F. B.

Yarnold

P. R.

(1995). Principal-components analysis and exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. In Reading and Understanding Multivariate Statistics (pp. 99–136). American Psychological Association.

Casalis

Colé

Sopo

(2004). Morphological awareness in developmental dyslexia. Annals of Dyslexia, 54(1), 114–138. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11881-004-0006-z

Chalmers

R. P.

(2012). mirt: A multidimensional item response theory package for the R environment. Journal of Statistical Software, 48(6), 1–29. https://doi.org/10.18637/jss.v048.i06

Deacon

S. H.

Parrila

Kirby

J. R.

(2008). A Review of the Evidence on Morphological Processing in Dyslexics and Poor Readers: A Strength or Weakness (pp. 212–238). The Sage Handbook of Dyslexia. https://doi.org/10.4135/9780857020987.n11

10.

Deacon

S. H.

Tong

Francis

(2017). The relationship of morphological analysis and morphological decoding to reading comprehension. Journal of Research in Reading, 40(1), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12056

11.

Embretson

S. E.

Diehl

K. A.

(2000). Item response theory. In Kazdin

A. E.

(Ed.), Encyclopedia of psychology (4, pp. 378–380). Oxford University Press.

12.

Georgiou

G. K.

Vieira

A. P. A.

Rothou

K. M.

Kirby

J. R.

Antoniuk

Martinez

Guo

(2023). A meta-analysis of morphological awareness deficits in developmental dyslexia. Scientific Studies of Reading, 27(3), 253–271. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888438.2022.2155524

13.

Han

Koh

P. W.

Zhang

Joshi

R. M.

(2022). The relative contributions of facets of morphological awareness to vocabulary development in Chinese: A longitudinal study in grades one to three. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 69(2022), 102063. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2022.102063

14.

C. S.-H.

T.-T.

W.-K.

(2003). A “radical” approach to reading development in Chinese: The role of semantic radicals and phonetic radicals. Journal of Literacy Research, 35(3), 849–878. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15548430jlr3503_3

15.

C. S.-H.

Wong

Y.-K.

C.-M.

Chan

D. W.

Chung

K. K.-h.

S.-C.

(2014). Helping children with reading disability in Chinese: The response to intervention approach with effective evidence-based curriculum. In Chen

Wang

Luo

Y. C.

(Eds.), Reading development and difficulties in monolingual and bilingual Chinese children (pp. 103–124): Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7380-6_6

16.

Institute of Language Teaching and Research . (1986). A frequency dictionary of modern Chinese: Beijing Language Institute Press.

17.

Koda

(2000). Cross-linguistic variations in L2 morphological awareness. Applied Psycholinguistics, 21(3), 297–320. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0142716400003015

18.

(2020). The reciprocal relation between morphological awareness and spelling in Chinese: A longitudinal study of primary school students. Plos One, 15(12), 0243050. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0243050

19.

(2015). Effects of metalinguistic awareness on reading comprehension and the mediator role of reading fluency from grades 2 to 4. Plos One, 10(3), 0114417. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0114417

20.

Lin

Sun

McBride

(2019). Morphological awareness predicts the growth rate of Chinese character reading. Developmental Science, 22(4), 12793. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.12793

21.

Liu

P. D.

McBride-Chang

(2010). What is morphological awareness? Tapping lexical compounding awareness in Chinese third graders. Journal of Educational Psychology, 102(1), 62–73. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0016933

22.

Liu

P. D.

McBride-Chang

Wong

T. T.-Y.

Shu

Wong

A. M.-Y.

(2013). Morphological awareness in Chinese: Unique associations of homophone awareness and lexical compounding to word reading and vocabulary knowledge in Chinese children. Applied Psycholinguistics, 34(4), 755–775. https://doi.org/10.1017/S014271641200001X

23.

Loevinger

(1957). Objective tests as instruments of psychological theory. Psychological Reports, 3(3), 635–694. https://doi.org/10.2466/pr0.1957.3.3.635

24.

Marks

R. A.

Eggleston

Kovelman

(2024). Brain bases of morphological awareness and longitudinal word reading outcomes. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 238(2024), 105802. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2023.105802

25.

McBride-Chang

Shu

Zhou

Wat

C. P.

Wagner

R. K.

(2003). Morphological awareness uniquely predicts young children’s Chinese character recognition. Journal of Educational Psychology, 95(4), 743–751. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.95.4.743

26.

Meguellati

Samia

Ferhat

Djelloul

(2024). A critical analysis of the use of classical test theory (CTT) in psychological testing: A comparison with item response theory (IRT). Pakistan Journal of Life & Social Sciences, 22(2), 00715. https://doi.org/10.57239/PJLSS-2024-22.2.00715

27.

Messick

(1995). Validity of psychological assessment: Validation of inferences from persons’ responses and performances as scientific inquiry into score meaning. American Psychologist, 50(9), 741–749. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.50.9.741

28.

Ministry of Education of China . (2022). Compulsory education Chinese language curriculum standards: Ministry of Education, People’s Republic of China.

29.

Mousavi

Cui

(2020). The effect of person misfit on item parameter estimation and classification accuracy: A simulation study. Education Sciences, 10(11), 324. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10110324

30.

Pang

Son

(2024). The relationship between morphological awareness and reading comprehension among early grade Chinese children with reading difficulties: A path analysis. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 77(2024), 102268. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2024.102268

31.

