Validating a Reading Comprehension Assessment for College Students: Preliminary Findings

The purpose of this study was to validate a novel reading comprehension assessment for college students named MOCCA-College. A random sample of college students (N = 63, average age of 22.5) were recruited from various education programs (e.g., first-year courses, TRIO, SONA) and completed MOCCA-College Online and were later recruited to complete face-to-face think-aloud and recall tasks, as well as standardized assessments such as the Nelson-Denny Reading Test (NDRT) and the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (TOWRE-2). Based on the think-aloud findings, correct answers on MOCCA-College were associated with meaningful connections to background knowledge. Incorrect answers were associated with irrelevant connections to background knowledge that are not helpful for comprehension. Moreover, efficiency on MOCCA-College (seconds per correct answer) demonstrated criterion validity based on the NDRT and TOWRE-2. Future research and analyses may examine assessment development, particularly for identifying nuanced individual differences in college readers’ comprehension.

• Publication year

  2025

• Venue

  Journal of Psycholinguistic Research

• Publication date

  2025-05-03

• Fields of study

  Medicine, Education

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1007/s10936-025-10144-6PMID 40317340PMCID 12049318
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

• MOCCA-College: Preliminary Validity Evidence of a Cognitive Diagnostic Reading Comprehension Assessment

  2022cited by this paper
• Factors That Influence Skilled and Less-Skilled Comprehenders’ Inferential Processing During and After Reading

  2022cited by this paper
• Controlling speed in component skills of reading improves the explanation of reading comprehension.

  2021cited by this paper
• Automaticity as an independent trait in predicting reading outcomes in middle-school.

  2021cited by this paper
• The Role of Surface Text Processing in Centrality Deficit and Poor Text Comprehension of Adolescents with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: A Think–Aloud Study

  2021cited by this paper
• Test of Word Reading Efficiency, Second Edition

  2020influential reference
• Semantic Analysis

  2020cited by this paper
• Processing and Memory of Central and Peripheral Ideas in Reading Comprehension by Poor Comprehenders

  2020cited by this paper
• Is Retell a Valid Measure of Reading Comprehension?

  2020cited by this paper
• Testing the inference mediation hypothesis in a post-secondary context

  2020cited by this paper
• Trades-Based Literacy: Community College Faculty’s Exploration of Disciplinary Literacy

  2020cited by this paper
• Relations Between Component Reading Skills, Inferences, and Comprehension Performance in Community College Readers

  2020cited by this paper
• Essential but Invisible: Collegiate Academic Reading Explored from the Faculty Perspective

  2020cited by this paper
• MOCCA College: An assessment of inferential narrative and expository comprehension

  2020influential reference
• A Comparison of Comprehension Accuracy and Rate: Repeated Readings and Listening While Reading in Second-Grade Students

  2019cited by this paper
• Constructing Subscores That Add Validity: A Case Study of Identifying Students at Risk

  2019cited by this paper
• How do students process complex formative feedback in question-answering tasks? A think-aloud study

  2019cited by this paper
• Improving the Predictive Validity of Reading Comprehension Using Response Times of Correct Item Responses

  2019cited by this paper
• Revisiting the Construction—Integration Model of Text Comprehension and its Implications for Instruction

  2018cited by this paper
• Bayesian Inference for Kendall’s Rank Correlation Coefficient

  2018cited by this paper
• The Comprehension Problems of Children With Poor Reading Comprehension Despite Adequate Decoding: A Meta-Analysis

  2018cited by this paper
• Knowledge revision through the lenses of the three-pronged approach

  2018cited by this paper
• The emergence of automaticity in reading: Effects of orthographic depth and word decoding ability on an adjusted Stroop measure.

  2018cited by this paper
• Profiles of young readers: Evidence from thinking aloud while reading narrative and expository texts

  2018cited by this paper
• Academic Reading: Comparing Students’ and Faculty Perceptions of Its Value, Practice, and Pedagogy

  2018cited by this paper
• Preliminary Findings on the Computer-Administered Multiple-Choice Online Causal Comprehension Assessment, a Diagnostic Reading Comprehension Test

  2018cited by this paper
• Changing Demographics and Needs Assessment for Learning Centers in the 21st Century.

  2017cited by this paper
• Using think-aloud protocol in self-regulated reading research

  2017cited by this paper
• Processing of expository and narrative texts by low- and high-comprehending children

  2017cited by this paper
• Cognitive Processes in Discourse Comprehension: Passive Processes, Reader-Initiated Processes, and Evolving Mental Representations

  2017cited by this paper
• Effects of Task Relevance Instructions and Topic Beliefs on Reading Processes and Memory

  2017cited by this paper
• When Do Comprehender Groups Differ? A Moment-by-Moment Analysis of Think-Aloud Protocols of Good and Poor Comprehenders

  2017cited by this paper
• Effects of Social-Cognitive Processing Demands and Structural Importance on Narrative Recall: Differences Between Children, Adolescents, and Adults

  2016cited by this paper
• Reading Comprehension

  2016cited by this paper
• Can Scores on an Interim High School Reading Assessment Accurately Predict Low Performance on College Readiness Exams? REL 2016-124.

