Mediatory Effect of Reading Skill in the Rapid Automatized Naming/Reading Comprehension Relationship

Abstract

This study aims to explore the explanatory and predictive relations between Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) and Reading and Comprehension Skills in a structural model and to examine the mediatory status of reading skills in a possible relationship. The participants of the research were 177 primary school second-grade students (98 girls and 79 boys) attending a state primary school in a city center of the Western Black Sea Region of Turkey. The structural equation modeling was utilized as latent variables were tested in the study, and it allowed for identifying the error in the variables. As the analysis results showed, it is argued that RAN has a directly predictive effect on the reading skill and the reading skill strongly predicts the comprehension skill. It was also seen that the reading skill had a fully mediatory role in the relationship between RAN and comprehension. It can be argued according to the results that students with better RAN performance have better reading skills and students with good reading skills achieve better reading comprehension.