College Students' Conditional Knowledge About Reading

Strategic reading requires not only a repertoire of processing strategies but also knowledge about the conditions under which a given strategy is relevant. This study examined college students' conditional knowledge about reading. Subjects sorted descriptions of reading situations according to how they believe they read in each situation. Cluster analyses of the resulting distance matrixes identified 10 distinct categories of reading situations. Ratings of the cognitive demands of the reading situations supported the interpretations of the sorting data and suggested how reading patterns vary across different texts and task demands. The 10 distinct reading categories constitute a first approximation to a typology of reading situations that may serve as a framework for organizing research on reading strategies.