  2016cited by this paper
• Comprehension processes and outcomes with refutation and expository texts and their contribution to learning

  2016cited by this paper
• Training Inference Making Skills Using a Situation Model Approach Improves Reading Comprehension

  2016cited by this paper
• Accurate reading comprehension rate as an indicator of broad reading in students in first, second, and third grades.

  2015cited by this paper
• Inferential processing among adequate and struggling adolescent comprehenders and relations to reading comprehension

  2015cited by this paper
• Text-Processing Differences in Adolescent Adequate and Poor Comprehenders Reading Accessible and Challenging Narrative and Informational Text.

  2015cited by this paper
• A general inference skill

  2015cited by this paper
• Development, Discouragement, or Diversion? New Evidence on the Effects of College Remediation Policy

  2015cited by this paper
• 1 Comprehending implicit meanings in text without making inferences

  2015cited by this paper
• Inferences during Reading: Inference generation in text comprehension: automatic and strategic processes in the construction of a mental representation

  2015cited by this paper
• Are there gender differences in the cognitive components of adult reading comprehension

  2014cited by this paper
• The Interplay of Reader Goals, Working Memory, and Text Structure During Reading.

  2014cited by this paper
• Development of a new reading comprehension assessment: Identifying comprehension differences among readers

  2014influential reference
• Coh-Metrix Measures Text Characteristics at Multiple Levels of Language and Discourse

  2014cited by this paper
• Making Connections: Linking Cognitive Psychology and Intervention Research to Improve Comprehension of Struggling Readers

  2014influential reference
• A Cognitive View of Reading Comprehension: Implications for Reading Difficulties

  2014cited by this paper
• Gender Differences in Inference Generation by Fourth-Grade Students.

  2014cited by this paper
• Automated Evaluation of Text and Discourse with Coh-Metrix: What Is Text and Why Analyze It?

  2014cited by this paper
• Completing College: Rethinking Institutional Action

  2014cited by this paper
• Interest, Inferences, and Learning from Texts.

  2012cited by this paper
• Variance in Broad Reading Accounted for by Measures of Reading Speed Embedded Within Maze and Comprehension Rate Measures

  2012cited by this paper
• Making the right connections: Differential effects of reading intervention for subgroups of comprehenders

  2012influential reference
• Interrater reliability: the kappa statistic

  2012influential reference
• glm2: Fitting Generalized Linear Models with Convergence Problems

  2011cited by this paper
• Do procedures for verbal reporting of thinking have to be reactive? A meta-analysis and recommendations for best reporting methods.

  2011cited by this paper
• Comprehension and Learning from Refutation and Expository Texts.

  2011cited by this paper
• Decoding, vocabulary and comprehension: The golden triangle of reading skill

  2010cited by this paper
• Poor Metacomprehension Accuracy as a Result of Inappropriate Cue Use

  2010cited by this paper
• A Motivational Perspective on Engagement and Disaffection

  2009cited by this paper
• Reading between the lines: Developmental and individual differences in Cognitive processes in reading comprehension.

  2009cited by this paper
• Applied Regression Analysis and Generalized Linear Models

  2008cited by this paper
• The effects of prior knowledge and text structure on comprehension processes during reading of scientific texts

  2007cited by this paper
• Higher-Order Comprehension Processes in Struggling Readers: A Perspective for Research and Intervention

  2007cited by this paper
• The Effects of Readers' Misconceptions on Comprehension of Scientific Text

  2005cited by this paper
• Relations Between Adolescents' Text Processing and Reasoning

  2005cited by this paper
• SERT: Self-Explanation Reading Training

  2004cited by this paper
• Fluency and Comprehension Gains as a Result of Repeated Reading

  2004cited by this paper
• Fluency and Comprehension Gains as a Result of Repeated Reading

  2004cited by this paper
• Assessing Reading Skill With a Think-Aloud Procedure and Latent Semantic Analysis

  2003cited by this paper
• The effects of reading purpose and working memory capacity on the processing of expository text.

  2002cited by this paper
• The effects of readers’ goals on inference generation and memory for texts

  2001influential reference
• Comprehension: A Paradigm for Cognition

  1998cited by this paper
• Students making sense of informational text: Relations between processing and representation

  1998cited by this paper
• AUTOMATICITY AND INFERENCE GENERATION DURING READING COMPREHENSION

  1997cited by this paper
• Discourse comprehension.

  1997cited by this paper
• THE IMPORTANCE OF AUTOMATICITY FOR DEVELOPING EXPERTISE IN READING

  1997influential reference
• Completing the College

  1996cited by this paper
• Children's and adults' memory for television stories: the role of causal factors, story-grammar categories, and hierarchical level.

  1996cited by this paper
• Comprehension and memory of narrative texts: Inferences and coherence.

  1994cited by this paper
• The Time-Course of Constructing Knowledge-Based Inferences for Scientific Texts

  1994cited by this paper
• Constructing inferences during narrative text comprehension.

  1994cited by this paper
• Protocol analysis: Verbal reports as data, Rev. ed.

  1993cited by this paper
• The role of knowledge in discourse comprehension: a construction-integration model.

  1988cited by this paper
• Causal thinking and the representation of narrative events

  1985influential reference
• Protocol Analysis: Verbal Reports as Data

  1984cited by this paper
• Rank Correlation Methods

  1981cited by this paper

• No citing papers are available for this paper.