Self-reported reading as a predictor of vocabulary knowledge.

25 engineering students in India, who were highly motivated to improve their English, filled out a questionnaire about their reading habits in English and took a demanding vocabulary test based on words taken from preparation books for the Graduate Records Examination. The correlation between reading habits and vocabulary was substantial (r = .78).

Does "pure" phonemic awareness training affect reading comprehension?

The six studies found concerning the effect of pure phonemic awareness training (without phonics) on reading comprehension gave a positive but modest overall effect size in favor of phonemic awareness training. Four studies had small samples, two showed no or very small effect sizes, and one inconsistent results. Three involved languages other than English. Such results do not support the popular movement for universal phonemic awareness training.

Bipolar manic-depressives and unipolar depressives distinguished by tests of lateral asymmetry.

Tests of lateral asymmetry in hand preference and superiority in thumb opposition rotation (opposing the thumb's pulp surface to that of the little finger) have been applied to bipolar and unipolar affective patients in an attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of these tests in differentiating the bipolar and unipolar patient populations. Two comparison samples were also tested: nonpsychotic central nervous system (CNS) disease patients, and normal controls. The normals divided almost evenly into pure dominance (e.g., right-handed, and superior right thumb opposition) and cross-dominance (e.g., right-handed, but superior left thumb opposition). All but one of the CNS disease patients were cross-dominant; the bipolars were predominantly pure dominant; while the unipolars, in contrast to the pure dominant bipolars, were in the majority cross-dominant. This result is consistent with the view that there are two types of affective disorder, bipolar manic-depressive and unipolar depressive illness.