Cohen, M. , Mahé, G. , Laganaro, M. & Zesiger, P.
University of Geneva
The Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) task consists in naming as fast as possible a set of visually presented items. It has aroused great interest among researchers because of its reliable relationship with reading. The RAN-reading relationship is known to be influenced by task format (i.e., serial or discrete) and stimuli type (i.e., alphanumeric vs. non-alphanumeric). Furthermore, in the serial RAN, pause time is more strongly related to reading than articulation time. In this study, we investigated the mediation of the RAN-reading relationship by task format, stimuli type and response time type. Sixty-three French-speaking children aged 7 to 10 years took part to the experiment. They performed three reading tasks (serial and discrete word reading, and text reading) and four RAN tasks (serial and discrete with pictures and letters). The results show that: a) the mediation of the RAN-reading relationship by task format is observed only in older children; b) picture RAN is as reliable as letter RAN to predict reading skills, independently of age; and c) articulation time is more strongly correlated to reading skills in French. These results advocate for caution in the selection of task format as a function of children's age in the assessment of reading.