Contained in:
Book Chapter

La comprensione del testo digitale e cartaceo in età scolare: il ruolo delle Funzioni Esecutive

  • Costanza Ruffini

The use of digital devices in education is increasing. The literature, however, reveals a disadvantage of digital compared to paper in performing specific learning tasks, in particular text comprehension, which is probably sustained by a different cognitive load and a tendency to use digital for superficial and fast reading. The present study investigates possible differences between paper and digital text comprehension in children of school-age by analysing the role of Executive Functions (EF) as mediating factors in performance. 175 children in 3rd, 4th and 5th grade were assessed for text comprehension in the two modes and assessed with EF tests. The results show that there are no differences between digital and paper text comprehension. However, dividing the sample into children with low and children with high levels of text comprehension, the former group is seen to benefit from digital compared to the latter group, which shows an opposite trend. Furthermore, the low performers score worse than high performers in the EF measures which show a mediating role between performance level and differences between paper and digital modes in text comprehension. The present study has important educational implications for the use of digital devices in education.

  • Keywords:
  • Digital,
  • Executive Functions,
  • Paper,
  • School-Age,
  • Text Comprehension,
+ Show More

Costanza Ruffini

University of Florence, Italy - ORCID: 0000-0001-8180-8965

  1. Ackerman Rakefet, and Tirza Lauterman. 2012. “Taking Reading Comprehension Exams on Screen or on Paper? A Metacognitive Analysis of Learning Texts Under Time Pressure.” Computers in Human Behavior 28 (5): 1816-28.
  2. Annisette, Logan E., and Kathryn D. Lafreniere. 2017. “Social Media, Texting, and Personality: A Test of the Shallowing Hypothesis.” Personality and Individual Differences 115: 154-58.
  3. Belacchi, Carmen, Scalisi Teresa G., Cannoni Eleonora, e Cerare Cornoldi. 2008. CPM. Coloured Progressive Matrices. Standardizzazione italiana. Firenze: Giunti Organizzazioni Speciali.
  4. Butterfuss, Reese, and Panayiota Kendeou. 2018. “The Role of Executive Functions in Reading Comprehension.” Educational Psychology Review 30 (3): 801-26.
  5. Carretti, Barbara, Borella Erika, Elosúa Maria R., Gómez-Veiga, I., e Juan A. García-Madruga. 2017. “Improvements in Reading Comprehension Performance After a Training Program Focusing on Executive Processes of Working Memory.” Journal of Cognitive Enhancement 1 (3): 268-79.
  6. Cartwright, Kelly B., and Nell K. Duke. 2019. “The DRIVE Model of Reading: Making the Complexity of Reading Accessible.” The Reading Teacher 73 (1): 7-15.
  7. Clinton, Virginia. 2019. “Reading from Paper Compared to Screens: A Systematic Review and Meta‐Analysis.” Journal of Research in Reading 42 (2): 288-325.
  8. Cornoldi, Cesare, e Barbara Carretti. 2017. Prove MT -3 Clinica. Il test sviluppato da Cesare Cornoldi per la valutazione delle abilità di lettura, comprensione, scrittura e matematica. Firenze: Giunti Psychometrics.
  9. Cornoldi, Cesare, e Giovanni Colpo. 2009. Prove di lettura MT per la scuola elementare2. Firenze: Giunti Organizzazioni Speciali.
  10. Golan, Danielle D., Barzillai Mirit, and Tami Katzir. 2018. “The Effect of Presentation Mode on Children’s Reading Preferences, Performance, and Self-evaluations.” Computers & Education 126: 346-58.
  11. Delgado, Pablo, Vargas Cristina, Ackerman Rakafet, and Ladislao Salmerón. 2018. “Don’t Throw Away Your Printed Books: A Meta-Analysis on the Effects of Reading Media on Reading Comprehension.” Educational Research Review 25: 23-38.
  12. Diamond, Adele. 2013. “Executive Functions.” Annual Review of Psychology 64: 135-68.
  13. Florit, Elena, Cain Kate, and Lucia Mason. 2020. “Going Beyond Children’s Single-text Comprehension: The Role of Fundamental and Higher-level Skills in 4th Graders’ Multiple-Document Comprehension.” British Journal of Educational Psychology 90 (2): 449-72.
  14. Florit, Elena, De Carli Pietro, Rodà Antonio, Domenicale Samantha, and Lucia Mason. 2022. “Precursors of Reading Text Comprehension from Paper and Screen in First Graders: A Longitudinal Study.” Reading and Writing: 1-23.
  15. Follmer, D.J. 2018. “Executive Function and Reading Comprehension: A Meta-Analytic Review.” Educational Psychologist 53 (1): 42-60.
  16. Graesser, Arthur C., and Bruce K. Britton. 1996. Five Metaphors for Text Understanding. In Models of understanding text, edited by Bruce K. Britton, and Arthur C. Graesser, 341-52. Hillsdale: Erlbaum.
  17. Hung, Cathy O.Y. 2021. “The Role of Executive Function in Reading Comprehension among Beginning Readers.” British Journal of Educational Psychology 91 (2): 600-16.
  18. Kong, Yiren, Seo Young S., and Ling Zhai. 2018. “Comparison of Reading Performance on Screen and on Paper: A Meta-Analysis.” Computers & Education 123: 138-49.
  19. Mascheroni, Giovanna, e Kjartan Ólafsson. 2018. Accesso, usi, rischi e opportunità di internet per i ragazzi italiani. I risultati di EU Kids Online 2017. Milano: EU Kids Online e OssCom. <http://globalkidsonline.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/EU-Kids-Online-Italy-report-06-2018.pdf> (2022-12-15).
  20. Miyake, Akira, Friedman Naomi P., Emerson Michael J., Witzki Alexander H., Howerter Amy et al. 2000. “The Unity and Diversity of Executive Functions and their Contributions to Complex “Frontal Lobe” Tasks: A Latent Variable Analysis.” Cognitive Psychology 41 (1): 49-100.
  21. Van Dijk, Teun A., and Walter Kintsch. 1983. Strategies of Discourse Comprehension. New York: Academic Press.
PDF
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Pages: 187-195
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

XML
  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
  • © 2022 Author(s)

Chapter Information

Chapter Title

La comprensione del testo digitale e cartaceo in età scolare: il ruolo delle Funzioni Esecutive

Authors

Costanza Ruffini

Language

Italian

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0081-3.20

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

Esercizi di ricerca

Book Subtitle

Dottorato e politiche per la formazione

Editors

Vanna Boffo, Fabio Togni

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

278

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/979-12-215-0081-3

ISBN Print

979-12-215-0094-3

eISBN (pdf)

979-12-215-0081-3

eISBN (xml)

979-12-215-0082-0

Series Title

Studies on Adult Learning and Education

Series ISSN

2704-596X

Series E-ISSN

2704-5781

112

Fulltext
downloads

80

Views

Export Citation

1,303

Open Access Books

in the Catalogue

1,746

Book Chapters

3,161,365

Fulltext
downloads

3,987

Authors

from 820 Research Institutions

of 63 Nations

63

scientific boards

from 339 Research Institutions

of 43 Nations

1,148

Referees

from 346 Research Institutions

of 37 Nations