Peng

Wang

Tao

Sun

(2017). The deficit profiles of Chinese children with reading difficulties: A meta-analysis. Educational Psychology Review, 29(3), 513–564. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-016-9366-2

32.

Qiao

Liu

Yeung

S. S.-s.

(2021). Mechanisms by which morphological awareness contributes to Chinese and English reading comprehension. Journal of Research in Reading, 44(1), 189–209. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9817.12345

33.

Relkin

de Ruiter

Bers

M. U.

(2020). TechCheck: Development and validation of an unplugged assessment of computational thinking in early childhood education. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 29(4), 482–498. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10956-020-09831-x

34.

Shi

Mao

Nie

Geng

Chen

(2022). Development and validation of the health-related quality of life instrument for Chinese infertile couples: A mixed-methods study protocol. Health and Quality of Life Outcomes, 20(1), 54. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12955-022-01957-3

35.

Shu

Anderson

R. C.

(1997). Role of radical awareness in the character and word acquisition of Chinese children. Reading Research Quarterly, 32(1), 78–89. https://doi.org/10.1598/RRQ.32.1.5

36.

Shu

McBride-Chang

Liu

(2006). Understanding Chinese developmental dyslexia: Morphological awareness as a core cognitive construct. Journal of Educational Psychology, 98(1), 122–133. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.98.1.122

37.

Siegel

L. S.

(2008). Morphological awareness skills of English language learners and children with dyslexia. Topics in Language Disorders, 28(1), 15–27. https://doi.org/10.1097/01.adt.0000311413.75804.60

38.

Smith

E. V.

(2004). Evidence for the reliability of measures and validity of measure interpretation: A Rasch measurement perspective. In Smith

E. V.

Smith

M. K.

(Eds.), Introduction to Rasch measurement: Theory, models and application (pp. 93–122). JAM Press.

39.

Tabachnik

B. G.

Fidell

L. S.

(2001). Using multivariate statistics (4th ed.). Allyn & Bacon.

40.

Tong

McBride

(2017). Unpacking the relation between morphological awareness and Chinese word reading: Levels of morphological awareness and vocabulary. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 48, 167–178. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2016.07.003

41.

Wang

K. C.

Wong

W. L.

Siu

T. S. C.

McBride

Chung

K. K. H.

Wong

P. C. M.

Maurer

(2021). Remediation of a phonological representation deficit in Chinese children with dyslexia: A comparison between metalinguistic training and working memory training. Developmental Science, 24(3), 13065. https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.13065

42.

Wang

L.-C.

Liu

(2025). The moderation effect of morphological awareness on the relationship between word detection skills and reading comprehension in Chinese children with and without dyslexia. British Educational Research Journal, 51(1), 244–258. https://doi.org/10.1002/berj.4073

43.

Webb

Sasao

Ballance

(2017). The updated vocabulary levels test: Developing and validating two new forms of the VLT. ITL - International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 168(1), 33–69. https://doi.org/10.1075/itl.168.1.02web

44.

Wenling

Anderson

R. C.

Nagy

Houcan

(2002). Facets of metalinguistic awareness that contribute to Chinese literacy. In Wenling

Gaffney

J. S.

Packard

J. L.

(Eds.), Chinese children’s reading acquisition: Theoretical and pedagogical issues (pp. 87–106). Springer US. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-0859-5_5

45.

West

Finch

J. F.

Curran

P. J.

(1995). Structural equation models with nonnormal variables: Problems and remedies. In Hoyle

R. H.

(Ed.), Structural equation modeling: Concepts, issues, and applications (pp. 56–75). Sage.

46.

Wetzels

Matzke

Lee

M. D.

Rouder

J. N.

Iverson

G. J.

Wagenmakers

E.-J.

(2011). Statistical evidence in experimental Psychology: An empirical comparison using 855 t tests. Perspectives on Psychological Science: A Journal of the Association for Psychological Science, 6(3), 291–298. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691611406923

47.

Wright

B. D.

Masters

G. N.

(1982). Rating scale analysis. MESA Press.

48.

Anderson

R. C.

Zhang

Zheng

Zhu

Shu

Jiang

Chen

Wang

Yin

Packard

Gaffney

J. S.

(2009). Morphological awareness and Chinese children’s literacy development: An intervention study. Scientific Studies of Reading, 13(1), 26–52. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888430802631734

49.

Xie

Zhang

Nguyen

T. P.

(2019). The relationship between morphological awareness and reading comprehension among Chinese children. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 54. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00054

50.

Xiong

Zhao

(2020). Cognitive intervention of Chinese children with developmental dyslexia. Advances in Psychology, 10(8), 1286–1294. https://doi.org/10.12677/ap.2020.108151

51.

Zhang

Sun

Bianglae

Widiawati

(2024). The development of a Chinese vocabulary proficiency test (CVPT) for learners of Chinese as a second/foreign language. Language Testing, 41(2), 412–442. https://doi.org/10.1177/02655322231219998

52.

Zhang

Sun

P. P.

Zhang

Fan

Zhang

(2023). A systematic review of Chinese character size tests from 1930 to 2021. Sage Open, 13(3), 21582440231185699. https://doi.org/10.1177/21582440231185699

53.

Zhao

Cheng

(2019). Contributions of morphological awareness and rapid automatized naming (RAN) to Chinese children’s reading comprehension versus reading fluency: Evidence from a longitudinal mediation model. Reading and Writing, 32(8), 2013–2036. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11145-019-09935-w

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

0.00 MB

0.47 MB