Abstract
Japanese English as a foreign language (EFL) readers, especially less proficient readers, reportedly have difficulties in predictive inference generation. The present study examined factors that would make it difficult for them to generate predictive inferences. Four versions of each story, which have a contrasting nature with a different storyline rather than different linguistic difficulty levels, were prepared to examine the textual influences on predictive inference generation via a probe word recognition (Experiment 1) and think-aloud (Experiment 2) tasks. The results of Experiment 1 showed that response time (RT) did not make a significant difference among four story versions. The results indicated that even when using text that can easily generate predictive inferences, it is difficult for Japanese EFL readers to generate them. To examine why Japanese EFL readers have difficulty in generating predictive inferences, we analyzed their cognitive processes during reading through the think-aloud task. The results of Experiment 2 demonstrated that the participants produced varied reader responses based on their impressions during the reading in all the story versions. The findings suggest that impression formation that does not facilitate the generation of predictive inferences may serve as a potential disincentive for their production by readers.
